Shabbat shalom, everyone.
As I write this, my friends and colleagues are taking an afternoon excursion to the Sea of Galilee for some light swimming. I elected to stay behind because my recently poor health has made me cautious of cold water and long exposure to the elements.
(Speaking of which, health update: I actually slept through the night for the first time last night. I opened my eyes this morning, saw sunlight through the window, checked my phone and discovered it was 7:17 - a vast improvement over 2:30 and 1:45 from the two previous nights - and lay in bed for a minute just thinking "Thank you God." I felt rested, my cold was at about 40%, and things were looking up.)
We have just returned to Hakuk Balev after a field trip. It was the bees' knees. We went to Tel Qadesh first, wrestled through 7-foot high thistles that had really pretty purple flowers but vicious thorns, all the way up a hill, then arrived at the site. It had clearly been a magnificent building complex before it was in ruins - it was very large and had lots of rooms (including a pantry and a granary area) and, according to Dan the Pottery Man (who had excavated there before), was a Phoenician administrative center. Don't quote me on that though; I may have gotten my facts mixed up in the past several hours. I'll confirm or retract that if you ask me in person when I get back to the States. Anyways. It was a gorgeous site, I thought, especially since it had been a bit overgrown and there were flowers and grass climbing up the rocks and over the floors. On the way back down the hill, I ripped the skin above my hip whilst climbing under a metal fence, and didn't think much of it until one of the synagogue square supervisors, Brian, said something about tetanus shots, thus reminding me that I don't think I've ever had one. I threw some hand sanitizer on it after it stopped bleeding, hopefully I don't die.
A hop, skip, and a jump away was a Roman temple. Jodi thinks it was a roofless temple so worshipers could look up to the heavens, because of the absence of roof tiles and such. Also, there were apparently child sacrifices that took place there at some point, which is kind of gruesome. With all that aside, the ruins were amazing - only the facade and a few columns and various stones were left, but it was clearly a beautiful structure in its time. The stonework had some really lovely designs, and the columns were chiseled very intricately; I'm almost certain they were in the Corinthian style.
Next we went to Bar'am. I'm pretty sure that's how it's spelled; just now I tried checking the brochure I got but everything on it is written in Hebrew so I can't verify this assumption. It is pretty close to the Lebanon border, and is the site of a beautiful Galilean-type synagogue, similar to how ours at Huqoq is supposed to be, except that at Bar'am the floor is made of flagstones and at Huqoq it is a mosaic. Interestingly enough, it seems that there was a regional trend of mosaic synagogue floors in the southern Galilean area, as demonstrated by the synagogues at Huqoq and two other nearby sites. In the northern part of the region, flagstone floors are prevalent. It was a lovely synagogue - it had been two stories in its prime, but now only the base, facade, front porch area, and some columns remain. Also, it's significant because it is still standing on its own instead of having been dug up by archaeologists.
After walking around and taking pictures in the synagogue, we picnicked under the trees and headed back. (A quick note about lunch: schnitzel. Schnitzel everywhere. Schnitzel all day, errday. Also, juice boxes here are disappointing; I expected my juice to taste like Capri Sun, and instead got a mouthful of something like melted Benadryl.) We stopped in Safed (pronounced and alternately spelled "Tsefat") for about half an hour - an old, charming town on the side of a mountain. Because it's Shabbat, everything was quiet, all the shops and galleries were closed, and there were very few people on the streets. Nonetheless, we got to roam the cobbled streets, admire the flowers and view overlooking the plains and mountains, and play in a little playground above what looked like a miniature Greek amphitheater. Then we went back to the kibbutz and part of the group went to the Sea of Galilee.
It was great getting to go out today. I've spent the last couple of days closeted in my room, listening wistfully to the sounds of happiness coming from the courtyard, and only hazily aware of the people around me during meals in the dining hall. Yesterday I did get to wash pottery for a while, which made me feel like a full-fledged archaeologist. Then I got bored. And dirty. So I took a nap.
Tomorrow I get to go back out to the dig site. I'm excited. I haven't been there since the first day of excavation prep. I don't want to miss any more of the digging, and we get to start going through the plaster floor in my square. My square buddies are Bailey and Lisa, and our supervisor is Jocelyn. Hopefully everything goes well and everyone pulls their weight and we find some cool things. I feel like I'm behind on everything - pretty sure I've forgotten how to take elevations, and I don't know what I'm supposed to be documenting in my notebook, or even what the numbers of the squares are. Still, everyone's been really nice through this annoying period of terrible feels. They're all very helpful and kind, which warms the cockles of my heart. Another of the perks of getting better is that pretty soon I'll be able to hang out with them all in our free time again - playing backgammon and chess and debating theology and such.
In case you're wondering, yes, I did take pictures. I don't have the camera cable, though, so I can't put them onto my computer until I get home. Patience, patience.
Again, Shabbat shalom and (since it's closer to night than morning) laila tov.
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