Titling this 'the final countdown' would be slightly too cheesy, wouldn't it?

Church blog is still in the writing, but I'm getting distracted by swing dance youtube videos and blues dancing with AJ, so it might be up tomorrow.

It is 8.30 oops 10.05 on a Monday evening, our last Monday at the dig, and it is hot. It was apparently over 100 degrees in Budapest earlier, but up here in the mountains it was only (!!) mid-90s. Don't worry, we're hydrating very well and putting on lots of sunscreen. Besides, I'm mostly in the shade over in my little corner pit.

I'm really not sure how we're going to finish everything we need to finish by Friday, but I'm betting this week is going to go upsettingly fast. Purely out of spite because it is the last week and I'm finally in a groove with everyone and everything and we have so much more to dig.

I would very much like to come back next year, ideally on Denice's linguistic anthropology field school or this dig again if not. Or! The 'experimental archaeology' class that didn't end up happening this year, but would have gone through metal working and/or leather working; basically making the artifacts we find in as close as possible ways to the originals. I'd really just like to come back and do something like this again, because there is so much I haven't been able to learn and see.

stories are woven and fortunes are told/the truth is measured by the weight of your gold

One of my favorite things about this trip has been examining the local culture versus outside influence, often broken down very clunkily into 'traditional' and 'modern' (modern being a codeword for Western technological inventions, more or less).

So let's compare and contrast yesterday in Odorhei and Sighisoara, shall we?

Odorheiu's local market was just that, one street cordoned off and filled with the same wooden-and-green-fabric-covered stalls and very fresh, local goods. At least three different meat stands, two cheese ones, multiple pastry stands (cinnamon rolls and pretzels, mmm!) and that's not even touching the honeys and jams. There was soap and there were wood and straw crafts, and a few stands selling similarly made bracelets and accessories. Traditional and/or local music drifted from the large speakers, a very welcome change from the American pop music we've been hearing in every restaurant and shop. It was very nice to just buy some food and wander around and then sit in the park and listen to the music and the people. I had one of those moments where I realized, once again, how fantastic it is to be here and how lucky I am and how cool it is that I'm just wandering around Transylvania.

The train from Odorhei to Sighisoara could be seen as a liminal symbol, if I were to be anthropological about it -- we travel from Szekelyfold (ethnic Hungarians and the local culture of Odorhei) to more Romanian Romania, through the country where we don't know which is which. We're in neither place, rattling and stuttering through the fields and the outskirts of towns with names we can't pronounce.

Sighisoara (pronounced, depending on the person's origin and language, either Siggy-shwara or Siggy-shorah; also my favorite place to say.) is a very interesting combination of Romanian and English (plus a dozen other languages; the man at one of the stands asked if I spoke German then French before we settled on English), of old architecture and bouncy houses strapped between the buildings, of stall food (stall goulash! I wanted to try it before we left, but we didn't have time) and British style pubs.

The Sighisoara medieval festival is somewhere between a ren faire and an SCA event. There were loads of obviously ren faire type people there, tons upon tons of tourists, and a whole lot of proper medieval fighting and crafts and outfits. There's traditional Romanian food and traditional Hungarian food in stalls (langos are incredible. Fried dough type bread with sour cream and shredded cheese and garlic on top. It sounds gross, but it's really yummy!) and the stalls sell everything from kitsch that we've already seen outside of Bran Castle (those vampire face mugs are everywhere!) to handcrafted, handmade leather-bound journals. There were knights fighting each other as we bought our tickets in and someone dressed as Vlad himself wandering around; there were a bunch of dressed up guys working who ran blowing a horn and photobombing people, and we stayed long enough to listen to a really cool band.

Easily my favorite stall was Natura Paper. I was drawn to old maps on parchment next to journals, and then the man behind the table showed me that they handmake every piece of paper. They had a paper-making stand next to the table; they offered to print me up whatever design I wanted on their parchment right then and there. I looked through their prints, their maps, their journals and their parchment (smooth but rough at the same time) and I had to walk away. It actually hurt, I want you to know. I wanted it all, but was on a gift-giving mission and besides, I didn't want to know how expensive it would've been. (More than that, I wanted to know how to do it myself.)

Yesterday was long and sweaty and crowd-heavy, but so great and so much fun. Today, we're off to visit quite a few of the churches in the area, so later I'll have another blog detailing that and talking about the quite literally breathtaking Orthodox church we found in Sighisoara.

Title lyrics from Loreena McKennitt's Marrakesh Night Market

Quick short update

After a whole week of nothin', I know.

We are off to the local monthly market in Odorheiu, which one person says is amazing and another says is just a farmers' market, but I'm excited nonetheless. I already picked up some jams and honeys (potentially for some family members--get excited!) at the LARAC-esque festival we found last weekend while we were in town, and now I get to pick around some more and maybe some local crafts. Very sweet stuff, it sounds like.

