Home abroad

It is very good to be in Petra again. This is only a three days holiday in the middle of the excavation season, but it has been nice to see old friends and acquintances. And to move on my own - in Jarash we ladies are not allowed to go to the town without being accompanied by a male member of the team, due to some incident a couple of years back. Also, after spending altogether closer to a year here (in bits and pieces), this place has a certain feeling of being a home abroad. When I left in 2005 I had no idea when, if ever, I'm coming back. I did not quite fall to my knees and kiss the ground, but... yes, it is nice to be here.

After we come back from Petra, the students (and I) are being rotated to new squares. I might even get to do a little sounding of my own. I'm very excited about that! My previous fieldwork experience in Jordan has been almost exclusively survey, so this has all been new to me. Although of course most excavation skills are transferable to almost any environment. Speaking of which, I got to do my first Harris matrix since my own fieldschool in 1995 yesterday. Heh.