The Great Wait

When I was just finishing my last entry Monday night the rain began to pour upon Varna. Shortly after the thunder and lighting darted across the sky… the rain only intensified. My upstairs roommate, Tom, described it perfectly. He was upstairs in his room, looked out the window and it was nice and sunny. Perhaps a couple seagulls passed by but for the most part it was all clear skies. A minute later he looked again and what he saw was a black wall of water accompanied by thunder and lightning and other Zeus associated characteristics.

Needless to say, the streets flooded all around the hotel and permeated into the avenues, streets, and alleys around the city. I do have pictures.
*By the way, just so everyone is aware, I forgot (of course) the cord that connects my camera to my laptop. Ergo, I will put pictures up after I return to the States. I promise I will make this blog more visually stimulating.

That night was spent with the rest of the archaeological crew in the dinning room of another hotel - where the group as a whole dines. We drank our Zagorka beer and Bulgarian wine while playing card games. The original intention was to wait until the storm passed. It never did.

The next morning was sunny. The weather had cooled after the storm so it was pristine working conditions for the ol’ pickaxe and shovel. However, the working pits had literally become ‘Byzantine baths’ and the new segment (not M6) that my excavation team was to work on was under water. This was extremely disappointing because this was the day that we were going to be moved from M6 to P8 on the grid. P8 is the place where the previous diggers had exposed the limestone layer, which is the infamous layer that traditionally covers the graves discovered on the site. At least the graves discovered in the adjacent squares. In P8, all of the evidence was pointing toward another Roman grave discovery. My team and I were totally ready to be the ones to reveal this new hypothetical grave. But, as you now know, it rained hard the night before. My team and I were not therefore ushered into archaeological glory. We were instead subjected to tedious paper work. We spent the day doing scaled 1:10 drawings of walls. It was a neat task to learn but our real inspirations, our hopes and Indiana Jones-esque dreams, they were elsewhere on the site yesterday.

This morning my internal alarm clock woke me up at 6:45am, as it does everyday. It never fails. I stumbled downstairs and ate my yogurt, drank my ritualistic Nescafé Mocha, and tested a hardboiled egg. You have to be careful because sometimes you might end up with an egg that is not all the way cooked. In those situations, I silently curse to myself and search around for my napkin to wipe off the yokey mess on my hands in the most discrete way possible. Upon completion of the main breakfast operation, I then turn my attention to the fruit basket in hopes of finding something to nourish myself while at the site all day. A banana is usually a safe bet. I have had bad experiences with mealy apples, mealy melon, and rotten oranges while desperately biting into one with hopes of rejuvenation. It is horrible because I instead have received continued hardship. No break.

The site was still damp today. In some squares people were able to resume work, but the square that we all have our eyes on was still too bog-like to even shovel. My teammate and I spent the day emptying a dolium full of pottery shards, pebbles, and this one huge stone that was in the way the entire time. Right in the middle, almost peculiarly placed. As if some marauder put it there for the sole purpose of perplexing us. The stone is about 50cm x 50cm x 25cm. Massive enough to break my back if I tried to lift it out of that awkwardly shaped dolium – which at it greatest width is about 1m (3.28084 ft. for those who are not familiar with the metric system).

I hope that tomorrow will be the day to finally sink my shovel into that square that holds so many hopes of discovery.

There were more dolia discovered in an enclosed area of the churches outer architecture. About four more dolium in total, all of them were side by side and positioned in pairs. This indicates that the area was most certainly a storage room for grains, wine, or even apparently gargantuan stones. But on a serious note, the stone more than likely ended up in the dolium after tumbling from the nearby church wall when the structure was being torn apart by whomever. It was kind of funny though. A little bit ridiculous, which makes me smile.

So for tomorrow, keep the καλή τύχη coming!