And then we'll be taking the 11-something train into Sighisoara to go to Romania's largest medieval festival! I am well excited for this. It's going to be quite a lot of fun, especially with this group. (A good chunk of the people here are history majors/history specific and many focus on medieval Europe, so it'll be fun.)

In unrelated, shocking news, I really like mornings here in Transylvania. I even don't mind the birds! Okay, so sometimes the cow bells and the constant mooing just outside my window can set my teeth on edge, especially if they wake me up when I don't want to be woken up, but the sunlight is soft and a warm counterpoint to the cool temperature and the windows are thrown wide onto the world. It's lovely.

dig up her bones but leave the soul alone

New site! New site new site new site!

If you didn't catch that, we have a new dig site and it's fantastic. It's a thirty minute public bus ride away, through towns and fields and hills, to a small neighborhood and then another six minute tromp into someone's backyard to our little grove of trees and rocks.

We're excavating burials inside actual ruined church walls (instead of the last site, which was more or less 'the walls are over there' with some careless hand waving), which are encircled by pretty trees and bounded by the neighbor's garden on one side. The trees provide enough shade, except for the hour surrounding lunch, and there's some nice breeze depending on where you sit.

I had no idea what to expect when I came here, but this peaceful ruin of a church is the closest we've come to the pencil sketch I had floating in the back of my mind. Digging up bodies in Transylvania doesn't have to mean disturbing their eternal rest looking for vampire-like wounds; it's laying questions to rest while we unearth history that even the locals find fuzzy.

I have a few more blog ideas percolating, so I'm going to go do some more writing. Enjoy the song Bones by MS MR, which is in the running for the Transylvania 2013 theme song, purely for the title lyric.

The Faceless Gargoyle: Brasov, Dracula, and the Carpathians

Part Two: Brasov and the Carpathians

So, technically, I'm doing this in a bit of a flip-floppy order. We descended upon Brasov late Friday night, and drove through the Carpathians all day on Saturday, and then spent Sunday exploring Brasov a bit more. But I wanted to get Bran Castle and Poenari out of the way before the more descriptiony type stuff.

So let's talk about the Carpathian Mountains. I am a writer, yes? I scribble things down in my journal and focus on the words used and try desperately to describe the color of the sky and the feeling of rain on my skin and all those sorts of poetical things. I get asked questions about this note-taking habit of mine quite a bit and my response is, because I'm a writer. Yet, when it comes to the Carpathians, words are...scarce. Fuzzy. I have lines and lines in my journal where I start a description and then strike it out because it's not right.

In Brasov, we walked through the Black Church, a stunning piece of faith and utter devotion right in the heart of the city, and as we wandered through it, stunned and open-mouthed, we found our way into a little alcove of grave markers and/or recognitions of important people of the past. Above them crouched a dog-sized gargoyle, possibly taken from outside and placed in here, with a weathered-off face. When inspiration strikes, I find myself muttering to myself, murmuring the words that make sense, that sound right; I found myself whispering about this faceless gargoyle, the phrase sticking on my tongue. The phrase returned to my brain as we sped our way through the mountains back to Odorhei. It was the phrase I was missing on our three hour trip back from Poenari as we whipped and wound through the darkening clouds and the lumbering mountains.

The Carpathians are monstrous, but not in the ugly and horrifying use of the term. They feel mythic. The clouds settle over them, a grey-purple crown, worthy of these old protectors. Giants, wreathed in mist and clothed in the finest, richest silk. The faceless gargoyles of Transylvania.

How do I portray this with words? Usually, words are the only thing I have. Words create our world, determine how we mold it, how we describe it, how we pass it on. But, much as it pains me to quote Hamlet: words words words, mere words!

But words are my only tools, especially in this medium, so back to Brasov:

Sat in the cradled arms of the Carpathians, Brasov is quite a nice city! It has Indian food, Turkish food (oh, it was wonderful to have Turkish coffee again), shawarma, and we even found a place to swing dance on Friday night. There is always something happening in the main square in town, there is a bookstore that also sells English language books, and a wonderful little weird cafe that we sat in for hours (it was really quite odd. Quirky. Mama, you would have loved it). I think my favorite part, though, was absolutely the Black Church. Half for what it is, and half for how much journal writing it inspired, especially on the idea of faith and devotion.

This weekend trip was very much all wrapped up in the concept of power and devotion, for me. The sheer...sheer-ness of Poenari is a testament to one man's power and his peoples' devotion to him (Vlad had a very dedicated following in his peasants, remember); and the Church struck me as an extremely impressive dedication to faith. The devotion required to conceive of and build these giant, truly magnificent gifts to the power you hold dearest is truly striking. 

The Faceless Gargoyle: Brasov, Dracula, and the Carpathians

Part One: Bran Castle and Poenari Citadel

On Saturday, we headed out of Brasov to begin our double adventure of, first, Bran Castle and then Poenari. 

