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"Oh, a bedroom. Yup, that's where the person who lived here slept."
A couple visiting a castle with their children have announced that now they have driven an hour to get there, paid the cost of admission, and are standing inside, they don’t know what to do.
“Well, this certainly is a large room,” said the mother Reyna, standing with her husband and three children. “The sign says this was a dining room, yes, a large dining room.”
When she noticed that the children were unimpressed, father Patrick tried to embellish the experience.
“So this is the room where the prince or lord or whatever would sit with his wife, the princess or lady or whatever, and they would eat,” he said. “Imagine a long table, right here in the middle of the room, where they would, you know, eat.”
Finding the kids still unenthusiastic, Reyna took over.
“And not your everyday meals,” she said. “Banquets, with guests, and lots of, well, food, and drinks, and food.”
Later, the family wandered up to one of many bedrooms which had been furnished with a bed, night stand, and a mannequin wearing some sort of medieval-style clothes.
“So that’s where someone slept, I guess,” said Patrick “The bed certainly isn’t authentic, but we can use our imaginations.”
“Yes,” said Reyna. “So imagine the lord and lady, putting on their lord and lady pajamas, and then going to the lord and lady bed. Sleeping, but in a, well, castle. How cool is that?”
“It’s likely they had a bed pan,” Patrick added, desperate to enliven the visit. “Do you know what that is, kids? Have you seen any toilets?”
After visiting more mostly empty rooms and speculating what their function might have been, the parents took the children to an inner courtyard.
“Just imagine all the things they did with this space,” Patrick said. “They must have come out here to, well, sit and maybe relax or…”
“Or fight with swords,” Reyna added. “Let’s pretend that we are battling or jousting. Anyone see a stick? No?”
Afterwards, the family made a visit to the gift shop and bought soft drinks and a book about the castle and began their 45-minute drive back to their home in the city.
