Yesterday was a pretty big day for me. I had my orientation @ the Gap and I attended the sneak preview of the King Tut exhibit @ the AGO. I don't really have much to say about the orientation, aside from sharing my joy @ watching training videos. I love those - and, by gar, it's been a while since I've worked for a company large enough to have them. Unfortunately, these videos weren't really high-larious enough to be cheese-tastic...parts of them were funny in a legit way. They showed clips of the SNL Gap girls [Chris Farley, Adam Sandler and David Spade] and other comedians poking fun @ the Gap [including when Dave turned his control room into a Gap] in addition to showing some real-life Gap TV spots from the 70s [groo-vy]. I think it's clever that they show new employees that they are self-aware enough to have some LOLs @ their own expense.
So, after working and killing some time in the millions of shopping malls that all interconnect to the building I now work in [I think I will have to stop bringing my wallet as the urge to spend is too overwhelming - at least yesterday I got some deep discounts on a CD that I've been waiting since forever to buy and a video game] I made my way to the AGO to stand in line with many other staff and volunteers for my chance to see some of King Tut's stuff. Hmmm...I know that people will think that I'm just being my standard Bitter Betty self by saying that I didn't like it, but I really have some legit reasons for feeling this way. It's true that I know a bit about ancient Egypt, so maybe my expectations were too high...but it's completely underwhelming. Today I was searching for some critical reviews [FYI - I can't find any reviews of substance - all of them just seem to be sucking up to potential touristicos] and I found that one reviewer put it better than I could - they said that this exhibit is taking it's cues from the spirit of Las Vegas [I thought it seemed like the Disney-fied version of ancient Egypt, but the Las Vegas comparison is apt...apt I say!]. The entrance to the exhibit has this cheese-tastic door that swings open as if by forces unseen [everyone who was entering with me - about 50 people - just cracked right up @ this point - not a great sign]...there are fake columns and stone archways throughout the exhibit [and these are lit as though they are objects of significance...not polystyrene artifacts]. I found the exhibit lacking in both content and explanation [even with the audio guide]. With the exception of two big [partial] statues [the Akhenaten one is particularly glorious], the exhibit seems small [unless you like fake columns?] and lacks the ostentatiousness that one associates with ancient Egypt [at least, I associate that]. Hearing Harrison Ford on the audio guide was fun, but the other guy...I can do without. In addition to his highly questionable views, he's just annoying to listen to and I ended up skipping or just tuning him out. I also question the validity of referring to ancient Egypt as a supernatural sort of society...it wasn't really viewed as magic so much as it was their religion [in 2000 years how would our society feel about referring to our religions as magic?]. There's also so much going on in the exhibition space - lots of different lighting is employed and there are video screens all over - it's a lot of sounds going on and you can hear the screens while you're in other parts of the exhibit...in addition to ambient music, that's a lot of noise pollution.
There's lots more I could say, but I could bore anyone to tears on ancient Egypt...so I will shut up for now. However...if we can reflect back to a couple of weeks ago when I went out for a job in the retail shop of the King Tut exhibit and I was rather gracelessly turned down. I had the misfortune of being shuttled through the shop on the way out. To show how Tut-wild the local media has gone - there is even a positive review of this shop! It was, by far, one of the tackiest gift shops I've ever been in. Especially when compared with the quite lovely shopAGO - stocked with jewellery and prints and books - all of a nice quality. There are few words that can fully capture the tacky nature of this shop, but I will try with the use of one of their own items...they are selling a stuffed toy Cleo-CAT-ra. And! TUT-ty Bears! And oh, so much more. In some small way, this kinda makes up for me not being good enough to work there. At least, at the Gap - I like their clothes...I'm not sure I could successfully hawk that stuff - even with my advanced selling techniques!
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Oh training videos...
ReplyDeleteThe only interesting thing that I learned was that Kohl's actually started out as a supermarket. The videos were boring (aren't most of them?), but beyond that, I was just seriously annoyed that throughout the whole thing they referred to their shoppers as "she" and "her." Stereotypes just annoy me, even if they're dumb ones.
In our videos and throughout the orientation the Gap videos and real-life employees referred to our spouses/partners as his or her. I liked that. But referring to shoppers as only women? Were these videos from the 1950s?
ReplyDeleteI don't know much about Kohl's - I'm not sure I've ever been to one. Whenever I went shopping in the US it seemed we would go to a lot of Kaufmanns or Lord & Taylor. The only thing I know about Kohl's is that Britney had a line of clothes there!