Next Two Weeks...

Once again, sorry for the delay in posting! I'll get right to it.

Work week for Monday, July 18th:
The trench keeps exploding with contexts and features (meaning interesting areas and various walls uncovered) so there's been a lot of flurry and discussion (mostly in Greek) happening around us. Katie got made a secondary trench master so she could help Adrianos with the paperwork since there's a lot happening here. That's left me with hand-sifting, bagging and drawing. The drawing started on Friday the 22nd and didn't really stop - more on that later. I did get accidentally jabbed in the lower calf with a shovel, which left a nice bruise. Memmo, the Greek workman who did it, was very apologetic about it.

Saturday, July 23rd:
The last field trip! This one took place at Olympia, the first site of the Olympic Games in 776 BCE. There were lots of things to see, like a big gymnasium, a few temples, treasuries, a workshop and a large stadium. It was here that boys and girls split into separate groups and each ran a race (around 200m long, I think); I'm pleased to note I came in third place.
Afterward, we were taken to a nearby small town with a nice beach. We had lunch here (shrimp for me!) and then had a nice little dip in the sea. Not as warm as Karathona, but still pleasant and far less crowded.

Sunday, July 24th:
Lazy day! I slept in until about 10:00 (though I never seem to be able to get a full night's sleep when overseas - I almost always wake up at 5:00 or 7:00 or some such silly time.) After having breakfast at one of the restaurants in town, I went up to Petite Planete to chat with Vasiliki and go swimming in their pool, which is so nice to do on a hot day.

Work week (final) for Monday, July 25th:
So, that drawing from Friday, I continued this week. That drawing is built on top of previous plans. But over the course of the week, they would continue digging, so a couple parts of the plan changed and had to be drawn again. The entire week I did nothing but draw, and it's a large, complex trench. It's about 7 by 4 metres and contains an unimaginable number of rocks. So for six straight work days, about seven hours a day, my eyes were on those rocks or the paper in front of me. It kind of made me go loopy - there were moments I'd have to look up at something - anything - else, or take a small walk, or listen really attentively whenever someone came by and talked about the trench in English. Andy had to come join our trench and become a third trench master so he could provide extra help.

But lots of other interesting things occurred over this week. Monday night was free of activity but there was something every night otherwise.

Tuesday, July 26th:
There was a special village party called Panegyrie, a celebration for the patron saint of Mycenae. We had tables reserved for us at Jimmy's Restaurant (a popular eating spot for the team) and there was live music, some dancing (a strange variation of the Hora dance done at mitzvahs and weddings; the steps were similar but there were an extra few thrown in there.) We had Greek salad, pork, cheese, bread and wine for the table. It was a really good time, and I was glad everyone would be eating together instead of at different places at different times like the usual - I feel it makes for more enjoyment. There was no curfew for that night and everyone but the trench masters could go down to site at 7:00am instead of 6:00am, which was pretty nice. I definitely took advantage of that.

Wednesday, July 27th:
I had to move rooms this day for some reason - I think a girl moved out of room 1, and I was sharing a room with Amanda and Patricia by that time (yes, Patricia was moved into there the previous week! Lots of moving about), so I guess for reasons of space, I was told to take the new spot in room 1.

Talent show night! This is an annual occurrence for the dig, and was the third year doing it. I didn't take part but several others did. Songs (including one short opera piece) and dances (tap and bellydancing) were performed, poetry (The Highwayman) was read, and one martial arts performance was thrown in there as well. They were all very good and I enjoyed it very much.

Thursday, July 28th:
Soccer game! Or rather, football, if you're in Europe. Apparently, most years it's the Greeks vs. the Excavators, and most years we lose terribly. But this year, it was the Workmen vs. the Archaeologists, which meant we had Adrianos and his younger brother on our team and gave us a fighting chance. We took cars to a nearby town with a fenced astroturf field (far more fancy than the small dirt patch used in Romania and sadly less dirty gameplay-wise.)
The game started at 8:00 and would last for about two hours. It was quite entertaining to see the back-and-forth going on. There were a fair amount of tackles and slides and falls, which are always funny to see. The Workmen were up by a few points most of the time, and I think we almost caught up. I'm not entirely sure of the final result since I keep hearing that we either won or lost 21-24. Whatever the case, the Archaeologists team came out battered, bruised and happy.

