The Globe and Mail

Strap on 3-D glasses and watch holograms of cartoon sperm sprinting to fertilize an egg. Climb inside a gigantic nose, enjoy the smell of fresh hay, then feel the wind on your neck when it sneezes. Walk across a bouncy rubber tongue complete with taste buds and realistic burping noises in the background.

This all might sound weird or flat-out gross. But the people behind Corpus, a new attraction in the Netherlands, are hoping the amusement park/health education museum will encourage children to take better care of their own bodies.

Even before Corpus officially opened on March 20 in Oegstgeest, 34 kilometres southeast of Amsterdam, it was a local landmark. The building incorporates a 35-metre-high seated human figure into its structure. But the exterior isn't much to look at: The good stuff is on the inside.

All the walls and halls are modelled with fibreglass to resemble the inside of a giant human body, giving visitors the sensation of being shrunk down to a tiny scale, like the characters of the classic science fiction film Fantastic Voyage.

Visitors begin their tour via an escalator that carries them through a wound in the giant's calf. Once inside, they see an exhibition on what happens when a wood splinter pierces the skin.

Then it's on to the sit-down Uterus Theatre - the one with the cartoon sperm race.

"We chose not to show sexual activity, but actually just the fertilization of the egg cell by the seed cell and how that develops" into a fetus, says Dr. Tom Voute, one of a raft of physicians hired as advisers on the project.

He says the information in Corpus is medically accurate, if not always highly sophisticated. "I think that it gives information that will give people the itch to learn more."

When the show is over, the entire theatre platform is lifted to the next floor with hydraulic pumps.

Next is a display on digestion, featuring blocks of cheese, the Dutch national treat. After visitors watch a video showing stomach acid dissolving them, the curds' progress through a hallway-size intestinal system is charted with lights and narration.

While the cheese is heading downward, visitors progress up to exhibits on the heart, lungs, mouth, nose, and ear.

They reach the summit in - where else? - the brain, where they take seats around a cluster of display panels built atop model neurons, which then project images onto a larger screen at the top of the domed space, to give an impression of how consciousness might work.

The project is the dream of businessman Henri Remmers, who arranged $31-million in private funding and won the endorsement of the Dutch Health Ministry. The cost of entry is about $26 for adults and $21 for children under 14. Children younger than 8 are not permitted.

On the way back down, there are more displays on health and diet. And games. For instance, one where players attempt to knock out bacteria on a big screen display by tossing bean bags at them.

Other machines let visitors monitor their hearts while they exercise, or measure blood pressure, heart rate and body mass index.

Remmers says he hopes that when people learn more about what a "unique mechanism" the human body is, they'll have more respect for their own bodies and possibly treat them "a little more carefully."

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Pack your curiosity

GETTING THERE

Oegstgeest is located along the A44 highway between Amsterdam and The Hague and is reached most easily by car. Trains are available from the Leiden station in Amsterdam or The Hague Central station. Or take bus 57 from Leiden to Lisse (Snellius stop) or bus 32 from The Hague to Katwijk (Transferium A44 stop).

CORPUS

http://www.corpus-experience.nl. Open daily 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Admission is about $26 for adults and $21 for children under 14; children under 8 are not permitted. Narration available in Dutch, English, French, Spanish, Italian, Japanese and Chinese.