Life in Romania is still crazily busy, but it is still amazing!
Over the weekend we went hiking a couple times. Saturday we went to find the Monk's Cave which was used during the time when free religion was illegal. The hike was overall very pleasant, though the very end, right before reaching the cave itself, was pretty rough. In the forest there was a near-vertical slope that we were actually crawling on our hands and knees to get up. It was very amusing hearing everyone else having as much trouble as I was...you just had to be careful they weren't above you and about to slide down on top of you! One of the guys had very poor traction on his shoes and slide hlafway down about four different times. The cave itself wasn't terribly exciting since it was pretty much just a hole in the rocks, but I think it was worth the trip.
On Sunday we went for a walk in the woods along the Romans trench and vellum defense line. It was cool being able to see the ditches and hills they had built 2000 years ago that were mostly still standing. We followed it through the woods until we reached the site of the watch tower, in the middle of a field. We rested there, watching a big herd of water buffalo grazing in the fields. On the way back we had to climb another pretty steep bit of hill...we decided to race each other up, one boy vs one girl at a time... sadly I got paired up against a cross-country runner and lost :(
In terms of actual excavation, we have found a lot more pottery and bone fragments. We have found a number of human bones, and are now fairly certain that the floor we uncovered may actually be the top of a tomb. A discrepancy in the floor pattern makes our supervisor, Eric, think the tomb was probably robbed at one point. That has been our main focus over the past few days, so we are still waiting on opening a new trench.
Our afternoons have been pretty full of soccer and football. Last week we went to have our first soccer practice before we take on the Romanians at the end of the season... we were walking along the roman road to the amphitheatre , dribbling and passing the ball, when me and ashley both tried to steal the ball... I lost and in true Lauren fashion was scratched, bruised, and bleeding before we even made it to our practice space. We also made up a new game, called "Madness." We still dont really know the rules but the basic objective is to distract someone with a socccer ball and a frisbee, then pelt them with the nerf football. With little contact with the outside world, it's a great way to amuse ourselves :)
Last on my update today: All our wishes seems to come true in Romania! A couple days ago we were really craving some Mac and Cheese... we come in for lunch and what has Teresa made us? Romanian mac and cheese! (Noodles with FRESH, local cheese). Then we thought about how much a cookie break in the middle of the morning dig would be...and then, during a break at our halfway point, Eric pulls out a box of cookies! Another day, after digging, we were talking about how much we would LOVE some gogoc, a type of donught, and Teresa brings us a huge plate of gogoc... this also worked with watermelon, nutella, and, amazingly enough, a Trampoline! Romania is such a magical place haha. We're almost worried about wishing for anything else...the Trampoline seems like a pretty good place to stop!
All in all, still enjoying every second of my trip! We should be meeting the rest of our team, the ROmanian students, tomorrow so i'm really excited for that, and then we'll be all set!
Hope all is well at home, i'll try to update again soon!
<3,
Lauren
Monday, June 29, 2009
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Hello from Zalau, Romania! Sorry this first post has taken forever but this is the first chance i've had with internet. We've been pretty busy our first week. We spent a few days in the city of Cluj where we explored and checked out some museums. It was really neat flying into the city because it is located very close to the carpathian mountians so the surrounding area is very hilly. It was cute to see little villages nesteled in the valleys.
Last friday, while walking around CLuj, I quickly learned that street lanes and stop lights are really just suggestions that drivers can feel free to take or ignore. It's a bit frightening, the drivers here are worse than the taxis to Foxy's! Saturday we drove from CLuj to Porolissum, stopping in another city called Turda along the way. Here we visited a museum that was closed for renovations, but since the archaeological community in Romania is so small we were able to get inside because our Romanian supervisor went to school with the museum's director. We also visited an old salt mine which was cooler than any other mine i've visited! (And yes, I have visited a couple of mines!) We also went to the local market which was a really interesting experience. You can get just about anything and all the fruits and vegetables looked delicious!
I also learned another thing: not finishing all the food on your plate is a BIG no-no. UNfortunately, though the food is absolutely delicious (i've yet to have a single bad meal), the portions are WAY too big!
