A day at the site

Well, I've been chastised for not posting recently, so I figured, why not give you guys an idea of how a typical day at the tell works? So here is our generally schedule. It applies less this week (this is the final week) because we are mostly cleaning up and finishing paperwork, packing stuff up, etc. but it'll give you guys a little taste of what digging is like (insert subliminal message here: COME TO SAFI)

4:45 am -- Okay this tends to creep closer and closer to 5:00, 5:05, 5:10.... but hypothetically this is when we get up in the morning. We throw on cloths, grab gear, and chug down coffee and biscuits as fast as possible in an effort to wake up. It sounds really early, but I really like getting up at this time. Its nice and cool and its not bad once you get into a routine.

5:25 am -- This is when the bus leaves for the tell. There is a nice 15 minute drive to sort of wake up a bit.

5:45(ish) -- Digging begins! This is the best part of the morning -- it's cool and you can see an absolutely gorgeous sunrise over the tell.

9:00 am -- Breakfast! mmmmmmmmmm hardboiled eggs and peanut butter and honey never tasted sooooooo goood. Manna from heaven really.



This is Eric and Jacob at breakfast. Here pudding is considered an acceptable breakfast food. While I still can't bring myself to eat it, Eric and Jacob say it's very good with cornflakes.

9:30 am -- Back to work!

11:15 am -- Fruit break! mmmmm Israeli fruit.... Only 11:15 and my schedule is very food based, haha



This is watermelon was soooo delicious. I only like the ones here for some reason (more flavorful? less mealy? both? i'm usually so hungry i'd eat dirt... and accidentally do a lot haha). Carrying them up the hill is.... challenging but it becomes less challenging as the season goes on. Eric has joked about making a dig-based work out video which includes the watermelon hike (other exercises include Jerry can curls and turiya presses.... patent pending haha).

11:30 am -- Back to work! Just another hourish to get stuff done!

1:00 pm -- The bus heads back from the site to the Kibbutz where we are staying. It is called Kibbutz Revadim.

1:30 (ish) -- Lunch

2:30 pm -- Pottery washing and reading. During this we wash the pottery from the previous day which has soaked over night and look through baskets that have already dried. Pottery is used to date the various areas we're looking in. This can take just a few minutes or a couple hours depending how much stuff there is to do. It is so interesting to watch as the staff take tiny 3 cm sherds and can figure out exactly what the original piece looked like and where it was fun. I would love love love to be able to do that! Hmmmmm maybe a few more trips to the Rockefellar.... and about a billion years of studying haha.

(Some days) 4:00 pm -- Field trip. We get to visit nearby archaeological and Biblical sites.

7:00 pm -- Dinner

8:00 pm -- Lecture

9:00 pm -- Bed!


So that's a typical day! It's gone so quickly; I wish we still had another couple weeks.

I hope all is well with you all.

Love!