As I walked back to Reykjavik City Hostel from downtown, I came across a peculiar sign — it was for the Icelandic Phallological Museum. It took me a moment, but I began to laugh as I took a photo of the sign. I couldn’t believe that Reykjavik is home to the world’s only penis museum (or that any city would have such a thing).
When I returned to the hostel, I talked with the receptionist and asked her what other museums I should see. On her list of museums I didn’t enter was the Phallological Museum. When I inquired why I should go in, she said, “Because it’s the only one in the world.”
Well, in the interest of travel and morbid curiosity, I paid much more than I would have liked to see a museum full of dicks.
My expectations were shattered when I entered the museum. I assumed it would be full of viking phallic imagery — maybe some historic sculptures or other artwork. More importantly, I expected quite a bit more humor. I was instead disturbed.
As an Australian tourist at the hostel mentioned, “It’s just a bunch of cocks.” More specifically, it’s preserved animal cocks in glass jars.
Really, there’s nothing else that could make a man feel more inferior than standing next to a 13 foot whale penis. There were also plenty of other animal bits from around the world — I don’t even know how it was all organized.
There were some amusing items in the museum, but that didn’t make it any less disturbing. Sure, why not hang photos of phallus-shaped vegetables for immature people to giggle at. Better yet, turn an animal scrotum into a lampshade. They even have molds of the national silver medal-winning Olympic handball team [insert your own joke here].
Maybe if I hadn’t gone into the museum alone it would’ve been more amusing — it was definitely the case at the Museum of Sex in New York.
If you’d really like to go to Iceland’s penis museum, it’s located on Laugavegur and open from 10 am to 6 pm daily. Tickets are 1250 kr, which is about $10.
Oh my!
Fricken hilarious!!