Bran Castle is a pretty castle on the top of a hill, surrounded by the beautiful green forest and a large stone walkway...and, as my roommate put it, an entire village of kitsch surrounding the base. But the castle itself is large and white and brown and lovely, and so much more than just 'Castle Dracula.' I have to do more research, but it was a fortress and castle and place of residence for many a Romanian noble, including Queen Marie, who was really cool based on all the plaques we read. It's a nice touristy type of place. 

However lovely Bran is as a cute little town, it is indeed a veritable village of tourism and kitschy souvenirs. (Big ol' mugs with a painted Dracula face, fangs extended and forehead scrunched, for example.) We had lunch at a cafe, a couple of us and our field director, and it was a nice relaxing time. 

Which is more than I can say for Poenari. 

During the three hour bus ride through tiny villages and unpaved roads into the Carpathians, dodging cows as we swung perilously around tight curves, we had a lot of time to chat about the upcoming adventure. It turns out that Poenari, being at a most defensible position at the very tip top of a mountain, has something like 1,480 steps. Yes, you read that right. One thousand four hundred and eighty stairs, just to get to the man who takes my money. 

The hike up Poenari was disgusting. I was frustrated and in pain. I was following behind athletes, who may as well have been Transylvanian mountain goats for how they frolicked up the steps to the top. The forest itself is a pretty sight, the concrete stairs rising up through the spread green trees, pointed and thin, like fangs but more beautiful--but other than that, it was quite a miserable time, all told. 

Poenari Castle is worth it all.

The view, the power, the history of it all was breathtaking. And that's even after I huffed and puffed and got my breath back. It is at a nigh-impenetrable height, a stone and brick fortress that overlooks the entire valley, the River Arges slithering far below us, roaring and rumbling. The outline of the crumbling fortress is still formidable, skeletal against the silhouette of the mountains.

I stood at the edge of the cliff, staring down into the long drop below, and felt powerful and tiny simultaneously. AJ and I had a conversation about why. For her, it's the longevity of the surroundings, that we are seeing the same rocks and trees that Vlad saw; for me, it's the remains of the castle and the manmade imprint on history. Nature ebbs and flows to its own rhythm; humans create and force themselves onto this landscape, using it to our advantage. Vlad's genius lay in his use of his own resources and the natural ones at his disposal.

I stood where Vlad III stood, staring down at those dark, unfathomable trees. He scans for enemies while I see cars. He strides with worn boots and powerful steps, and directs his soldiers; hold, wait, but do not be merciful, do not miss. I can feel the military strength, the tactical shrewdness, the strictness that spills over into cruelty. It's a truly incredible feeling.

And that's not even to mention the soaring height of the Carpathian Mountains--which is where I shall pick up in Part Two. 

Deadliest Warrior: Vlad Tepes v. Dracula

Tomorrow evening (Friday), we head off on a group adventure to city of Brasov, in southern Transylvania. From there, on Saturday, we visit both Bran Castle (Transylvania's 'Castle Dracula'; touristy and kitschy and hilarious) and Poenari Fortress, Vlad the Impaler's real castle.

I am so ready for this weekend to be all vampires, all the time. 

One of my favorite things about being in Transylvania with a whole bunch of vampire mythos geeks and history buffs is comparing/contrasting the real history with the myths. Vlad Tepes is a fascinating character, and once you start delving into his reality, it's obvious why he's used in so many different ways. He cuts a compelling figure. 

Similarly, comparing vampire myths cross-culturally, and with the definitive Dracula work, and the deviations in fiction, is a really good time. You're dealing not only with cultural differences on what 'vampirism' is (Greek vampires vs. classic Eastern/Central European vampires vs. stories in Native American cultures like the Iroquois Vampire Skeleton), but also what Stoker decided to set down (his influences are many and varied, pulling from lots of sources and his own imagination) and how popular culture and fiction writers have played with that and weaved their own mythos. It's so much fun. 

Some backstory on Vlad the Impaler from Andre's lecture that first day/The Historian/wikipedia: 

• His father (Dracul, meaning Dragon; named for his policies and his inclusion into a society called The Order of the Dragon) made many enemies, so when he was younger, Vlad was kidnapped and held hostage in Istanbul for many years.
• When he finally returned to Transylvania, he was well-educated, very smart, and very shrewd when it came to military tactics. (Some natural talent combined with observing the Turks, no doubt.)
• As it was, the man was very kind to his peasants and they loved him, would die for him; his lords and nobles, not so much. He was hard on them, didn't favor the aristocracy system, and that made them rather grumpy. 
• Vlad made his fair share of enemies, not least of all, his lords.
• Interesting point: while Vlad was in command, the Ottoman Empire (the Turks) never set foot in Transylvania. The soldiers did (not for very long; they were defeated rather quickly, though it takes a while to die when you're impaled), but there was never a Turkish foothold in the region. (According to Andre; have not fact-checked this, but he is a Romanian scholar who has worked in this region for a very long time)
• One of his most persistent antagonists (previously an ally) was Matthias Corvinus, the famous king of Hungary. 
• Now, this is interesting, coming from Budapest where Corvinus is hailed, to a lecture where he's an impotent coward--such an interesting transition. History, man. One man's hero is another story's black-hatted villain. The truth exists somewhere in between. Or, as John Sheridan says, "Understanding is a three-edged sword: your side, their side, and the truth." 
• The legends of Vlad's death are where much of the vampire myth-research can be seen (though Andre did give us some funny anecdotes that give some evidence) 
• For example, the best one we heard, was: Vlad did not allow weapons in his presence, but a Dominican monk (an order who vehemently opposed Vlad) was allowed to carry a large wooden cross (being a monk). While in a meeting with Vlad, the monk broke the wooden cross to provide a pointed tip and plunged it into Vlad's heart, killing him and starting a whole avalanche of vampire myth questions.
• Andre's closing statement gave us one of my favorite tidbits about Vlad's life and legacy: apparently there are still monks of a religious order set outside his tomb (at Snagov, potentially), praying for his return, to fix Romania.
• Also, I just want to call attention to this very interesting painting from 1463 placing Vlad as Pontius Pilate judging Jesus Christ. Man, you could write a very long, very involved article on that. Wow. 
• And finally, a quote that I think sums it all up very well (found on wikipedia, but very interesting): 

