Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Patience, Futility and Discovery

Notes: A few more pictures posted in the “Israel: Tel Kabri” album.

Day to Day: 17-26 July 2011

 

“Go brush that baulk and make it look nice and neat!” Off I run to use the bottom part of a stiff-bristled broom to brush dirt away, pick it up in a dustpan, and fill a bucket (or two or ten). What am I brushing the dirt from? More dirt, or maybe rocks. “Cleaning up” in archaeology means get as much dirt away from the dirt or rocks as possible.

“Hmmm, articulate those stones there, but make sure you don’t move anything!” Off I go with a pointy trowel, soft brush, a dustpan and a bucket (or two, or ten) in order to “articulate” an area. To articulate is to clean it up, maybe dig around it and get the clotted dirt out, or order to allow us to see what’s emerging. It’s slow work, because you have to be careful not to remove the very evidence you’re trying to clarify. Also, you don’t want to scratch or break some of the stuff you’re articulating, like pottery or plaster or even certain stone things, like orthostats (an upright stone, in our case, which shows the architectural outline of the building).

“Here’s a bag of dirt, pick through it and see if there are any bones inside.” With a small paintbrush in hand, I flick aside dirt, leaves, flint, pottery, shells and rocks to try to find tiny pieces of bone. I’ve gotten better at this throughout the last few weeks, able to spot them more easily, but still… there are hundreds of bags of dirt to go through.

“Those pieces of pottery you found today? Wash them off, we might want to keep some of them.” The chunks of pottery, large or small, which are dug up during the excavation are put in buckets and tracked carefully. We “wash” them with water and bits of sponge while sitting in a circle of chairs under the trees near our accommodations. Sometimes, what looked like pottery in the field is really just rock. When we’re done washing each piece, we put them in boxes out in the sun to dry. Later, more experienced people go through to determine if they’re worth further analysis. For the most part, they’re not, for a variety of reasons, and so they’re thrown away.

“Did you seriously just find a ______?!” It’s always fun when you hold something up, something you’ve dug out of the ground and which looks either odd or interesting in shape, color or texture, and the supervisor squints at it, asking you this question. The first week I found a piece of painted plaster, something they later determined to be a piece of wall plaster in an area not assumed to have had such a thing. The second week the find was a neolithic hand axe, a stone with clearly defined edges and symmetric shape. And this third week, the day excavation was supposed to wind down, someone found a new orthostat amid a section of masses of broken potter and more plaster. The finds and resulting excitement (or confusion) makes the futility and tests of patience absolutely worthwhile.

The past three weeks have been fun and educational and instructive… but I’m fairly sure that archaeology is not where my future lies. I just don’t have the patience – for the futility of most of the digging tasks, for learning all the history to be effective, etc – or the excitement that I’ve watched in the other volunteers and students here. It would be interesting to follow what happens at Tel Kabri and maybe even come back to volunteer again.

Meanwhile, I have pondered what to do with the rest of my time here in Israel, which will be about two weeks after this program is over. My general plan is to take a cooking class, visit Jerusalem, travel down to Mitzpe Ramon and hike for a day, visit Nahariya again, and visit some friends in between. Then, I’m off to Turkey for four days before heading to Nepal to see Ngima, with whom I e-mail daily still. We’re looking forward to seeing each other again and seeing how things go between us. I’m nervous, excited, ready to go… as usual!

--Z

Sunday, July 17, 2011

Guest Blogger: Derek Treuer

Note: Two new posts, make sure to read them both (“Guest Blogger: Derek Treuer” and “Old Things.”)

Note: Pictures associated with this post and taken by my parents Derek and Elissa Treuer can be found in the picture album titled “Israel: Guest Blogger Derek Treuer.” To best view the pictures, click on the link, then double-click on the first picture. From here, you just use the arrows to go through the pictures and see the captions. There are three albums: Israel Friends, 1st Week with Paula and Mutzi, 2nd Week with Devorah and Noa. Take a look!

