Winner! Round 7 - Grand Prize and Short List

Revealed! The Grand Prize for Round 7 of The Guess What Is in the Boxes Contest is this Translucent Tropical Fantasy Soap Dish !

I did not realize it was translucent until I chanced to see it in bright light and noticed it was not completely opaque. Then I held it up to the sunlight and was delighted to see how clear it is. The foreground details are nearly opaque, but the sea and sky are almost totally see-through. It is wonderful.

There is a complicated winner situation this round. First Place goes to a winner who does not reside in the continental United States - he will receive a certificate. I have selected a first runner up, who it turns out does reside in the United states, who will receive the Grand Prize itself, though not credit as Grand Prize First Place Honoree.

@The_No_Show: A very small but perfectly formed replica of the statue of David. Includes fig leaf. To cover the tiny penis.
- GRAND PRIZE FIRST PLACE HONOREE: Double congratulations to @The_No_Show for this. It was the first guess entered in this round, and it is the winning guess, most accurately capturing the essence of the object in the box. One might ask what have Michelangelo’s David and fig leaves and penises to do with a soap dish? When it is this particular soap dish, they have many things. It is difficult to appreciate in the photo, but the soap dish is in a kind of 3-D bas-relief, giving the tropical scene an uncanny depth. The statue of David was carved intentionally out of porportion in order to look realistic when placed high above the heads of viewers in a church. It wasn’t ever put up high, and now it just looks like he has an uncannily large head. And like somebody glued a leaf to his penis.

@J1: a stunningly rendered (albeit small) painting of a non-existent marsupial once found in Mesopotamia
- FIRST RUNNER UP- GRAND PRIZE: The soap dish is stunningly rendered, and I choose to believe there is a marsupial of one sort or another (there are hundreds of species currently in existence) in that Tropical Fantasy somewhere. And, Mesopotamia was once a Tropical Fantasy itself.

As always, the short list for the Grand Prize is presented in the order the guesses were received.

@atomicfez: } a paper-back copy of the Karma Sutra translated into Esperanto and printed in Braille…?
- Soap dishes have strong connections to bathing, often regarded as a potentially sexual activity, and this Translucent Tropical Fantasy Soap Dish has an image rendered in three dimensions that could be discerned by touch. However, it is simply not really all that sexy, and the only text is on the sticker that says “MADE IN CHINA.”

@felicitous: What I should have written about for my Thesis.
- I am giving this guess the benefit of the doubt. Although this soap dish is amazing and worthy of in-depth scholarship, without knowing what field you studied, I cannot judge this the winning guess.

@carterbob2: baked in the fires of desire, this object is revered by some, and reviled by others.
- If this soap dish were not revered and reviled already, I certainly hope it is now. It was crafted with some sort of heating process related to a desire of some kind (mass-production trade), I cannot state conclusively that it was baked in the fires of desire.

@d_g_: A single moment of glory.
- Glorious indeed. However, the Translucent Tropical Fantasy Soap Dish is an enduring moment of glory, visible whenever it is held up to the light.

@KT30003k: 2nd guess! It is a device that used to be called by a lovely archaic name. The modern name is not nearly as good.
- This is another guess that I am giving the benefit of the doubt. I considered embarking on a research project to find out what (if any) archaic terms were used for soap dishes, but did not have time or energy. The best I can think of is “pot of lye,” and that is evocative, but not really “lovely.”

Thank you everyone for taking part! I hope to have Round 8 posted by the end of this coming weekend, and everything to go into the mail should be on its way on Monday.