And he hated evil in his country so much that, if anyone committed some harm, theft or robbery or a lye or an injustice, none of those remained alive. Even if he was a great boyar or a priest or a monk or an ordinary man, or even if he had a great fortune, he couldn't pay himself from death.

Whatever you think of Vlad the Impaler, I will say this: he may have been cruel, but he was trying to do right by his people, and he was very effective at it. I will have more information, plus pictures and excited fangirling. 

Archaeologists Are...(part 1)

After spending so much time around my diggers, my anthro and writing instincts are kicking in and I find myself observing the people around me just as much (if not more than) I'm watching the dirt. So let's talk about the kind of people who are drawn to dig up graves in Transylvania.

Archaeologists are wonderfully creative people with wild and very vivid imaginations.

We can be out there early in the morning, already hot, already feeling the sweat in the crooks of our knees, cranky and caffeine-deprived, and you will already be able to hear detailed theories about what we're uncovering. Crackpot theories and jokes, or serious-faced educated guesses, they're all interesting.

I can't tell you much about what we're doing (I've asked the field directors, but not the higher-ups, so I'm erring on the side of caution; the background is all here) but I can give you a little context: we found some connected, in-context bones that first day of proper digging last week, but not much else since then, and nothing connected to the original bones. So, whilst bemoaning the lack of anything new (or anything else to help us make sense of our pit), the following exchange occurred:

Pit Partner: "Ooh, well, maybe there's a pagan cult we've never heard of!"
Me: [deadpan] "There always is."

It drew a laugh and much talk of Indiana Jones, and I think I'm going to add it to my ever-growing collection of Dialogue I Must Use In Something.

In all seriousness, though, we have a bit of background on the site and a general time/place understanding of the setting, but we're digging up some really weird and varied situations. There are a few theories floating around from the directors/people who actually know what they're doing, but the rest of us are just making it up as we go along. And when I say making it up, I mean pulling it out of our butts. It's a little frustrating not actually knowing what's going on, but it's ridiculously entertaining to hear everyone's comments, and I'm content to just laugh and write them down.

Lounging during lunch and writing everything down in my little Field Notes notebook that mama gave me. (Everyone loves it and is totally jealous of me. Good job!)

I'm talking to the shadows, one-o'clock to four*

I look up from my sun-hardened clay to glance around the hillside. Massaging my hand, careful to lightly pass over the forming blisters, I take in the sights. There, in front of me, is the tall grass, light green and desperate for breeze, as I am. A little further on, the town hidden in a dip, red roofs and white buildings and small ferocious cars. The silver spire of the church, a uniform symbol in this area, glints in the merciless sun. Still further, the mountains rise, the light green melting into deep shadows.

I watch the horse-and-cart trot down the road, I hear the students' laughter mix with the rapid low Romanian of the local diggers, and I am once again struck by the luck in my life. I am doing what I once only dreamed as a far-away dream. I am on an archaeological dig in another country, searching for the past and the watercolor-wet sketch of people long dead. I am in Transylvania, hearing Hungarian and seeing Romanian and eating fantastically well. I am rereading the dog-eared and ragged pages of my book just as I am living out the footstep-worn path of the characters and their trek through the region. I am so very lucky and it is wonderful.

All day today, I've been hit again and again by this realization. That I am here, and doing this, and I am going to make it count. It's been wonderfully centering, especially when I find myself getting frustrated over this trivial thing or that stupid comment or my own personal goals in contrast with the group.

