Ancient History Ramblings

Airport Runs Begin

Today was a busy Sunday. Bill, Mara (our Bronze Age ceramicist), and myself had a chatty-chat (PKAP lingo for a serious talk) about ceramic processing. Mara is down for a week to look at the pottery we collected last season from our survey work on Kokkinokremos. After this I did some computer work for a few hours, and then we stopped work for lunch. On the way to the sandwich shop, since Nick Karatjas (my colleague from IUP) had never seen it, we stopped at the Church of Ayios Lazarus for a brief sightseeing trip.

After lunch Bill and I went to the airport to pick up some PKAP staff members who arrived: Dr. Dimitri Nakassis (a professor from the University of Toronto whose specialty is the Aegean Bronze Age), and Michael Brown (a graduate student from the University of Edinburgh whose specialty is the Cypriot Bronze Age). While we were at the airport I tried to pick up an extra rental car but Astra was out of smaller cars, i.e. inexpensive ones, and since they had not received my email from yesterday requesting to pick up one, I will have to go back tomorrow around noon. When I wondered back into the airport waiting area I noticed Bill standing on the left side of the waiting room. The airport guys try to keep people who are waiting on passengers behind a railing on the right side of the waiting area. The only people who are allowed on the left side are arriving passengers and drivers/tour guides who stand around holding up signs with the name of the people they are at the airport to pick up. I noticed Bill was standing over there with these people and that he was also holding up a sheet of paper. I wandered over and when I looked at the sheet of paper he was holding, expecting to see Dimitri's and Michael's names on it, I saw that it was blank. I have to admit that for the next 20 minutes it was hysterical because when people looked at the sheet of paper and realized it was blank they did a double-take. One guy nearly tripped and another stopped to tell Bill he must be holding the paper backwards since nothing was printed on the side facing the crowd. Since I figured that security might eventually notice, I slid a few feet away from him and tried to look like I was not associated with him. Eventually Michael and Dimitri came out and it amazed me that neither said anything about Bill's blank sign, but they both know him and probably weren't surprised. Anyway, that was the high point of the day. We went back to the airport after dinner and picked up Brandon Olson (a graduate student from Penn State whose interest is in the Late Roman military). That does it for airport runs until Thursday.

As I am finishing this up in my room, I just caught the end of the conversation going on in the kitchen as Brandon talking about someone - "He is getting really old, he must be 40." As someone in that general age group I am going to have go in there and..........

RSM 

A Somewhat Slow Saturday

Today has been somewhat of a slow day. We got up and went to visit the Idalion Museum and found out that they were closed on Saturdays and Sundays. It was a nice drive though, and my colleague Nick Karatjas got a chance to see some of the Cypriot countryside. Since we need to buy some excavation supplies, we went to a hardware store and Bill and I argued about the suitability of the shovels. He kept insisting on buying the shovel heads separate from the handles, while I felt that if they were already assembled they were still fine. Anyway, after much discussion and sarcastic commentary we decided to move on to grocery shopping at Carrefour. I am still a bit in sticker shock over prices, the low exchange rate of the dollar is really hurting us financially this year. We also visited the local fruit market and bought some items for a salad. After a simple, but filling lunch, Bill and I had a meeting at Starbucks (he had coffee while I had a chocolate dream frappachino) where we worked on the rooming arrangements and car rental situation. This actually went very well and I feel better organized now. Later today I need to do some database work and print out some forms and if I accomplish that it will have been a very productive day.

RSM

Day 3

Today was an interesting day. Bill and I and went to the museum to check out the artifact situation. (See his blog on Artifacts in the Museum). After doing that, we went up to the ancient site of Idalion. Our main purpose was to visit Dr. Maria Hadjicosti who is finishing up her excavations at Idalion. We met with her for about 15-20 minutes and talked about many of our concerns/questions/requests/etc. As usual she was very helpful and offered many good suggestions. She also, even though she was very busy with her work, took time to walk us around the site and give us a guided tour. I have to admit that the site was pretty fabulous. There was one area that had an olive oil processing section that had all the components, including 16 press weights. Bill and I both remarked on how a former PKAP volunteer who was fascinated with olive oil production would have gone crazy on seeing all of this. After this, we came back to the hotel for lunch and caught up on email.

Later this afternoon we went to the airport to pick up a colleague of mine, Dr. Nick Karatjas, from the airport. Nick teaches in the Economics department at IUP and, as I found out several years ago, his father was Cypriot and Nick still has relatives on the island. We have been talking about Cyprus for the last four years and he finally took me up on my suggestion that he come out and check out PKAP and visit his relatives. I will be interested to see what he thinks of PKAP. As I write this, Nick, Bill, and myself are having a discussion about many very different subjects (IUP versus UND, hiring practices, global phones, faculty and staff hiring, etc.). Nick remarked that Bill and I must have known each other for a while based on our interaction, mainly Bill's comments to me which in my opinion are sarcastic, in Bill's opinion - witty. Anyway, when I counted it up, I realized that I have known Bill for 14 years, which added to my feeling of being old. So, that's it for today.

RSM

PKAP Day 2

Today was my first full day in Cyprus. We met with the guys from the British Base at Dhekelia and went over basic procedures about doing work on the base. After that meeting, which went very well with everyone being very friendly, we went shopping at Carrefour for a few basic things. I noticed again today how much Larnaka has changed in the last year, lots of new stores. Then we embarked on an adventure to find a laser printer which we weren't sure we would be able to track down on our own. We drove by a ComputerCentre store and decided to stop, then we found we couldn't get into the store because they had just laid down new concrete at the entrance to the store. It was weird, the door was open and the sign said open, but the cement was too soft to walk on - I checked it with a toe. At our second store, we actually found a laser printer for only 75 euros. Success! Anyway, the rest of the day has been and will be devoted to computer work. Oh, and my bags? .....Still haven't showed up yet, hopefully they will soon.