 

My trip to Israel in May 2011 quickly became a fascinating journey with the friends we visited. Paula and Mutzi in Nahariya, Gabi and Rachel in Haifa, and Devorah and Noa in Jerusalem. So many friendly and delightful people! Add in our happy reunion with Zoë for the last week and you have a wonderful mix of perspectives.

And, I found, lots of perspective is required for being in Israel. Seems like every person has at least one or two opinions, every place has at least a millennium or two of history, and every situation has an unending number of interpretations. Facets upon dimensions upon eras ... and all of it wrapped up in a beautiful country.

We were in Israel for 2 most interesting and engrossing weeks. I'll be thinking over my impressions and experiences for much longer than that ...

--Derek Treuer

Saturday, July 16, 2011

Old Things

Note: New picture album soon to be uploaded! “Israel: Tel Kabri Archaeological Dig.” Also, please visit www.telkabri2011blog.wordpress.com for daily links to pictures taken by one of the directors, most of which you can find me in, somewhere!

Day to Day: 12-16 July 2011

 

My right hand hurts, my lower back aches and all in all, I’m feeling like a feeble 31-year-old! I suppose it should be no surprise after a week of wielding a pick-axe and a hoe for hours on end, after a week of hauling bucket after bucket of dirt and rocks, after a week of either sitting or standing bent over, scrabbling in the dirt for pieces of pottery or plaster or flint. Still, the feeble feeling that has followed really has me down in the dumps! I can’t grasp a knife in my hand, or curl it more than halfway into a fist. I’ve never had arthritis or tendonitis, but I imagine this is what it feels like.

Not to mention the tiredness and exhaustion that kept me in bed, on and off, for over twelve hours yesterday. Yikes! I mean, thirty-one isn’t old, right? But I certainly feel that way! Luckily, Paula, a childhood friend of my mom’s, and her family have welcomed me into their Nahariya home as if I’m one of them. It’s so nice to have a place to call home and a family to chat and joke and eat and walk with, who don’t mind if I laze the day away. And Paula, with her quick smiles and cheerful outlook, makes all the aches and pains and feebleness seem ok (as long as it doesn’t last too long).

Some of the pain is worth it, though: on Thursday, I made the end-of-week big find. The day before, Jeff, another volunteer, and I were lowering a square of earth. That is, we’d take a “pass” by pick-axing away a layer of dirt, then use the turiyah (or hoe) to gather the loose soil into buckets. Pass by pass, the area we were working got lower and lower. We found bits and pieces of pottery and flint on the way and finally reached a point where we were told to use a petiche (or small hand pick-axe) to continue digging more gently. Eventually we reached a plaster floor, which was expected. Our job Thursday morning was to see how far the plaster floor went. So we were on our knees or butts, using the petiches and trowels and brushes and dust pans to loosen the soil, clear it away and find the floor. We found an edge and kept going to see if it was just a gap in the floor, as had been found elsewhere on site.

Then it picked out a piece that seemed to be a chunk of plaster, or maybe pottery. I brushed it off and was about to toss it into our “finds” bucket, when I noticed the bright red on one side.

“Oooh! Is this painted pottery?” I asked Laurel, a girl digging out a pit nearby. She held out her hand to take a look, although even painted pottery is nothing unusual. Before she’d gotten a close look, though, she said, “Isn’t that plaster?” Soon we’d called over the supervisors and they in turn eyeballed the piece and in turn took it over to the directors, who were conducting a site tour. It turns out that the piece I’d found is big news: painted wall plaster. The fact that I found it in an area that seems to be a robber’s pit (where some stones are missing) is frustrating, but everyone was excited nonetheless. Woohoo! Next week I will continue digging in the same place and hopefully come across more of the painted plaster.

If I’m able to hold a trowel, that is…

--Z

Monday, July 11, 2011

Dirty, Dirty Girl

Note: No new pictures up yet but I’ll try to post them as I get them. Luckily, there’s wi-fi at the kibbutz I’m staying at, so it should be easy to keep things current for awhile.


