Posterous theme by Cory Watilo

First day at Humayma!

What an exciting day! We started the morning at 7am for breakfast, before heading down to the bus to the site. It's an hour East-ish of Aqaba (I think!), beyond a military checkpoint and about 1000 m above sea level, where we were at. On either side are old mountains, hazy with dust and dark against the sky. As we went higher up, the temperature change was noticeable - I had chills for the first time since we arrived! An hour later, we were at the site, climbing out of the buses and getting set for a hike. It's a lot more sprawling than I'd expected - the fort is off in the distance, with a number of other buildings close at hand. Some are many hundreds of metres apart. We climbed first up to Nabatean burial area, with several tombs carved into the rockface as well as the remains of water collection systems. It was incredibly cool, with a 360 degree view. Unbelievable. After some exploring, we did a tour of the site. We'd already seen the bathrooms (aka the remains of camel stalls - great fun.) but looking around was incredibly neat, especially seeing ancient cisterns still in use. There were also tons of cool lizards creeping around - the bedouin call them "araboon."

After a second breakfast and the conclusion of the site tour, we marked off some dig squares and prepared to leave. It was wonderful, and the bus ride back extremely fun as well. Unfortunately, getting closer to Aqaba the humidity is UNREAL - we started sweating everywhere, but it's been surprisingly easy to acclimatize. 

When we returned for lunch, we learned who we would be digging with - our two squares, supervised by Chris (YAY!), are made up of two sets of partners - I'm working with Meaghan to uncover the aqueduct and outer wall of the bath house, while Mike F and Darcy uncover the road connecting the bath house to the brothel and another outer wall of the bath-house. It's extremely cool, and a really great group to work with. We had our first meeting and briefing, and then did some prep work for the dig and had dinner. It's amazing how quickly time passes, especially in the heat.

Our squares have never been dug into before - unlike some others that have been started and now contain backfill, these ones will involve breaking ground - it's harder work, but any finds will be completely new to everyone, which is pretty cool. However, to prepare for the digging for everyone, we'll start by removing backfill from all the other squares begun in other seasons - that means we won't actually start our own work for a few days. The anticipation is a little overwhelming.

First glimpse of the dig site, first hike, first day out in the desert. Lots of new experiences, adjustments, and discoveries. Time to start digging!

Finding Nemo

After adjusting to the weather last night and spending an hour chatting on the roof (it cools down to around 30 degrees - really hot but much more manageable!), we woke up to our first orientation meeting, which happened after everyone arrived! It was really neat to see the whole group together, and especially to get excited that we were all about to start! 


After the meeting, a group of 8 of us (Jake, Mike F., Mike C., Meaghan, Robin, Danielle, Erin and I) went to the beach and bargained our way into a three hour glass-bottomed boat tour, with snorkeling and swimming as well. We traveled an hour outside of Aqaba (towards Egypt), moving past HUGE freight ships and tons of blue water. Then one of the boys (I won't use names so he can keep some shred of dignity) realized he REALLY had to pee. After a few minutes of discomfort, he told the boat driver, who offered him two options: pee in a bucket and toss it over, or jump in. After a few frenzied moments, he took off his shirt and jumped overboard. It was hilarious, and we all had a good laugh at his expense, and took lots of pictures. Finally, we reached a massive coral reef filled with blues, greens, and purples, tons of brain coral, and a large variety of fish.  Our favourites were some incredible angelfish and the many clownfish - I personally loved the sea urchins as well. I saw a lionfish and something that puffed up, which was pretty neat as well! 


As we passed the coral reef, we found a safe spot to anchor the boat, jumped off the side and swam in the Red Sea. It's extremely salty and prefectly refreshing, so we had an amazing time floating around. Mike C, Jake, Meaghan, Robin and Danielle went to get a closer look at the nearby coral reef, but Mike F, Erin, and I decided that after seeing a few critters and corals more poisonous than we'd like, we would stay closer to the boat. We floated about and enjoyed the sunshine and freedom; we'd felt awkward going too close to shore in our shorter bathing suits.

After about an hour, a particularly friendly jellyfish floated by - that was the end of my swimming day. 

Heading back, we had a really amazing moment where we stopped by the shore to chat with some of our captain's friends - one young girl reached out to Danielle and Robin and introduced herself - she seemed really surprised (possibly by their bright blonde and red hair) and sweet, it was really lovely. After passing that beach, we were hit by a wave of humidity - Aqaba is easily 3-4 degrees warmer than that shoreline. Quite a shock to realize how much you could sweat in the afternoon heat in Jordan! Definitely worth the money to get away from the heat. 

We spent the afternoon preparing labeling tags for the dig, eating shawarma and falafel and resting - now, enjoying a fresh-squeezed mango juice for 2JD - AMAZING, while the sun starts to set over the mountains on the Israeli side. So cool.  

