A couple of days ago I went to the Aga Khan Museum in Toronto with Sami and her friend. My experience was pretty good and I hope to see more things like this during my stay in Canada. I’ll be listing off my favorite parts and my not-as-favored parts of the museum.

My Favorite Parts

The museum featured many different things, from historic Qurans with beautiful Arabic calligraphy, dining ware with exquisite patterns and garments the Mongols wore. The museum was filled with many items, and it is inspiring to think that even with all of the museum’s many artifacts, their exhibits only showcase a small fraction of Muslim relics spanning the globe and various historical periods.

One exhibit in particular that I found to be extremely fascinating was a 3d plaster statue that depicted a Mongol warrior in full uniform. What really captivated me was just how much the statue blurred the lines between 2D and 3D, creating a really cool effect. The complex patterns of the uniform were very interesting and really highlighted the attention to detail and craftsmanship of this time in history. It was pretty extraordinary and it left a lasting impression on me.

The Okay Parts

The size of the museum was alright, it could have been slightly bigger, but even with the small size it was still very impressive that they managed to fit so much history into the museum.

There were many different Qurans and loose pages of scriptures which was rather cool and I enjoyed how they created a display of Qurans in chronological order from 11th century to the 20th century. The display showed the history of the designs and how Arabic writing changed throughout history.

The overall design of everything was really good, and the markings of various doors and other decorations were all very beautiful, although there weren’t many items in each collection.

There was also a chicken-looking thingy, I can’t remember the name of this item, or what exactly it was meant to be or what it’s purpose was but it was very cool looking nonetheless. My guess was that it was an incense holder, but I’m not too certain about this being 100% true.

My Least Favorite Parts

Although the museum held many artifacts, it was still a very short experience that lasted about 30-40 minutes. We didn’t examine every single thing meticulously but I still feel we spent a good amount of time looking over the different artifacts, but there just wasn’t a whole lot within the museum.

Overall Experience

Overall I really enjoyed the Aga Khan Museum and I hope to see more stuff like this in the future as I continue to travel. It really showed the history of Islam and this museum is truly a relic that shows lots of stuff that many people may have never seen prior to their visit to the Aga Khan museum. I am very appreciative that so many people of different faiths support this museum and take an interest in learning about our history and different cultures.