Sunday was our first day and I have to admit: I was filthy, dirty and awfully disgusting! Of course, you might be too, if you’d spent six or seven hours swinging a pick-axe, hoe-ing, packing and moving sandbags, filling and toting buckets of dirt, and hard-brushing huge areas for excavation! The morning wasn’t so bad but as the sun rose, the humidity skyrocketed and the heat built up.
Yesterday I turned thirty-one years old. It was a low key day with no especial celebration, although I did treat myself to a few things in the run-up to the '”event.” Wednesday marked my return to Jerusalem and my mother’s friend Deborah’s apartment, which was nice to settle into again. On Thursday, I got my hair cut, nothing extraordinary, just a trim to even up my poor, mistreated hair, and went to see “The Green Wave,” a well-done blogger-perspective film about Iranian’s recent elections. On Friday was another movie (the Jerusalem film festival is on), Albanian “Amnesty,” which wasn’t my cup of tea. Also, I got a one-hour Swedish massage, which alerted me to the fact that more of me is knotted up than I thought. Friday evening saw me out to dinner with Deborah, her mother Shoshanah, and her daughter Noa. I chowed down on some amazing scallop-and-shrimp skewers and wine.
 On Saturday, though, the Actual Day, I didn’t do much in the way of celebration. The morning was a lazy one; then I packed up and caught a sherut to Tel Aviv, where my mom’s other friend Paula and her husband Mutze picked me up and hauled me up to Nahariya. They had been visiting family in Tel Aviv anyway, so everything worked out great. That evening, they dropped me off at Kibbutz Lohame Hagetaot just south of town, and I joined up with the Tel Kabri group.
Tel Kabri is an archaeological dig that’s been excavated on and off since the late 1950’s, when it was recognized as an important Canaanite center of commerce. The first major, organized excavation was 1986-1993, and now since 2005 George Washington University and Haifa University have been doing an every-other-year kind of program. Some of the earliest known Eastern Mediterranean art has been found here and they’re digging amongst 3,500 year old buildings!
Luckily, a friend of my mom’s friend’s husband’s neice’s husband (yeah, you read that right!) is an archaeologist and knew about the dig going on this summer, and recommended I check it out. All I pay for is room and board at the kibbutz, which is relatively cheap (for Israel). I also have the option of auditing one of two classes: an archaeological field studies class or a history class on commerce in the area thousands of years ago.
It’s an interesting group that I’m with. I share a bungalow with two girls and one guy, all of whom seem to be in their undergraduate years of school. One girl is from the Netherlands and the other girl and the guy are from the US (Massachussettes and California). Most of the group of thirty-eight diggers are undergraduate students, with a few graduate and post-doc students mixed in as supervisors. The two leaders, Asaf and Eric, are professors of the two universities involved and are very friendly and involved with everything.
I am assigned to area “D-West,” which means that we’re excavating a new-ish area thought to possibly be a temple of some sort. It’s fascinating as we dig down because we come across pieces of plaster and shards of pottery.
Today, I helped clean up areas made messy by a bulldozer yesterday (it was hired by the team to widen our site a bit) and then several hours thigh-deep in a muddy pond, sifting dirt samples through loose screens. Not a bad day and definitely not as hard as yesterday. Tomorrow will probably be much more challenging. We had a brief lecture last night,detailing the history of the dig. Tonight is the first history lecture, which should be fascinating.

--Z

Wednesday, July 6, 2011

Whirl Wind Surprise: Jordan

Note: More pictures posted in the “Israel: Three Weeks in Sar El” album! Also, please note that there’s a “Jordan: Whirlwind Weekend” album up to go with this post! Wow, I’m all caught up on pictures AND posts! Can’t quite figure out why I’m no longer able to post pictures IN my posts, though. Hmph.

Day-to-Day: 3-6 July 2011

 

The Eilat Bus

Diane elbowed me awake as gently and unobtrusively as she could. My eyes refused to focus for the first few seconds, but as I glanced about, blinking rapidly, everything around me became sharper. The bus seats in front of me; the other passengers; the glare from the window a few inches from me; all of this became clear and I turned to Diane to see what occasioned this interruption to my nap. We had to be near Eilat, since we’d left Tel Aviv about five hours before, but now we were at a complete stop, the desert looking hot and dry beyond the windows. Diane was looking away from me, back into the aisle into the rear of the bus. Everyone seemed a little tense, a little confused. The bus driver was pacing, if one can pace in the space of the front of a bus, going down the steps to the closed doors and glancing out, muttering in Hebrew to no one in particular and raising his voice now and then to coincide with his hand motions.