For example: while I am an independent/I can do it myself type of person, I do like a certain level of structure when there are group projects and big things to be done. I want to know what I'm doing right or wrong so I can attain the former. And this dig does not have much structure or direction, which is generally okay because I've dug before and I know about square pits and straight walls and leveling and levels and layers--but most people haven't done any of this before. There's no direction, there's no workshop portion of 'here's how to hold a trowel' or 'here's how to fill out paperwork.' Granted, there wasn't much my first summer, either; it was purely an accident of a slow day and my pit partner being absent that led our dig director to teach me the proper way to hold a trowel, to dig, to level out, etc. But it makes having a certain level of uniformity very hard when general knowledge isn't taught. Like, my troweling form is so bad it's embarrassing, because of the hardness of the clay and lack of a properly sharp trowel edge, and if it's like that for someone who has dug for the past four seasons, I can imagine just how confusing and frustrating it is for my pit-mates.

Also, I've come up with another story idea! An archaeological murder mystery! Not particularly original, I know, but the bits and pieces are being sketched out, like:

• murder by trowel--but on a dig like back home, where there are uniform trowels, what acts as the key is the amount of wear/tear and sharpness/dullness of the blade (?)
• someone came up with the idea of the body being found under the plastic tarps we cover our pits up with at the end of the day
• ~controversial~ discovery in a pit
• argument at night, over controversial discovery

Something like that, maybe. I'd have to do more research, but it could be really fun!

*Black Coffee, Ella Fitzgerald. Sad and soppy, but I was in the mood for jazz.

to dungeons deep and caverns old

For those of you who know The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings (I'm looking at you, daddy), the Mines of Moria are located in Transylvania. In case you needed this information.

We've only just come back from a trip to a local salt mine-- Praid/Parajd, apparently one of Europe's biggest stratification(s) of salt. It is massive and very very cool.

We took a bus a hour through the hills and mountains and valleys, which were absolutely gorgeous, and I was left staring at the way the mist drapes itself soft-heavy inside the green and the way the towns lie just out of its reach, but stretch up to meet the hills. The view continues to remind me of the UK, but this time, the Irish countryside. The patchwork pattern and the colors are very similar, but the texture of the vegetation gives it a different feel. As I was discussing with my roommate, who is from the very different geography of Florida, the scenery here is like looking at a familiar picture with a different zoom or sideways angle. The hills, the green, the valleys--it could be a picture of the mountains surrounding Lake George, but just slightly different. There's that extra flavor, a slightly different type of paint or mix of colors that makes it addictive. I can't stop staring.

Of course, the scenery made me think of a song, from which the title lyric comes: Misty Mountains, from The Hobbit soundtrack. (Mmm, Richard Armitage's voice...) Which was only enhanced when we found our way into the mine.

It starts with a long wooden staircase. The stairs descend into a dark, not-very-well-lit rock tunnel; down and down into darkness. It would be silent were it not for the tourists galumphing their way into the main chamber. It opens to you as you pass through a small door, and there is a truly massive cavern carved out of the earth.

I don't think Moria had kids' games and an entire rope course strung from the ceiling, though. It might have had a church cut into the side of it, though, as Praid does.

Down we go...

The rope course, for a sense of scale.

The church was really beautiful, and also huge, to fit the rest of the place.

It's been raining on and off today, interspersed with nice warm sun. Now, when I say it's been raining, I don't mean a misting kind of rain. I don't mean a nice light summer rain or even a summer storm. When it rains, it has been absolutely drenching everything with heavy pelting rain. I don't mind it, since I like rain, and the clouds are absolutely stunning, but it does make the idea of going out and digging tomorrow a little iffy. So I'm in a bit of a pickle. I like the rain and clouds so much better than humid sunshine, but I want to dig. We left it in the middle of a discovery on Thursday and I'm dying to get back to it. 

Look at those clouds, though. That is beautiful. Absolutely beautiful.

sweating out confessions/ the undone and the divine*

Easily the best story of this trip so far: getting caught in a thunderstorm in a Transylvanian cemetery and taking shelter in the nearby church.

But before we get to that...

Today we walked into town again (which is a tiring ~45 minute walk) and got breakfast at an absolutely delectable place. Alexandra's is a divine experience. (We've had quite a few of those today!) We went there for a snack yesterday and I got a giant eclair which rivaled Parisian eclairs. (I'm being absolutely serious. It was incredible.) Today, I got a cappuccino and some sort of chocolate-pastry-whipped cream thing. We sat and talked and it's so nice to just be in a new place. I love the digging and I like the socializing, but my favorite thing is slipping into the place, nice and easy and slow like the local honey. Walk around and familiarize yourself with the area, but always leave places to be explored. Eat the local foods, use the language. Talk to local people or knowledgeable people or interesting people. (There is no shortage of interesting people on this dig.) 

In following that vein, we went exploring. There are quite a few churches (two bookend the main green space/square in the town, which tells you something about how religion is viewed here). At one end of town, beyond the square, there is another church on top of a hill with a cemetery attached. We were meandering and wanted somewhere shady (at that point, it was sunny and hot) and figured the church and cemetery would work; plus, they're usually interesting places in a town, so we wanted to explore. 

