salamalacum

So catching up on last weekends trip to Mt. Nebo and the Dead Sea.. It was amazing. After Mt. Nebo, headed down the hill we paid to enter the Dead Sea beach through an awesome hotel. Everyone was smiling once they entered what was like an oasis in the desert. We played for hours in the Dead Sea floating on the water, then almost drowning in the pools. We ate ice cream and smoked hookah, until it was time to leave. The next day at camp. Tom(director) had some exciting news about our scarab. It dates to the Late Bronze age and says" The one who tramples foreign land". It sounded like something straight from Indiana Jones. The camp plague has been going around I caught it a couple days ago- sucks to have a fever in the desert. I am currently missing Mexican food, condiments, sushi, ice, and any normal food I have eaten in the last 21 years. The foods been rough, meat(chicken) is a once a week luxury. In Aqaba again resting, eating and prepping for Petra next weekend. Oh and I miss you Daniel!

WE FOUND A SCARAB!!!!!!

So finally the weekend, We are currently in Madaba, known for their Byzantine Mosaics. We will make our way to Mt. Nebo, Biblical site, and then head to the Dead Sea to uh, float. Yesterday in the first hour of our digging we found a Scarab!! It's no bigger than a dime, perfect hieroglyphs and the best part about it, it was headed for the trash pile of dirt. We caught it at the screening section and just like that we have text to support our tenth century fortress. During our off time at the camp we have a nightly ritual swapping travel stories with music and hookah. It's a really chill group and I enjoy them. Our hotel this weekend is Awesome it has a pool which I drunkenly decided to go swimming in last night along with some others I recruited during our hotel party. It felt like swimming in snow, but can't take advantage of any amenity when you live in the desert. Oh yeah and I'm getting better with my arabic by the day, thanks to my bedouin friends. Oh yeah and I almost forgot My pictures were published in my good friend Ashley Richter's article, check out the link...http://archive.cyark.org/ruins-of-jerash-field-report-conservation-and-tourism-blog
And we are doing a weird duo of vlog-ing for her company Cyark, this should be interesting. Miss you all, masalama.

Kwais-good

This week has been pretty routine-excavate, lab work, food and reading..Our site is AWESOME! I'm in a corridor of the building and so far have found pottery, shells, bones, and today a human tooth! This past week we have encountered our first snake at site and a scorpion in someone's tent . This is a tough job, rewarding, but tough. Don't think I could do this with my life, but on the upside my tent roomie works for a historical archaeology firm dealing with photo imagery of famous archaeological sites and she wants some of my photos to publish with her research project for Jordan...meaning my photo will be in an archaeology journal with credit to meee! I'm stoked, leaning towards a jornalism/photography side of anthropology possibly, in my process of narrowing down for a master's. The food here is getting OLD and the constant heat from wearing modest clothing is hard to adjust to. I like Jordan, the bedouin, the roaming camels in the Wadi, just could never live here. Next week we are going to Madaba, Mt. Nebo, and the Dead Sea. I don't plan on updating until the week after next, since I will be so busy. But after that is Petra for 3 days! Currently I am in Aquaba again, enjoying my day off. Until next time, Shokran.

First Weekend off

Currently in Aquaba, a city near the Red Sea, it's like a beach town, but everyone is still modest in their dress. Lesson number one never take beach, food, and civilization for granted. I miss San Diego.

I am a magnet for odd experiences

Second day of lab, We again wait for our daily outdoor seminar, when our bedouin friend Solomon (neighbor lives next door to lab), kindly greets us as his kids run around playing soccer through tree brush, streets, and concrete. Very sweet kids, unlike the devil ones down the street aiming for ankles. I met Solomon earlier in the lab, he offered me tea as I tried to tell him the story of my braced foot in broken Arabic. Anyways, back to the story we were sitting on the wooden benches wasting time, as he came over and introduced his 5 month old, I didn't catch her name. He walks right up to me and plops her down on my lap says " No mommy or daddy, you". I laugh as everyone did, he's a jokster. Then he walks away, here's a mental picture, me carrying this big baby, it starts crying he goes inside his house, which sets in the very uncomfortable joke. LOL. I was first honored, then as he left I started to wonder how in the hell will I get through customs with a baby. After he came back with her I was finally able to see the humor in his joke. But can't help but wonder, Why do these things always happen to me?

I can dig it

Finally able to connect to the internet, currently here in Aquaba on our day off, but thought I'd catch you up on some of my first days and the whole camp experience. Site is located 30 minutes away, all offroading in the Wadi...I feel so adventurous. It's so serene leaving at 6 am the moonlight lights up the desert just enough for our 4 FULL trucks including people in the bed race throught the Wadi. It's hard acclimating to dirt surrounding me, but I am adjusting. Our tents are like the Israeli tents,lined with bedouin mats and 4 cots. Every morning around 5am, the donkey wakes up along with the the Mosque's call to prayers on loud speaker. We DO have bathrooms, although we enter the stalls with a bucket of water to flush. :) It's funny seeing camels laying down out on bedouin farms amongst the desert hills, it all blends, their humps and the hills. I now can draw a camel for the first time in my life. We work with a handful of Bedouin men and learn some arabic during water breaks. At the field, we began excavation on site W, it began with heavy lifting of massive boulders, but now we are able to see walls and a terrace. Still waiting for some inscription finds. The first day at the lab, a big group walked to the market around the block to buy a pepsi, everything is pretty desolate. On our way back, some devil child threw a rock and nailed me in the achilles tendon, I reacted with some loud gestures and words. This spread throughout camp, next morning it was swollen and I had to stay back. FML.
I would post pictures from site, but I have been informed that I am not allowed to quite yet, since National Geographic owns it. boo.