Just a couple of notes to add on the space itself - we're staying in the Shokini apartments (sp?), not the most luxurious accomodations but we each have an apartment suite with one bedroom for 2-3 people (sometimes 2 bedrooms), a bathroom with a rickety shower and a living room with kitchenette. No fridges in the main space, but there are several in the common areas. Each room has tiled floors, which helps keep it cool on your feet. So nice.

What a beautiful day, and I cannot wait to start digging! 

Best wishes from Aqaba  :)

Aqaba, Jordan: May 17th, 7:57PM GMT+2

Hello from Jordan!
It's an unbelievable day in Aqaba, 37 degrees (wow) and gorgeously sunny. Since London, we've had had the most unbelievable, silly adventures together. It started with meeting Erin, Meaghan and Ana in the airport at Heathrow, where we got to know one another a little bit as our increasing tiredness led to escalating hysterics. We also bumped into my seminar professor, Dr. Chowdhury, in the airport - he was on his way back to Canada, and it was one of the funniest run-ins of the day!

After five hours together, we jumped on a plance to Amman, meeting several students from a dig at Petra who were sitting on the plane next to us. It was really interesting to compare notes and fun to get excited together. They had an equally long travel day, so it was good to see we weren't the only ones going insane from exhaustion. Arriving in Amman, we met up with Jake, and played cards, chatted, and sat for three hours until the others flying from BC, London, and Frankfurt started to arrive. After several mishaps including a forgotten laptop, a passport switch (Robin accidentally took Jake's instead of her own - ha), and many more hysteric giggle fits, we were finally on our way to our final destination.

Aqaba is shockingly similar in appearance and climate to the Costa del Sol in Spain, albeit much hotter, so it's been fairly easy to adjust to the living space. No AC yet, and our room faces East so it's scorching during the day but cools down quite a bit in the evenings. We went down to the water and put our feet into the Red Sea - it was really refreshing, but also pretty cool since you can actually see Israel from Aqaba - it's only 6km to Eilat, Israel; you can walk there easily, and see the whole city from much of our area. So far, the biggest shock has been the heat, the people have all been friendly, helpful, and welcoming. Unfortunately, wandering around Aqaba I was quite sick, and ended up spending the better part of the day taking gravol and sleeping for hours, though I woke up feeling way better, which definitely helped the adjustment to the humidity, the altitude, and the hot sun. Much needed! Everyone took such great care of me - Victoria kept checking in while I slept and Chris regularly made her way around to make me drink more water. Plus, Mike C walked me back to the rooms and then checked in later on to make sure I was ok. I was super grateful, they're all awesome.

All in all, a pretty eventful first day. Looking forward to tomorrow :) 

 


 

London, May 16th, 10:00 AM GMT

After months of anticipation, planning, panicking, and excitement, being in transit is such a surreal experience. My parents dropped me off at the airport yesterday evening, and I've arrived to a beautiful, brisk, sunny day in London! Travels began with one of the most chaotic adventures through lineups and customs EVER (woohoo YOW), followed by an awesome plane ride. I got shuffled around to a new seat, with no neighbour and extra leg room, so even though travel won't end until 8:30 am tomorrow (another 20 hours or so), things are looking awfully nice. Though the idea of spending the whole day in the airport is less than appealing, I'm currently writing from the arrivals lounge for Air Canada - a comfortable set of rooms equipped with private showers, a computer area, seating, and a pretty awesome breakfast; completely worth the 40$ fee since I'll be stuffing myself with their food until they force me to leave, abusing the wifi and draining the coffee machine. Many thanks to my unbelievable parents for taking such good care of me even when they're an ocean and a five-hour time difference away <3

Just in case you're reading along and haven't heard me prattle on about this adventure for the past six months or so, I'm currently on my way to join an excavation team, led by Queen's, who are working on a site called Humayma, (see details here: http://www.queensu.ca/classics/humayma.html) located an hour's drive outside of Aqaba, Jordan, one of the southernmost cities in the country. The group includes a number of students from Queen's as well as UVic, supervised by Prof. Barbara Reeves and her support staff, mainly "Senior Excavators" who have participated in the dig before. Together with myself and the other "Junior Excavators," we will be working to uncover several sections of a Roman fort, including a bath-house and what might be a brothel. Also working with our team will be a number of local Bedouin men.

Aqaba (pop 105 000 - Lonely Planet) is on the Gulf of Aqaba, a part of the Red Sea just a few km from Israel, and about 8 hours driving South of the capital, Amman, where around ten of the girls joining the dig for the first time (including me!) will be traveling together this afternoon. Hopefully we'll be able to stay awake long enough to get to know each other a little better! 

This is a really brief overview so feel free to comment, email, message, etc. if you have any questions or thoughts. I'll do my best to answer!

That's all for now! Best wishes from the UK :)

Sarah