It’s vacation time. With the weather playing spoilsport, many of us are forced to stay indoors. But this is the best time to step into some of the interesting museums in the city that are often overlooked by residents. Here are five of the many museums that are off the beaten track.
Keralam – Museum of History and Heritage
Housed in Park View, a heritage building that was once the home of the chief secretaries of erstwhile Travancore, this museum offers a glimpse into Kerala’s antiquity. An imposing pair of canons, believed to have been Tipu Sultan’s, excavated from Perumthottam temple in Kannur, graces the courtyard of the museum, along with a horse-drawn cart used by British gentry in the city. Step inside and you’ll find eight themed galleries that will transport you to Kerala’s rich past. The display on the iron age, featuring tools and vessels such as an iron implement from a megalithic site in Nedumangad and several burial urns from Vallikunnu, Malappuram, are worth close study. The museum’s impressive collection of coins, from Roman dinari that prove Kerala’s maritime contacts with the Roman Empire, to those imprinted with the conch seal of Travancore, will make any numismatist envious. Equally impressive is a selection of palm-leaf texts. The top floor of the museum is dedicated to Kerala’s artistic and architectural heritage, featuring displays of murals, Theyyam masks, Kalamezhuthu, musical instruments, a replica of a traditional Kerala temple and a nalukettu. Dotted around the museum, particularly in the corridors, are sculptures of wood and stone, such as a Ganesha, dating back to the 9th century, a wooden statute of Yoga Narasimhamurthy (14th century) and a 16th century sculpture of Nataraja. All the items on display have been properly labelled and if you need extra information you just need to tap on the touch-screen kiosks to be found in each room.
Location: Park View, Opposite Museum main entrance
Entry fee: Rs. 20
Timings: 10 a.m. to 5.30 p.m. (closed Mondays and public holidays)
The Chacha Nehru Children’s Museum
One feels as if one has stepped into a magical land where childhood memories are revived. There are those large plastic dolls one played with as a child and those delicate porcelain figurines one admired but were warned not to touch. Gen Y kids will have reason to cheer too as Mickey Mouse and Batman grin from shelves. Unfortunately, one can only see and not touch any of the displays. Founded in 1972 by R. Kesavan Nair, former secretary of Kerala State Council for Child Welfare, The Chacha Nehru Children’s Museum has a rich display of dolls of various sizes and shapes, puppets, tribal masks and more.
There is a room dedicated to stamps at the museum. The science corner is for children with an inquisitive mind – the ‘ladder to hell’ and the ‘ulta pulta chair’ are sure to be hits with them.
Location: Kerala State Council for Child Welfare, Thycaud. Next to Gandhi Bhavan
Entry fee: Rs. 5 (per child), Rs. 15 (per adult); there are discounted rates for groups.
Timings: 10 a.m. to 5.00 p.m. (closed on second Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays)
State Soil Museum
‘I am your soil. Please touch, feel and conserve me’. This message welcomes you to the cool confines of the State Soil Museum at Parottukonam, the first one in the country and perhaps the largest in the world. Through the 82 soil monoliths on display, visitors get to know about the kinds of soil seen in all 14 districts of the state. Soil monoliths are vertical sections of soil taken from a region, preserved as it appears on the landscape, and mounted on a board for display. If the Vellayani series is deep red in colour, the Aruppur series of Chittur in Palakkad district is black, while Battuvady series in Wayanad is pinkish grey in colour. The museum, set up by the Department of Soil Survey and Conservation, displays prominent rocks and minerals, and geological and mineral maps of Kerala. The Soil Information Centre exhibits soil survey tools, model of a watershed, along with soil and water conservation measures.
Location: Central Soil Analytical Laboratory, Parottukonam
Entry fee: Rs. 5 (school students), Rs. 10 (college students), Rs. 20 (others)
Timing: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. (on all working days)
Survey Museum
It is a journey back in time, with circumferentor, pantographs and theodolites. They are among the old survey equipment exhibited at Survey Museum, housed at ‘Thayillam’ at Survey Bhavan, Vazhuthacaud. The Survey office has been functioning in this building since 1865. Prior to that it used to be a Brahmin illam . The equipment and instruments trace the evolution of surveying in Kerala. NC Scriber, which were used to create or change drawings, hand press, binoculars, trough compass, tracing table, dumpy level, optical square, meter chains, its predecessor Gunter’s Chain, and English and French pantographs are among the exhibits, along with modern equipment such as electronic distance machine and total stations. Another attraction is the stone litho press, which was used to make maps. The present-day machine which uses fairly easy method is also displayed.
The museum has maps of erstwhile Travancore state, survey records and a library exclusively for books related to survey. Minutes of the first meeting of the Sree Moolam Popular Assembly in 1901 and gazettes of Travancore state have been preserved.
Location: Survey Bhavan, Vazhuthacaud
Entry fee: Free
Timings: Office hours on all working days
Maharaja Swathi Thirunal Palace Museum (Kuthiramalika Palace)
Built in the early 1840s by King-composer Swati Thirunal, Maharaja of erstwhile Travancore, this expansive palace, next to the Sree Padmanabhaswamy Temple is a tribute to Kerala architecture. There are intricate wood carvings, with entire facades, railings, pillars, and ceilings often created out of a single piece of wood. The palace itself gets its name from 122 wooden horses ( kuthira ) – representing 122 blood vessels in the human body, according to the tour guide – that are carved into the wooden wall brackets that support the southern roof of the palace. Inside the palace are innumerable artefacts and paintings dating back to Swati Tirunal’s era and beyond such as a set of life-size Kathakali statues made of teak wood, a throne of Bohemian crystals and another made of ivory, idols of Sree Padmanabhaswamy and other deities made of pure white Italian marble, crystal chandeliers, armaments, and the likes. Visitors are allowed into the palace only in groups with minimum five persons. So if you are going by yourself, particularly in the afternoon, it may involve a bit of a wait. The guided tour inside the 20 dimly-lit, stuffy rooms (of the 80 in the palace) that is open to the public takes about 45 minutes.
Location: Near East Nada, Sree Padmanabhaswamy Temple
Entry fee: Rs. 20
Timings: 8.30 a.m. to 12.30 p.m.; 3 p.m. to 4.45 p.m. (Closed on Mondays)