Friday, July 29th:
At the end of our last workday, we had a small field trip directly across the road from our path to site to the Treasury of Atreus, the largest tholos (beehive-shaped) tomb in Mycenae. We entered this huge construction and took pictures inside. There was a small side room, and on the side of that path was a sign saying "WARNING, BE CAUTIOUS" or something similar and everyone took it to mean that maybe it was slippery or there were loose rocks inside. So we went in and took pictures there. When I came out, an angry woman employee came yelling "WHY YOU GO INSIDE? SEE THE SIGN?" and she moved it back to its apparent original position, blocking the path inside. So we weren't supposed to go in at all, oops.

Later that night, most people went to Jimmy's for a final dinner together. I sat with Ella and Katie M. and we split a pizza together. I had several drinks but they were all well-deserved for the ridiculous amount of drawing I had to do. Heidi (the supervisor for Katie and I) came by and bought us drinks as gratitude for our hard work, which was really nice of her. All in all, another fun night was had.

Saturday, July 30th:
There was a chartered bus due to leave for Athens at 7:00am, so I got up at 6:30am to say goodbye to people. I had to be up at that time anyway since that's when the hotel people wanted to clean out all the rooms and give fresh towels/sheets. I was to move again, to room 10 with Elly, the other student who would be remaining behind for another week. However, I don't think anyone was prepared for the length of time it took for this cleaning to happen. George, the manager, kept coming around and giving updates on progress. Most people were allowed to move back in at 11:00am, but Elly and I had to wait a whole other hour for ours to be specially cleaned. I did not think that was okay. I was really tired from the night before and tried to sleep on the couch in the lobby. I did get to finish my book, Deja Dead, by Kathy Reichs (the inspiration for the TV show "Bones".) I'd read A Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood before that. And then I started Thank You For Smoking by Christopher Buckley. All books were borrowed from the hotel's bookshelf.

Once it was finally time to move into the new room, I had to nap for a little while. I went for lunch with Elly and after that I decided to do some work. There was so much of the plan still to do, that I couldn't possibly finish it before I left if I tried to do it all on Monday. I went down to the site and did another square metre of drawing.

Sunday, July 31st:
Elly and I went to Petite Planete to use their pool, since Vasiliki gave me the okay to invite people now and Elly was really excited about the idea. It was another hot day so again the pool felt like an excellent place to be. In the evening, I did more drawing and made progress on the plan.

That night, we had an official dinner at Kolizeras (the place we ate lunch at during the workweek) with several workmen and the remaining team in attendance. It was a very good meal of meatballs, sausages, cheese pastries, moussaka, pork and watermelon for dessert. We had music and good conversation, so it was another nice night.

Monday, August 1st:
Adrianos came by at 7:30 so we could head to site and finish the work. He had a profile to do (a sketch of the stratigraphy in the trench) and I had to complete my plan. I finally managed to do so by noon. It's been a maddening time in that trench, but I was glad to be done. Or almost done. In the evening, I still had to fit together the sketches I'd done on two different pages and make it a coherent whole. I started on that and it took me several hours to get it going.

Tuesday, August 2nd (today's date):
I woke at 7:30 for breakfast and then returned to my work. I finally managed to get the whole thing together, but I still had to ink it! I only finished the whole thing at 2:30pm. I was deliriously happy to be able to put down that pen and walk away.

At 3:00 I said my goodbyes before Adrianos and his father gave me a lift to Fichti (the next town over, really close by) so I could catch the 3:30 bus to Athens. By 5:15 I was at the metro stop and was able to hop on for the two stops to the one near my hostel and at 6:00 I was settled into my hotel room. I'm in the lobby now typing this up and I'll be heading out soon for a quite bite to eat.

Tomorrow, I fly to Toronto and will be home by the evening (Canada time). It'll be great to see everyone again!