MOTnews 32 (04/04/2002)

New at the MOT

The summer season is approaching and the three sections of the museum are open again every weekend from the first weekend in April (from 2.00 p.m. to 6.00 p.m.). We have a whole host of new elements for the public at the start of this season.

First of all, from now on you can't miss the MOT. Three brand new information pillars stand waiting to greet you at the three buildings. The three pillars make the Museum more easily identifiable in the Grimbergen region and provide visitors with all the practical details they need (opening hours, prices, which exhibitions can be seen, etc.). Feel free to send us an e-mail to info@mot.be and let us have your opinion of the pillars.

We have also been thinking about the inner person. On the first and third Saturday every month, the museum baker will be baking bread in a real wood oven. But you'll have to be quick, because his loaves virtually fly through the door. However, as baking is only part of the whole process from grain to bread, we are combining this baking demonstration with a milling demonstration. This means that visitors can see first hand how grain is ground in a real watermill (Liermolen section).

We have not forgotten our 'smaller' visitors, either. On the same days (1st and 3rd Saturdays in the month), the children's bread exhibition is free of charge. Little imps aged between 6 and 12 can have a great time with this interactive exhibition that combines learning with fun in the classroom at the Liermolen (exhibition texts only available in Dutch).

The last change concerns the opening hours during the week. From this season on, the MOT is open on weekdays from 9.00 a.m. to 5.00 p.m. instead of from 9.00 a.m. to 4.00 p.m. We hope this will give visitors all the time they need to visit the exhibitions.

TRUE or FALSE

A compass always points North.

True or false? Find out in the next MOT News.

ANSWER to TRUE or FALSE in MOT NEWS 31 (08/03/2002)

Herbal remedies.

Severe toothache can drive you to distraction. In the past, people had countless remedies for toothache, one of which was to put a clove against the sore tooth. This wasn't a bad idea, because cloves contain a natural pain-killer that is still used today by dentists as an anaesthetic.

TRUE

Cloves, like those you use in the kitchen, are the buds of the clove tree, a small evergreen tree that grows mainly in the Antilles. They are shaped like a nail and contain an essential oil with a very high content (85 to 92%) of the substance 'eugenol'. Owing to their eugenol content, cloves are sometimes used as a disinfectant with a slight (local) anaesthetic effect in certain medicines.

Externally, clove (oil) is used as a antiseptic and soothing agent for toothache.

SAY WHAT?

In this MOT-news item we try to explain proverbs and sayings that have their roots in our technical history. Similar proverbs are found in different languages, but each language has it's own typical sayings. Therefore we do not translate this item in English.

KIDS-news: something to tell the children this evening

Vikings, ships and sails.

You may already have seen a picture of an old Viking ship. They look as if they are very simple boats, but these sturdy seafarers sailed as far as North America or the Mediterranean in them. That's quite a distance, so you wonder what these boats were like. We can tell you something about the sails to be going on with. The home of the Vikings, in the extreme north, was pretty cold and very few plants grew there whose fibres could be used to weave cloth. However, there were a lot of animals with big furry coats to protect them from the cold, so the Vikings used wool to make their sails, rather than plant fibres.

The outer long hairs of the sheepskin were used for the warp of the fabric and the softer inner hairs for the weft. To make the sails waterproof, they coated them in tar and grease.

These simple-looking sails carried the Vikings farther across the sea than any other people until then and gave them their reputation as famous (and infamous) seafarers. You can find out more about the Vikings on this very amusing website, produced entirely by a strict Viking lady: http://www.vikinganswerlady.org.