After our Turda adventure we finally got to Porolissum. Sadly, we arrived during a torrential downpour. We all were so excited we decided to go exploring anyway. SO glad we did, too! The site is WAY bigger than I thought it was, and we had such a great time running around discovering places. Probably the coolest thing we found was the amphitheatre, which seated about 5,500 people when it was in use. We're planning to put on a play and/or talent show in it one night. :)
On sunday we had a day to relax. It was cold and rainy in the morning but by the afternoon it had cleared up enough that me and the other girls walked down to the nearby town of Moigrad. It's a very cute little town, and it made us laugh that all these rundown looking houses had giant satellite dishes attached to their sides. The walk took a long time but we enjoyed it. We were even lucky enough to see a chicken cross the road! We of course ran over to finally see why, exactly, she had done this. She wanted to peck at a brick. Not the most exciting outcome, but i'm glad I finally know the answer :) After our walk we went back to our camp and played with Pixie, our camp dog! He (yes, Pixie is a he) belongs to Teresa, who is the local woman that cooks all our DELICIOUS meals for us. We're all so happy to have a camp dog who wags for us whenever we come back from the fields!
We started Monday with an early morning "official" tour of Porolissum. After walking around a bit we were set to work cleaning some of the structures that are already on display. We basically had to clear trenches around the base of each structure to prevent too much plant life from growing and weakening the structures. While we were doing this we met a couple of tourists! They were both raised in ROmania but currently live in Pennsylvania. It was cool talking with them, and even cooler to see tourists exploring our home!
Tuesday we finally broke ground in the forum! The boys slept late so they had to spend the morning cleaning the last few structures, but us girls got to head down to the forum and start excavating. I love the walk down to site. We walk through these big, flower filled fields, surrounded by beautiful hills. It makes me want to sing like in the Sounds of Music. Sadly, we cant run and spin around like Maria because, as we quickly learned, the field is also full of a stinging nettle plant. I still have a couple welts on my ankles from where I accidentally rubbed against it. :( We began the excavation by sorting through some topsoil, in which we found a number of pottery and tile/brick pieces. My first official find(which I get to keep!... because it's pretty common) was part of a roofing tile. We also got to start troweling in the trench, which is more precise, and I found what looks like it will be a sizable piece of pottery vessel. Unfortunately I couldn't take it out because it extends into the layer below which we were currently working on. I was super excited to go back and get it out today, only to find that our Romanian workers had dug it out and demanded a day off work because they thought it was a good find. We still need to explain to them that you can't just pull things out of the ground but instead work in layers to determine chronological order. On the bright side, it IS a very nice piece. The whole bottom of a small jar. Today (wednesday) we also found the first coin! We haven't been able to clean it yet so we dont know the date but we're hoping to find some more in the near future!
Hopefully i'll be able to update gtain soon, but these trips into Zalau may be rather scarce, depending on how supplies and such are running. Everything is amazing so far and I miss you all but i'll see you in just over a month!
<3,
Lauren
PS- 1. Twilight is even more popular in Transylvania and
2. Our romanian supervisor kept telling us to beware of the mini draculas that were coming whenever it rained. We thought it was superstition. TUrns out he just forgot the wordfor "mosquito" :P
Last friday, while walking around CLuj, I quickly learned that street lanes and stop lights are really just suggestions that drivers can feel free to take or ignore. It's a bit frightening, the drivers here are worse than the taxis to Foxy's! Saturday we drove from CLuj to Porolissum, stopping in another city called Turda along the way. Here we visited a museum that was closed for renovations, but since the archaeological community in Romania is so small we were able to get inside because our Romanian supervisor went to school with the museum's director. We also visited an old salt mine which was cooler than any other mine i've visited! (And yes, I have visited a couple of mines!) We also went to the local market which was a really interesting experience. You can get just about anything and all the fruits and vegetables looked delicious!
I also learned another thing: not finishing all the food on your plate is a BIG no-no. UNfortunately, though the food is absolutely delicious (i've yet to have a single bad meal), the portions are WAY too big!
After our Turda adventure we finally got to Porolissum. Sadly, we arrived during a torrential downpour. We all were so excited we decided to go exploring anyway. SO glad we did, too! The site is WAY bigger than I thought it was, and we had such a great time running around discovering places. Probably the coolest thing we found was the amphitheatre, which seated about 5,500 people when it was in use. We're planning to put on a play and/or talent show in it one night. :)
On sunday we had a day to relax. It was cold and rainy in the morning but by the afternoon it had cleared up enough that me and the other girls walked down to the nearby town of Moigrad. It's a very cute little town, and it made us laugh that all these rundown looking houses had giant satellite dishes attached to their sides. The walk took a long time but we enjoyed it. We were even lucky enough to see a chicken cross the road! We of course ran over to finally see why, exactly, she had done this. She wanted to peck at a brick. Not the most exciting outcome, but i'm glad I finally know the answer :) After our walk we went back to our camp and played with Pixie, our camp dog! He (yes, Pixie is a he) belongs to Teresa, who is the local woman that cooks all our DELICIOUS meals for us. We're all so happy to have a camp dog who wags for us whenever we come back from the fields!
