There is a Japanese saying I heard once along the lines of “He who climbs Mount Fuji is a wise man; He who climbs it twice is a fool.” A similar thing can be said about visiting Graceland.

I of course, have visited Graceland twice which means, well, yeah, pretty much.

The first time I went to Graceland I went because I felt it was something I ought to do. I lived in Oxford, Mississippi and had friends from Albania (Mom and Dad Two) who lived in Memphis and they agreed to drive me to Graceland, but wouldn’t go back inside. Instead Dad Two sat in the cafe across the street (which served Elvis specialties like deep-fried peanut butter and banana sandwiches) and drank coffee whilst I went inside.

I visited the car museum and the planes (both of which are worth a visit) and then crossed the street to the mansion.

A couple things struck me about the mansion. First, except for the jungle room, and some random leopard skin, it was less gaudy than I was expecting, or at least I was surprised by how it all seemed to work. Also, I remember how bored the room guides were. They weren’t tour guides, instead they were human tape players who waited in a room and recited the same speech many times a day and had grown bored and robotic about it all. When the young woman explained how Elvis saw the jungle furniture and decided to build a room around it, she could have been a text to speech computer.

The second time I went with my father and step-mother. That time the bored human tape players had been replaced with actual tape players (with headphones) and Priscilla Presley’s voice guided visitors through the mansion and the museum of Elvis guitars and jumpsuits. There were two problems with this.

First, many tourists followed the tapes so exactly that when Priscilla Presley told them to move they moved. She didn’t tell them to look though, so I got stepped on and bumped into a lot.

Second, the recordings couldn’t be hurried. You moved at Priscilla Presley’s pace and no faster. If you weren’t interested in the subtleties of the American Eagle jumpsuits from the Aloha Via Satellite from Hawaii concert, you were out of luck. You had to listen to the explanation before you got to move to the Mexican Sundial jumpsuit.

I ended up just letting the tape run and moved along at my own pace. This though, proved rather creepy, as I found myself surrounded by people who moved silently when Priscilla Presley told them to. I also got to visit a back building that had been closed the first time I visited.

I recommend everyone visit Graceland once, mostly because Memphis is worth visiting. Graceland is in a rough neighborhood, though, and don’t go in mid-August around the anniversary of Elvis death unless you have a place to stay. That’s when all the Elvis fans and Elvis impersonators do their annual hajj to Graceland. It’s kind of fun, but you’ll never get a room and you never, ever, criticize Harum Scarum.