I am not religious the way I used to be. I don't go to church with my father much anymore, but I have a great respect for religion and religious spaces. For me, it does not matter what religion you practice, what sect you're in, what spiritual explanation or lack thereof you hold to: sacred space is sacred. Sacred places, holy places, consecrated places, are all places of power and faith and you are to respect them. I can walk into a Catholic church, not being any sort of Catholic, and feel power there. I felt it today. Houses of worship hold a power all their own and whatever God you believe in, whether you gather your strength from prayer or from magic, you are always welcome in a holy place because it does not care how you believe--only that you do believe. The particulars fall away and all that is left is spirit, all spirit, every spirit, every holy power is present at once. 

We walked into this small, unassuming, bland white church --and gasped. No one was present, but we all three still whispered. The silence pressed on my ears and my mind and I felt clear. Cleansed? Both alone and  comfortingly connected to another something. I think it's what faith should feel like. I feel it in holy spaces. I've felt it in churches in London and Paris and now here. I remember feeling it when I would escape from lunch during Vacation Bible School and sit on the altar of our Methodist church, alone. I feel more when I'm alone, rather than through the communal nature of a religious service. I am allowed to relax and breathe and be at peace when I'm alone in a place of faith. Exactly as it was this afternoon. 

Once we felt like we'd had enough of this beautiful, calm place (and once we'd taken all the pictures we possibly could from all the different angles), we meandered to the cemetery right next door. We had just enough time to explore a little bit before we heard the thunder and the rain started to come down. So we decided to huddle in front of the church while we waited for it to stop raining. I couldn't stop grinning to myself about the situation, even in the rain --especially in the rain. I liked walking part of the way home in the rain. I lived in England for a semester; I loved the clouds and the rain and getting soaked to the bone was soothing in a weird way. In keeping with the spiritual theme, there's a lot to be said on the subject of being bathed while in a spiritual state. The rain felt nice. I was content. 

*Bedroom Hymns, Florence + the Machine. Faith and love and sex, all rolled into one, the way it should be. We tend to separate our lives into itty bitty bits and pieces, when really, it's all mushed in together, messy. Like when your parents tell you to eat all your food because it's all just gonna get mixed together and land in the same place anyway. Our lives, our selves, are a great big ball of mush--our thoughts, our feelings, our experiences. How can we separate it all out like laundry loads? 

It's not every day you get to clean Bronze Age bones.

So about yesterday (Friday 5 July)

I believe I mentioned that yesterday the forecast called for rain and so we went exploring for the morning. But in the afternoon, we met up at the lab and cleaned off bones from a Bronze Age burial for a few hours. Now, I'm not one for lab work and never have been, and there's a reason: it calls for me to work slow and steady and calm. I'm not usually good at that. In fact, the most common comment on my work (for school, on tests, at work, around the house, etc) is that I need to slow down and focus. So I was understandably a little iffy on being responsible for the fragility of over-1000 year old bones. 

It ended up being a really nice, kind of soothing, exercise. It forced me to slow down and think, which is something I'm not always keen on. In much of my life, when I'm doing something, I tend to not plan. I'm fairly lazy about the foresight. I generally figure I'll pick it up as I go, because much of what I've done has been that style. Watch what other people do and repeat what works. Living in Surbiton? Do what I normally do and see what changes I need to make in my daily routine. Figuring out London and the tube? Follow one person, then another, then another, until you know where you are. Linguistic research? D. says to just go with it and go out and do it. Lots of it is just doing (and the other half is ignoring thinking about what I have to do, but that's another blog post). So being forced to slow down and think and focus with all of me (mind, eyes, hands) is an interesting experience, and was fairly meditative by the end. 

Not to mention, I was periodically struck by the scope of what we were doing. The dig back home is really cool and I get to play with musketballs and animal bones, but that's fairly (comparatively) recent history. These are the remains of a person from 1600 BCE. One thousand and six hundred years before the current time marker of the birth of Jesus. That's 3613 years ago. That's incredible. And they were trusting me with this. That pressure and scope definitely added to my determination to do it right. I was responsible for the remains of a real person from a long, long time ago. I still can't quite wrap my mind around that. 

Also, pictures from Budapest are up! 

to the waters and the wild*

Good morning campers!

It is cloudy and threatening rain today (it's already rained twice and the forecast promises us Transylvanian thunderstorms this afternoon) so we have the morning off from digging! However, we'll be working in the lab  this afternoon, doing some bone cleaning and identification. Gotta brush up on my anatomy. (ha, that was punintentional)

Yesterday was good but frustrating. We didn't get nearly as far as I or our field director wanted us to in exposing more of the possible goodies in our area. I was working with two very nice, but very detail-oriented people, which meant that we spent a loooong time brushing off bones and being very careful--and not a lot of time moving dirt. We weren't very efficient and it drove me a little bit nuts, especially since we're not digging today and I'm not sure if he's putting us in the field tomorrow, so we may have to wait until Monday to actually get somewhere.

To be fair, though, this is the very first time most of the people here have done any digging. So while they know their anatomy and bioarch stuff, they're not as up on the practical, hands-on side. I'm a little antsy because I just want to dig. I need practice on slowing my roll and going slow and careful, though, so this is good for me.