I glanced across the aisle and out the window. On the roadside we were stopped at, a black IDF soldier was pulling baggage out from under the bus, holding pieces up for the inspection of a few people who were standing outside with him. They were three young black men who I recognized as fellow passengers, standing somewhere between sullen slouches and over-alert attention. They didn’t look upset or disturbed, but there seemed to be a tension in their stances anyway. Everyone on the bus was surreptitiously watching as each identified his luggage and the IDF soldier searched them. At one point, the soldier came back on the bus and motioned for a fourth black passenger to go outside as well. After ten minutes of searching their baggage and checking some papers that each presented to him, the four passengers got back on the bus, ignoring everyone else, and we were on our way again to Eilat, which we reached within minutes.

At the time I didn’t understand, and my American upbringing tsk’d, “Racism!” According to some Israelis I’ve told the story to, this isn’t far from the truth, although most seem to shrug it off with the vague and undetailed explanation, “Sudanese refugees, they find them near Eilat all the time.” The guess from what details I could provide is that the IDF soldier was most likely an Ethiopian Jew and the four passengers, being the only black people on the bus, were inspected as possible illegal refugees from Sudan.

Exploring Aqaba

After being handed off from the Israeli border to the Jordanian border and being found by our pre-arranged tour guide, Diane and I were taken to our Aqaba hotel, the Golden Tulip. Trying to keep costs down, we’d chosen the three-star hotel option offered by the tour, but our nervousness was relieved immediately when we walked into a lovely big room, nicely decorated. We cooled off and immediately decided to walk around the area and explore our first Arabic city. Both Diane and I were Jewish and American, so our perceptions of Arabs and what an Arabic city would be like were colored similarly. Being typical tourists, of course, we giggled at the fast food signs in Arabic – Pizza Hut, McDonald’s, KFC, Burger King – and took pictures, both voicing our disgust at one aspect of a world power’s influence in the world.

We sat at Tche Tche’s, a family-style café, for coffee and snacks. At a table near us, six Muslim women sat, eating and chatting and passing a hookah hose around. It struck me as one of those cultural norms here that seemed strange but perfectly placed. Diane mentioned under her breath that we were getting some stares from various other patrons, but nothing seemed out of place.

Later, we got into our bathing suits and headed for the Jordanian side of the Red Sea. The hotel clerk recommended a private beach we could take a taxi to, but Diane and I, being thrifty travelers, opted for the public beach that we could walk to in minutes. As we approached, following a stone promenade which meandered up and down the coast, we realized our very Western, rookie mistake. Although we were excited to be in our first Arab country, and we were both aware and educated about at least some of the most obvious Arabic customs, we had somehow failed to recall dress standards. There were few women at the beach. Those who were there were covered from head to toe in long black garb, closed-toe shoes guarding their feet. Few wore masks across their faces, and the little girls wore Western-style bathing suits, but when Diane stated that we probably shouldn’t swim, I agreed wholeheartedly. We walked along the promenade, discussing and rejecting the possibility of getting our feet wet. We didn’t touch the sand. We were both wearing pants and shirts over our bathing suits, but we still occasioned the odd glance from passersby, mostly men. No one harassed us but it was obvious we were out of place.

A Few Hours in Petra

Having expected to be on a tour bus, Diane and I were surprised and, eventually, pleased at our personal car, driver and tour guide. They had picked us up at the Golden Tulip in Aqaba and, after brief introductions and handshakes, we were on our way to Petra, two hours drive away. Faqid, our tour guide, kept up a running commentary for over an hour of the drive, telling us about the geology, history, economics and interesting facts regarding Jordan as a whole and Petra in particular. He himself was originally from Petra, although he now lived six months of each year in Coral Gables, Florida, and the other six months in Aqaba, Jordan. I was surprised to learn that the Dead Sea accounted for much of Jordan’s economy, behind tourism. Also, it seemed that Jordan was the poorest Arab country amongst it’s neighbors, but was considered (at least according to Faqid) as the jewel of the Middle East; our reception by everyone from the hotel, shop owners and people on the street had been so cordial and friendly that I could imagine this to be true.