We started Monday with an early morning "official" tour of Porolissum. After walking around a bit we were set to work cleaning some of the structures that are already on display. We basically had to clear trenches around the base of each structure to prevent too much plant life from growing and weakening the structures. While we were doing this we met a couple of tourists! They were both raised in ROmania but currently live in Pennsylvania. It was cool talking with them, and even cooler to see tourists exploring our home!
Tuesday we finally broke ground in the forum! The boys slept late so they had to spend the morning cleaning the last few structures, but us girls got to head down to the forum and start excavating. I love the walk down to site. We walk through these big, flower filled fields, surrounded by beautiful hills. It makes me want to sing like in the Sounds of Music. Sadly, we cant run and spin around like Maria because, as we quickly learned, the field is also full of a stinging nettle plant. I still have a couple welts on my ankles from where I accidentally rubbed against it. :( We began the excavation by sorting through some topsoil, in which we found a number of pottery and tile/brick pieces. My first official find(which I get to keep!... because it's pretty common) was part of a roofing tile. We also got to start troweling in the trench, which is more precise, and I found what looks like it will be a sizable piece of pottery vessel. Unfortunately I couldn't take it out because it extends into the layer below which we were currently working on. I was super excited to go back and get it out today, only to find that our Romanian workers had dug it out and demanded a day off work because they thought it was a good find. We still need to explain to them that you can't just pull things out of the ground but instead work in layers to determine chronological order. On the bright side, it IS a very nice piece. The whole bottom of a small jar. Today (wednesday) we also found the first coin! We haven't been able to clean it yet so we dont know the date but we're hoping to find some more in the near future!
Hopefully i'll be able to update gtain soon, but these trips into Zalau may be rather scarce, depending on how supplies and such are running. Everything is amazing so far and I miss you all but i'll see you in just over a month!
<3,
Lauren
PS- 1. Twilight is even more popular in Transylvania and
2. Our romanian supervisor kept telling us to beware of the mini draculas that were coming whenever it rained. We thought it was superstition. TUrns out he just forgot the wordfor "mosquito" :P
Monday, June 15, 2009
Next stop: adventure!
So as many of you know (well, all of you should know now, if you're reading my blog!) I am setting out for Romania on Wednesday, June 17th, and will be there until July 26th. I am attending a 7 week field school called the Porolissum Field Project, a joint American-Romanian archaeology project excavating the forum at Porolissum, an ancient Roman military base founded under Emperor Trajan in 106 AD.
Porolissum is located in the famed province of Transylvania, about 8 km from the modern day city of Zalau. During this field season I will be living in accommodations built by the Salaj County museum specifically for these excavations. I am so excited for this because we will actually be living in a rural Romanian town called Moigrad, so I will truly be able to experience and participate in the Romanian culture. Not only will we be working with the local people, but we will also be living and sharing this experience with them. Oh, and did I mention that a local woman cooks all our meals for us? I can't wait to try some authentic Romanian cuisine!
Unfortunately, living in such a rural area means there is no internet access in Moigrad itself, and very little cell phone reception. That's where this handy dandy blog comes in! Every few days (or whenever something really cool happens!) I will be able to make the trip into Zalau, where internet cafes are on every street corner. That means my main form of communication will be this blog, but if you're dying to email me (callisto357@gmail.com) or facebook me I will certainly try to get back to you ASAP!
Now my last little tidbit (since I feel like i've been typing this for quite a while...) is about... MAIL! Everyone loves mail! SO, if you leave me your address (either email it or message it to me) you just might be lucky enough to warrant a postcard or two! And guess what, you can even send me mail if you really wanted because i'll have a mailing address too! You can send me letters at:
Lauren Earl, Porolissum Field Project
c/o Salaj County Museum of History and Art
Str. Unirii, nr. 9
450042, Zalau Romania
*Because of the distance, any mail could take up to 2 weeks to find me.
Hopefully i'll have some interesting stories to tell you all about, and some even more interesting pictures to show you once I get back!
noroc (cheers)!,
Lauren
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