The clay we're working in, however, is not good for my brand new shiny trowel. This is what it looks like after two days of digging.

And I'd like to make a point of saying thank you to Andy, because his joke present of the vampire hunting kit has actually been really useful.

It's perfect to carry my trowel, my sunscreen, my little field notebook that I haven't actually used, and I have been carrying around the paintbrush just in case, but they have field ones already for us to use. 

Also, in terms of adventures, yesterday was a fun one. AJ and I went shopping in a big proper Kmart/Walmart type place and boy, was that fun. We bought a whole bunch of great stuff and we're sharing supplies for lunches (since we have to provide our own for lunch break in the field) so our current plan is peanut butter and honey sandwiches. Oh my lord, the honey here is exquisite! I've never been a big honey person; I was into it for a little while when I really liked herbal teas, but then I switched to black and honey doesn't really go with Tetley or Twining's. (Or maybe it does. Ian?) But we put honey on bread/toast for breakfast in the mornings and it is the most delicious thing I've ever had, oh goodness. I'm hoping I can bring some local honey home for you guys to try, because you'd love it. 

In terms of trying new foods, yesterday was also fun. A few of us walked to the corner store about 7 minutes from the house and bought Lemon Ciuc. Ciuc is a popular local beer (I've tried a sip of someone's and it's okay for beer) and they have a low-alcohol content, lemon one that is really yummy. So we had some of that in honor of Fourth of July. And then our dinner was (get this) stuffed cabbage rolls, with sausage and rice inside and something like sour cream on the side. It was interesting. 

And on a final note, here's a picture of me actually on the dig. Parentals have seen it and probably already shared it, but I'm really excited to be here and doing this! 

*Re the title, I have Yeats' The Stolen Child in my head and have since yesterday around lunchtime. Specifically, I have the Loreena McKennitt song version going round and round in my head.

with the dust and rattlin' bones

Well, today was fantastic.

Sometimes I still can't believe I'm here. It doesn't hit me like when I was in London, a bubbling spring of laughter that caught me when I was part of the city. It's more just a calm pleasant buzz of contentment and wonder. The sky, the hills, the artifacts, the people, the language...

Today I finally got to dig! They sent three of us to start a new pit with relative surety that we'd at least find something, most likely a burial, and right off the bat we found some related artifacts. Later in the day (our first day, mind) we started finding some really cool bone! Tomorrow is going to be absolutely wicked, but probably hard work. I had to go really slow and use dental picks and a brush—the very image of a stereotypical archaeologist!

I also started a new story, and got some input from some interested diggers. It turns out that archaeologists can be some of the most scientific and most spiritual people you'll ever meet. I think it's the anthropology, even though it's not as wishy-washy as proper anthro (one girl I worked with today said she moved from cultural anthro to archaeology because she couldn't stand the shades of grey and wanted yes/no answers. I wanted to ask how she felt about the whole aspect of archaeology where you make educated guesses that are probably true, but you often don't really know with confidence.)--it's still about digging deeper and trying to understand, by whatever means are at your disposal. There's so much inference and guesswork that goes with anthro/archae, and so much intuition, too. There's a quote from one of my tv shows about how intuition is just the name we give to experience, but there's something else there, too.

Anyway, my new story is sort of about a haunted house with a graveyard in the backyard being excavated. (Life influencing art, blah blah.) I started writing and it sort of drifted away from a proper ghost story, with an actual villain on which to pin the terror and plot, and has that sort of vague nebulous non-entity of pure terror that I love in things like Woman in Black. Atmospheric and creepy and the essence of evil without a face. Now, before you think me morbid, it was inspired by our conversations in the field today about creepy abandoned houses and haunted houses and the like.

Which brings me to my title for today (you know how I love my quote titles). It's a lyric from a song that is fast becoming my unofficial Romania 2013 theme song. It's called Rattlin' Bones by Kasey Chambers and, before you ask, yes, it's country/bluegrass song, but in the style of Southern Gothic rather than just straight country/bluegrass. (It's the same thing and that's a lame distinction, but it's a great song, okay?) But the lyrics are so Southern Gothic and kind of related to this dig

But I cut my hands

And break my back

Draggin' this bag of stones

Till they bury me down beneath the ground

With the dust and rattlin' bones

And that's archaeology, folks!  

Dig, boys, dig till you drop

Thank you, mother, for getting yet another song relevant to my life stuck in my head. (Mine, Mine, Mine, from the Disney Pocahontas soundtrack, which is a really awesome song and a good pun. It's my unofficial digging song.) 

We spent today (~8.15 to 12.30, then 1.15-2.30ish?) shifting huge piles of dirt to another area and then digging deeper so we can get a level field going and finally, at some point this week, start troweling for graves. I volunteered as a bucket person (fondly called bucketeers who go bucketeering, which makes me happy) which felt easier to me than shoveling, so I felt a bit guilty, but the couple shovelers I talked to said they'd rather do what they were doing. So on the whole, if it's good for them and good for me, I'm okay with arrangement. 