The desert scenery zoomed past us, with it’s odd formations and occasional Bedouin encampment or semi-permanent village dotting the landscape. When we finally reached Petra, everyone was happy to stretch their legs. Faqid beckoned and we followed him into IMG_6579the park, which began with the Siq, a huge crack in the rocks which we learned had been created long ago by an earthquake breaking the small rock mountains apart. The minerals made patterns that looked as if “painted by hand,” a favored description by our guide. Faqid pointed out natural shapes in the rocks: a fish, a person, an elephant. He showed us the aqueduct, carved into the rock wall so long ago, that was at eye level at the beginning of the Siq but high above us by the end of it. The cliff walls towered above us, dwarfing other people walking through and messing with our sense of size. A mile into our walk and tour, Faqid pointed back behind us, asking us to identify the rock formation there. I turned my head this way and that and finally gave up.

“Never mind,” he said. “Take a look at what’s really important.” He turned us around and there, through the twenty-foot wide gap in the cliffs where we were walking, we could the Treasury’s façade. The Treasury, named centuries after it was originally carved for it’s rich look, actually houses three huge tombs. The entire façade is carved straight into the cliff side, and as we stepped out of the shade of the Siq, the sunlight about sparkled on the stone. The Treasury façade is enormous and we craned our necks back to look to the top of it. Faqid detailed each shape and feature that we saw, from the columns to the representations of days, months and years, to the figures carrying wheat on their back, resembling angelic figures. Eroded stones near the top had once been eagles. And parallel lines of pockmarks on either side of the façade were manmade stone ladders, where the original carvers had done their magic from.

All of Petra was similarly awe-inspiring: a half-stadium carved into the rock, able to seat over 3,500 people; “churches” carved into the cliffs, with caves as rooms, with the influences of four different civilizations etched into their features; the dromedaries that would rise from their resting positions to hover above us, lips mashing and jaws making perpetual chewing motions. Shopkeepers called us to see their wares and donkey and dromedary riders offered us rides. When we would refuse, they would smile and chat with us. One dromedary rider told us all about his impending marriage and move to New York, which would have to be soon because no marriages were conducted during Ramadan.

Diane and I spent two hours hiking on our own, going to see the mosaic tile floor of a disappeared church and watching a platoon of Roman-costumed Jordanians march around with their spears and shining shields. The morning sun turned into an afternoon scorch by the time we made our way out of the Siq, and as we began our two hour drive back to the Jordanian-Israeli border crossing, my imagination was filled with visions of those who must have created and lived in the massive creations carved right into the stone of the desert cliffs.

--Z

Saturday, July 2, 2011

Um… Duh?

Note: No new pictures yet… will post Tuesday or Wednesday.

Day by Day: 24 June – 2 July 2011

 

Sometimes when you travel, you think you’re all savvy and up on the right, proper, culturally-sensitive and appropriate way to do and view things. And you find that often, you’re at least partially wrong, or surprised, or just plain ignorant on some points. Here are a few examples of what me having some “duh” tourist moments.

Jews, BBQs and Ice Cream

Thursday evening, I organized a BBQ on the beach as a last hurrah for my Sar El group. The guy I worked for, Moshiach, brought a grill and tons of meat (chicken and beef). By the way, interesting side note, most Middle Easterners call chicken chicken, and everything else is meat. It’s a little disconcerting! Anyway, there were about a dozen of us there, gorging on deliciously marinated, herbed and coal-grilled meat and chicken, along with the sides everyone else brought. A friend of Moshiach’s brought his ice cream truck around and offered some to me. Being the friendly, sharing person that I am, I immediately took the handful of cones he gave me and started to dole them out to everyone… including Moshiach and Albert, both of whom are very obviously observant Jews. They graciously declined and about thirty seconds later, I realized: they had just eaten meat. Of course they wouldn’t then eat ice cream! For those who don’t know, Jewish kosher laws prohibit eating milk and meat together, and most kosher Jews tend to set a time limit between eating one after the other, usually a few hours at least.