RSM

Back in Cyprus

Ok, after flying to London and on to Larnaka, I am officially back in Cyprus. It was a fairly uneventful flight, the usual things (crying babies, sitting on the runway, cranky old men, etc.). For me the best part of the trip is the arrival at Larnaka because the plane flies east out into Larnaka Bay before banking north and then west to land. When it does this maneuver, it flies very close to the PKAP survey area and since I had a window seat on the right side of the plane I could see Vigla and all the other important features of the site. One bad thing is that some of luggage did not make the transfer from Terminal 4 to Terminal 5 in London. British Air assures me they will be here tomorrow afternoon.

I was stunned by the changes in Larnaka. It has been remarkably static the last few years, but thee have been some changes, mainly with older restaurants gone and new ones appearing. The other big difference is the change in currency, since last January Cyprus switched from the Cypriot pound to the Euro. It makes it look like everything costs more, but when you do the conversion, it is about the same. That will do it for now, I am very tired and we have to get up early to meet with the British base people.

RSM

Off to Cyprus

So tomorrow I am off to Cyprus. I have been running around for the last few days tying up loose ends, such as graduation ceremonies, entering grades, and buying personal supplies. The final few days snuck up on me and I can't find a few things I need. That's what I get for procrastinating. Anyway, since I leave early tomorrow for Philadelphia I won't post a new blog until probably Wednesday or Thursday of this week. So check back in a few days.

RSM

Sudden Realization

The countdown to my leaving for Cyprus stands at 5 days. I realized today that I need to work hard if I am going to be ready to leave next Tuesday. This morning I talked to Bill on the phone, called David, and then met my students to divide up supplies. Fortunately this year, between my students and David's students, we have 7 students who can help carry supplies to Cyprus. I then had lunch with a colleague who is coming to Cyprus for a week to visit family and checkout our project. This afternoon I spent some time scanning in stuff I will need in Cyprus and tonite I worked on logistics. The week before leaving for Cyprus is always so busy and then the first few days in Cyprus (before everybody arrives) seem to be very calm.

On the Second Life front, a few minor things to report. First, I was given an IUP Senate grant to facilitate the construction of ancient Greek and Roman buildings on Archaeology Island. Second, Archaeology Island is nearing completion and should be open to the public soon. Finally, there was an interesting article in the Chronicle of Higher Education's The Wired Campus that addresses Second Life - "Co-Founder of Second Life Says Academics Are Biggest Trailblazers in Virtual Worlds."

RSM

T-Minus 6 Days

Sorry for missing yesterday, but the days are getting more and more packed between graduation upcoming and gathering up my supplies for Cyprus. I am always paranoid that I will forget something crucial. Today I practiced with the 3D scanner and finally decided to bring it to Cyprus for a tryout. I came to this decision because I have an undergraduate anthropology student who agreed to haul it to Cyprus for me, and I am going to bring an extra laptop for running it so that we can have a separate GIS  laptop. I also talked to a former PKAP student who is now working on her MA in Geography at IUP. She has a project that she would like us to gather data for this summer, so we spent some time talking about where she wanted the data collected from. She is interested in line of sight and from how far away structures on Vigla would have been visible.

As a non-Twitter user, I keep finding lots of mentions of Twitter in the news. The Chronicle of Higher Education's The Wired Campus has another article about it - "Twittering During a Campus Lockdown." I guess I ought to join. So.....I actually just took a minute and joined. Now I need to find some friends on Twitter and that may be the hard thing for me, due to a lack of friends and technologically savvy ones at that.

RSM

Monday...just Monday

Well, my departure for Cyprus is now only 8 days away. I managed to finish up the PKAP supply list today by buying plumb bobs at Lowes. This turned out to be harder than I thought since the first 3 employees I talked to did not know what a plumb bob was. My next step is to divide up the supplies I have among the 4 IUP students going to Cyprus with me so that I only have to worry about the GIS equipment which is bulky and unwieldy.

I read a very interesting article in the Chronicle of Higher Education's The Wired Campus about a paper which takes the position that using current leisure activities, such as iPods and online discussions, actually corrupts the learning process. The article, "Learning to Leisure? Failure, Flame, Blame, Shame, Homophobia and Other Everyday Practices in Online Education" by Juliet Eve and Tara Brabazon, appeared in the Journal of Literacy and Technology's April 2008 volume. It was interesting to read since so many people are eagerly adopting new technologies as soon as they appear. The article, I believe, goes a bit too far in its conclusions.

• "We have gone too far in valuing the student “experience” over scholarly responsibilities to knowledge. We have “facilitated” an unproductive confusion between valuing student views and validating ignorance, discrimination and oppression." (p.58)

RSM

End of exams

I spent some time today tying up loose ends by grading some exams, finishing some paperwork, and straightening up my office. I also started getting my computers ready for travel to Cyprus. My laptop has had some minor issues and bugs. I have managed to fix most of these issues by running a few utilities and have also started clearing off hard drive space. Tomorrow I plan on checking for updates and installing a few new programs for GIS work. I am also going to practice some more with my GeoXH and Trimble Terrasync in the back yard, and work with manipulating the data. On Monday I will work on setting up my extra laptop as the project's laptop and make sure it works with the 3D scanner. I am starting to feel like I am running out of time before I leave.

Things I am now checking everyday when I log on:

Days before I leave for Cyprus: 11
Exchange Rate for Euro: $1.54 (a good downward trend)
High in Larnaka, Cyprus today: 75 Fahrenheit

RSM