Tomorrow looks to be much of the same, but if we stay at the rate we went today (a pace we were already regretting by the 10.15am break time) we'll be level in no time! Our field leader (K) was talking about tomorrow's events with another digger during dinner, but I couldn't really hear, so it'll be a surprise for me! 

The scenery here is absolutely fantastic. Our dig site reminds me a bit of our area in New York. On the side of giant green hill (mountain? hill? We're near the Carpathians, but I'm not sure what separates a mountain and a hill here, they're both huge and beautiful.), with beautiful deep green trees against the lighter green grass. All set against a blue, blue sky, with a few white-grey-white clouds. 

It sounds like Lake George, until you see the town down the road. Red terracotta roofs all over the place, topping short, squat, white buildings. The blue, blue sky, but not the clear blue and not the lake-reflected blue, more of a gem blue? Like looking at an aquamarine necklace or a blue diamond ring against the dark jewelry case interior. 

So the scenery is incredible, and the food is bloody fantastic, and the dig should be lots of fun once we get into it; Hungarian is super-fun to listen to, and I like quoting Dr. Daniel Jackson (archaeologist character from a sci-fi tv show) on an actual dig; but I have to say, I love the colors the best. Everything is good so far, but the colors are striking me most. The houses are a thousand different colors; bright yellows and suede grey and electric blue and electric green. Bright flowers everywhere (purple, pink, white, bright lipstick red) against the greenest, lushest foliage. Red terracotta roofs. Flags and signs and outfits, there's so much color here and it's so bright. It surprises me, against the dimness of the roads and the grimness of some peoples' expressions, and the assumption of a dreary, vampire-infested, post-Communist land. 

I promise I'll get pictures uploaded sometime soon! I owe you Budapest as well as Odorhei. 

Adding to my list of Things I Didn't Know I Wanted to Do Until I'd Done Them

1. Have fresh warm milk (as in, the cow was milked a couple hours prior) in my hot breakfast drinks (first tea, then strong coffee) 
2. Successfully go shopping for lunch/snacks at a Transylvanian grocery store

I am a loud, goofy, often faintly embarrassed American tourist, but it's fantastic to be here and to just walk around and be here. The people are very, very nice, especially if you smile a lot and at least try. (I throw in a lot of thank yous, both because it's the only Hungarian word I know, and because please and thank you can get you very far. People are so much more accommodating and pliant if you're polite. Also because it's the nice thing to do...) 

I didn't start taking pictures today until later in the afternoon, after our trek through town, partially because I don't like getting in the locals' way (summers in Lake George and Saratoga, know what I mean?) and partially because I want to experience it the same way I experienced London/Kingston/Surbiton. Anthropologically, trying to be part of the landscape. Getting money from the atm, spending time talking in a cafe with people, eating sandwiches at a bar, and finding my way through the grocery store. Looking around shoe stores. Trying desperately to figure out what music video is on the television when it's on mute. Just doing normal stuff in the town, because life is not more or less complex here, it just is. And that's the point of anthropology, for me; it's definitely what I like about it. The differences lie in how we are raised to deal with the situations put in front of us: physically, economically, socially, emotionally. 

That's why today's lecture on Transylvanian history with Andre was so wonderful, because he ended with our raison d'etre (and also because it's just so, so interesting, omg): the Transylvanian border was the eastern battlefield for all the major points in medieval Europe, he says; what he wants to look at is if these big political, religious, and sociocultural changes had any impact on the peoples' daily lives. 

Do changes in the economic/political/religious landscape mean big changes in la vie quotidienne? We cultural anthropologists talk big talk about a person's environment and upbringing shaping (or at least, partially shaping) their personality and how they behave/think/interact. But, for example, does the Protestant Reformation matter deeply to a farmer who is more concerned with having enough produce to feed his family? Does the border changing hands between the Hungarians and the Turks and pretty much anyone else mean much to the old widow living on the edge of town who is just trying to survive until next Sunday? 

This is actually really important for how we live our lives now, especially in American society. I am big on people knowing at least a little of what is happening in world events, because we are part of the world and not only does it matter for our own country's future, but there are billions of other people in the world and they matter too. But we fall back on what matters most to us, individually. What is best for our family, for our loved ones; what we're going to eat for dinner; what presents we still need to get for someone's birthday in two days; entertainment that affects us emotionally; gossip and girl time and chocolate. And I'm of two minds about it. On the one hand, I'm very much a just do what makes you happy sort of person; just do you and let the rest take care of itself. On the other, I do think that thinking about people not connected to you in any way is a good thing to do, and caring about what happens in different places to different people is about compassion and opening your eyes to see other people as equals, not just others. 

This post went a whole different way than I intended. We start in the field tomorrow and I'm a little nervous, but mostly really excited. It's been a whole year since I last got dirty and muddy and dug in the dirt. Tomorrow will be hard work, but fun and I have a feeling that it's gonna be so worth it.