Duh.

Bus to Eilat, with an IDF Guard Encounter

This one isn’t really a duh moment, because I’m fairly sure others were as confused as me at first. But it’s an interesting experience that I’d like to relate. Our five hour bus ride from Tel Aviv to Eilat was uneventful, apart from a brief incident that occurred ten minutes before arriving in Eilat. I was fast asleep until Diane nudged me. Once the bleariness left my eyes, I saw a stern, black IDF soldier with the usual gun hanging at his side. He was in the aisle of the bus hovering over the seat of a young black man, talking low and fast. I noticed that three other black passengers were standing outside, shoulders hunched a bit. The guard and the passenger he was speaking to got off the bus and then the guard had them all remove their luggage from under the bus so he could inspect it. He also seemed to take some time to review their papers. The bus driver seemed a bit agitated, although not quite belligerent. Fifteen minutes later, we were on our way, with the four black passengers on board and very quiet.

Later, when Diane and I were walking to our hostel from the Eilat Central Bus Station, we chatted with another passenger on the bus from America. He said he thought it had to do with Israel accepting Sudanese refugees but still maintaining a security watch on them. It was an unnerving experience and I’d like to learn more about that particular situation. The guard didn’t bother with any other passenger. Diane said that when he first stopped and boarded the bus (on a highway, mind, not a checkpoint or anything) he went straight for the four black passengers.

Fight in Eilat

Fights happen. In Miami I remember seeing fights in school and sometimes out in public. While Diane and I were eating at a little café near the Red Sea in Eilat, a fight broke out rather suddenly between a short, wiry, muscular and shirtless man who was maybe in his twenties and who seemed to be Israeli or Middle Eastern, and a seemingly white, fat, short-haired individual who I thought was a short woman but Diane thought was a teenage boy. The fight started with yelling and swinging fists on the part of the shirtless guy, but within three seconds expanded to include the throwing of chairs, tables, glasses and anything else immediately handy, like salt shakers and plates. The shirtless one seemed a bit out of his head, swinging even on his friends who tried to get him away. He spit full in the face of a blonde woman who seemed uninvolved, then went to bang on the glass windows of the store next door, seemingly demanding that whoever was inside come out.

Diane and I sat frozen in our seats until we realized that we should leave. All of this drama was happening within twenty feet of us. We quickly scurried to the next café over, which put a low wall between us and the events. I have no idea what was causing the drama, but the shirtless guy was overcome by rage and would see no reason, eventually being bodily removed by a small crowd of his friends.

A Public Beach in Jordan

Jordan is an Arab country and without knowing all the background and religious reasons, I know that women generally dress conservatively, to the extreme (in my view) of covering their entire bodies. Even at the beach. In Tel Aviv, it was common to see Arab women in full garb while at the beach, in or out of the water. Somehow, though, Diane and I skipped that realization and headed for the public beach just fifteen minutes away from our hotel in Aqabar. The hotel clerk recommended a private beach, but since we’d need a taxi to get there, Diane and I opted to go to the public beach. We had on clothes over our swimsuits – shirts and pants – but nothing can hide our white skin and Western looks. Once at the beach it smacked us in the face, though. No woman over the age of eight was in anything less than full sleeves, pants and closed-toe shoes. Young girls seemed exempt from this and run around in all manner of swimsuits. Men were shirtless, some in swimsuits and others in underwear. As we walked along the promenade, Diane and I got a lot of looks. Nothing rude or overt, but lots of looks and a few calls of, “Hello, come here!”

We pondered the possibility of at least wetting our feet, wading in the Red Sea, but ended up not doing so when we couldn’t see ANY other Westerners or ANY woman not full clothed to an extent we couldn’t match. 

Duh.

From Aqabar, Jordan,

--Z