The Space Age Museum posted a couple of days ago and the one you're about to read about make one wonder if a museum is really a museum if it isn't available for people to see. Mike Powell and Jürgen Horn heard about a museum at Hanoi University, but found it locked. However, it wasn't exactly off-limits, so they arranged for a private showing. It seems like a case of no one really cares much about seeing it. But to a first-time visitor, the Zoological Museum of Hanoi University is a treasure.
The effort was worthwhile, as this collection is fantastic for all the right reasons … and all of the wrong ones, as well. Fans of shoddy taxidermy will be in heaven. There are three rooms, mostly featuring mammals who were stuffed and embalmed by the French at the turn of the century, and the creatures look their age.
There are jars with lizards, penguins, scowling baby leopards, half-rotting monkeys, dozens of mounted heads, and even a baby elephant. The museum is small, but it manages to pack a lot in, and took longer to get through than we had expected. And it’s really entertaining… we felt bad laughing at some of the more comical corpses, but couldn’t help ourselves.
Take a tour in pictures and video of the Zoological Museum of Hanoi University at For 91 Days.