To future participants, I think everyone needs a small fan of some sort for the first day or two. I also think you should NOT let your mom take you to Marshalls or something to get new dig clothes because you definitely don’t need them. I’m serious! My mom took me, but I really didn’t need any of those clothes, and I think I would’ve been fine with things I needed to get rid of. Granted, my family doesn’t hike or go on big adventures, so I didn’t have any of that available to me to wear while digging. I also recommend fancy Korean 50+ SPF sunscreen for your face; put it on before/ at breakfast and during break. It does wonders. Put it all over your face and down your neck! And then spray sunscreen everywhere else, trust. unless your white? Maybe do more. But for my colored icons, this is my recommendation!! Before you go, I also recommend you learn Turkish. I am broke, so instead of babble or roesetta stone or anything fancy, I used drops! So, no, I did not learn it every day, BUT Drops is like Duolingo for small words you should know. I already know multiple languages (kinda), so this may have been best for me, but I prefer learning small vocabulary words over big phrases since you can still understand what someone’s talking about based on that. When you’re there, you should rent a bike! It is soooo hot in the middle of the day, and you’re going to want to go places on the weekend, so a bike is definitely the best option. I also say this because Olaf students seem to prefer the beach that’s further, so a bike will make the journey so much easier.
If I had a nickel for every time I made a joke about bronze in Antiochia using the lost wax method and the person hearing the joke took it seriously and agreed, I’d have two nickels, which isn’t a lot but it’s really weird it kept happening!!! Most of my history degree has focused on asian studies, specifically the globalization of chinese culture, so anything I know about bronze or ceramics is based in chinese methods. It was so fascinating finding the similarities to pottery in Antiochia. Besides glazing chinese pottery (not literally), I don’t know anything about ceramics or art (unless it’s writing. I know too mucha bout that. (but I can’t write an essay???… just ignore me, I’m sorry)). I loved learning about the different types, the fabrics, and the inside of the sherds. Seeing the line of fingerprints of grooves of hands was such an intimate feeling. Once, in ANS9, I found a HUGE amphora toe, and I cradled it in my arms like a baby for a bit because when was the last time that was part of an amphora or used? When did it last feel a human’s touch? Inanimate objects are just objects, but I like to think deeper about them, and I think ceramics was a perfect connection of that.
This whole experience ( Idon’tt mean the working and academic side) felt very nostalgic. Like if Mola di Bari and Escalante city combined and ended up somewhere in Türkiye (naturally). I think when I thought of the past, of my grandparents’ house that’s gone or the time with my Italian family I’ll never have again, I thought of the grief that went with it. I think Gazipasa taught me those memories do not just come with grief. I think I learned to let go. Let go of fragile charcoal I wanted to hold onto, and my old Shedd Aquarium uniform shirts, and my mom’s claw clip I stole and accidentally dropped off the balcony and broke. I learned to let go of the smell of my grandma’s house in Migross, the banter of family in a home I can’t go back to, the bond between cousins never needing to be said aloud, my brother’s face before he hit puberty. I learned what I’ve always learned and what my little pony doesn’t teach you and what you’d think working at an aquarium for three years would. I learned my insignificance, and when I mean more than an extra pair of hands. I learned silence, and Turkish, and how my own downfall was and will always be my instinct of mistrust.
ANYWAY I learned that I should return to Gazipasa and get every cat an abortion, hysterectomy, or vasectomy!!!! Abortion autumn is coming!!! Hysterectomy summer is here!!! Vasectomy winter is on its way!!!!
My most memorable experience besides the last day, where Whitney and I practically formed voltro, has to be the two days Margo and Margaret weren’t feeling well, so poor poor Yunus was left by himself with yours truly. Now. I should specify this isn’t because they weren’t there. I love Margo and Margaret dearly. But when I found that log, no one knew where homeboy Yunus was, and I really needed him there because I didn’t know what to do!!!! The next day, I got to watch him and Asude uncover and articulate the wood, which was just so freaking cool. I learned so much about them and was so excited to see something I FOUND to be so important to the study of Great Bath Room Five. Also, being able to talk to them about their journeys into archaeology and conservation was so fascinating, especially since I’m interested in both.
This project has changed my perspective on my career goals in so many wonderful ways. I learned sooo much about what I can do with a history degree and borrowing a çay spoon!!! I’m most interested in what Bihter and Burcu do. I still have an interest in technology and data collecting, and when I followed Bihter around for a bit, she told me she was making linear models with the wall coordinates she was taking, which is so freaking cool and I knew exactly what she was talking about! And then I realized if she compares wall coordinates from two places, a gap in that linear model would reveal where a wall is likely to be, and its size. I would love to have a career like that, and learn more about it, as well as what that looks like in America instead of Turkiye. Or in Türkiye. Do you think she needs an intern? I’d be a super good intern.