Day 3: 1st day on site at Tell Gezer

Woke up at 1:30 am. The A/C unit in our domicile (derivative of Latin "domus" meaning "home" for those of my friends who slept in school more than they learned!) began making awkward noises. I thought it was freezing up. It wasn't. It was just working on over drive. Turns out the cleaning crew left a window open so all the nice cool air was being sucked out all night. Nevertheless, I could not sleep so I went out to the parking lot and patio area near the lobby and got out my lap top and did some work.

Discovered that the sound of canine creatures in the not-so-far-away distance was jackals. Very large bats were flying over head eating insects in the trees. Had to decide what to do . . . stay there and get work done and disregard my personal safety (I'm certain my life was at risk!) or run away screaming like a 8 year old girl! I ran! Naw . . . I kept working all the while looking nervously over my shoulder and my head as I continued to work.

4:00 am (wake up time) came early. Of course I was already up, so no problem for me (it's beginning to effect me now, though). Got dressed and put on my cool archaeology shorts, t-shirt, beige socks, boots, and my cool archaeology hat! Sorry, Steph, didn't put on the cool archaeology vest! Didn't want to look like a complete dork on the first day! Had my gear with me small "barbie" pick axe, called a patiche, my much larger and more masculine pick axe used for mining (got that from my father-in-law's garage/shop . . . thanks!), my trowel in it's trusty leather holster, my Indiana Jones-like archaeology bag that Steph and Grace got me for my b-day, in which I had various supplies.

1st breakfast was served at 4:30 am in the upper parking lot while we waited for our bus. Yes, I said 1st breakfast. We also have 2nd breakfast. I fel like a Hobbit (for you Lord of the Ring fans . . . "Do you think he knows about 2nd breakfast, Merry? Or what about elevensies? Re-read that with a Hobbit accent, it will be much funnier.) 1st breakfast was bread, peanut butter and various jams. 2nd breakfast was served at the dig site at 9:00 am which consisted of more bread, peanut butter, jams, lunch meat, cheese, cucumbers, tomatoes, cereal, and pudding. Every meal is served with this orange-like beverage and water. We took a fruit break at 11:00 am . . . watermelon . . . cold watermelon! Now I'm not much of a watermelon eater, but I was today! It was quite delicious and refreshing! (I said, "delicious and refreshing!" that's pretty funny!) Lunch was served at the end of the work day (end of working on-site) at 1:00 pm. Amazing chicken (flattened until very thin, breaded in a very nice breading which included sesame seeds and fried until very crisp. Also some amazing spaghetti pasta very lightly dressed with tomatoes and a light sauce, more cuc. and tom. salad, pita bread, roasted potatoes, etc.

That's enough about food . . . bag do the dig!

We arrived at the dig site at around 5:30 am. Dr. Sam Wolf directer of the Israeli Antiquities Authority gave us a 2 hour tour of the site, giving us key history of the terrain, city of Gezer, and history of excavations, and reviewed previous excavation sites and our current/soon-to-be home for much toiling over the next 5 weeks.

I got chased by these amazingly large hornets/bees. They came pouring out of the ground as we were standing there listening to Dr. Wolf speak. Reminded me of the passages in the OT where God said he would chase the Canaanites out of the Land with hornets! Now I know what he was talking about! (I'll have to look up the passage.)

Today at the site was a grunt work day. We set up the large shade clothes to cover the areas that we are going to be working. We used this large tools for clearing grass and debris . . . something called a terrina (I'll have to get that spelling right). A survey team has been on site for 2 weeks, getting things established and ready for our work . . . weed-eating the grass, getting supplies, etc.). We began establishing grids for work and marking out our "squares."

Lots and lots of pottery shard laying around on the surface! Much of it (most of it) is basically useless from a archaeology stand point, but it sure was cool to find . . . I mean this stuff is 2800 years old or older! I found several pieces of handles and rims which are more interesting than just the plain, flat pieces of pottery shards. So that was our work today. Basically got things set up for tomorrow. We only lost 1 worker. Young lady from a college in Colorado got overheated during the first 45 minutes of the tour/lecture with Dr. Wolf.

Temperature . . . much hotter back home in Texas! It couldn't have been warmer than about 88 degrees with a nice breeze coming off the Mediterranean and coming acros the top of the tell. However, much drier here, so dehydration is more of an issue than one would think based on the temp.

Came back at 1:30, had lunch and then some down time until 5:00 pm. Normally we'll have pottery washing time at 3 or 4 in the afternoon for a couple of hours, but not this first day. I tried to take a nap.

5:00 pm we had a presentation by one of the residents and staffers of Neve Shalom ("Oasis of Peace"). I told you in one of my previous blogs that I would tell you more about them. This is a village established in 1977 by a group of Israelis and Palestinian Arabs who decided they wanted to change the way their two groups relate to each other. They have lived peacefully in co-existence for 30 years. It was interesting to listen to Akmed and tour the area. Their link to their website is on my link list.

Dinner tonight . . . I ate grapes. I had 2 servings of lunch, so wasn't very hungry. Place 4 chess games with my new Persian chess board, with olive wood pieces . . . won every game! Now that I've blogged, time to go take a shower and get to sleep. It is 9:30 pm here and 4:00 am will be fun. Hopefully I'll be more successful in my sleep.

Keep reading my blog . . . and let me know if you find it interesting and/or entertaining!

Shalom!

Trey