Hello I'm Rich Brown and this is my personal website and blog. I'm just your simple, average, down to earth, professional, out gay man and aspiring circuit boy, living in Phoenix, Arizona with a few things to say while trying to find my place among all the scary, conservative, religious nuts in this sick and twisted world.
Monday, February 12, 2007
Body Worlds 3 At The Arizona Science Center
The controversial anatomical exhibition of real human bodies is currently on display at the Arizona Science Center here in Phoenix. This display is something that I thought would be very interesting to see, but never imagined I would have the opportunity to see it soon, so as you can imagine when I found out it was coming to Phoenix, I immediately wanted to go.
As luck would have it, Andrea knows the President & CEO of the Arizona Science center, so she was given the opportunity to purchase tickets for a group of us to go on Saturday afternoon.
Mark, Andrea, Don, Kris, Philip, Jerry, Justin and I headed up to the Science Center around 1 PM for our time slot. After arriving I was immediately astonished at the line of people that stretched out the door and around to the side of the Science Center. I think Andrea best put it when she said that she was proud of Phoenix for supporting this event and coming out. Thankfully since Andrea has pre-purchased the tickets, we were able to bypass the line and go right inside. After a small wait and a few difficulties we finally arrived inside the main lobby of the exhibit.
At first it was a little eerie as you were presented with pieces of bones, joints and organs, as well as full body plastinates revealing the amazing construction of the human body. Walking in the crowd was almost silent, even though it was incredibly crowded. I quickly immersed myself in into the exhibit and the accompanying audio which narrated the exhibits. I lost track of everyone else in our group for a while as I studied the plastinate bodies, organs, bones and image slices. It was all so fascinating to me.
Of all the items at this exhibit there were 2 which especially caught my attention. The first being the display of a healthy lung next to a smokers lung. The smokers lung was almost completely black and appears to be almost like a large lump of coal in the glass case. It was the clearest display of the damage smoking does to your body that I've ever seen. After seeing the display I was really glad that I don't smoke. The 2ND display of the exhibit which really moved me was something called the Orthopaedic Woman. It was a female body which had examples of the most common orthopaedic surgeries which take place. This plastinate had a hip replacement, and elbow replacement, arm braces, jaw braces and more. It was an amazing display of the possibilities of modern medicine. I was really blown away by the realization of how much effort it is for these doctors to replace damaged body parts, and I gained a new respect for the surgeons who are capable enough to perform such complex surgeries.
Towards the middle of the exhibit I found Mark and we finished up the displays together. The rest of the crew was a bit faster then us and were waiting at the end of the exhibit. It was a very informative and educational exhibit, and while it has drawn much controversy over the years, it was definitely worth seeing.
