The Accidental Archaeologist

Meat, meat, meat & homemade wine

We’ve been eating a lot of meat on this project. A LOT of meat. Sunday was no exception.

We knew we had to work some, but we had no set start or end time. Most of us tried to sleep in a bit, but it’s hard when you’re on the floor on an air mattress and you’re used to getting up at 7.00. So, we lounged for a couple of hours. Some folks wandered in and out of the kitchen making tea and snacking…checking email…that sort of thing. Mid-morning sometime, we thought we were leaving, but then the prof. got all excited to show us some photos and video of his dig last year in Turkey (one of his main projects). So, it wasn’t really until about lunchtime that we packed up the truck and headed up the road to the site. It was a beautiful sunny day, and my team was drawing profiles of the walls (very tedious but easy work). Finally, around 5.00 or so we started to pack up and head downhill to get ready for the long-awaited barbecue. Of course, that’s when it started to cloud up and rain. Our original plan had been to have a barbecue at the “white house” near the site where we’re storing our gear and which has a big yard and some picnic tables. Instead we went to Plan B and came back to our resident village where we had access to the sports center, which has (conveniently enough) a covered patio with a fireplace and a couple of tables.

The prof. and I got a roaring wood fire going, in the process of which, he managed to gash his cheek with a splinter of breaking wood. Of course, while he’s standing there bleeding and swearing in German, the deputy mayor of the village shows up to say Hi. There was a scramble to apply a clean cloth and mop up most of the blood, and then lots of “schmoozing” (the Germans are getting a kick out of our use of that word, because it means something more like “smooching” when said in German). I managed to sneak a photo while they were talking (the prof. is on the left):

Eventually, the barbecue got underway, and, let me tell you, it was a meat-fest. Hamburgers, pork, two kinds of sausage, steak…you name it (except chicken…too tricky). Now, I should mention that our diet so far here in France hasn’t exactly been vegetarian. Every night we got to the local restaurant for a set meal, and every night we get a choice of steak or some other meat for our entree. I’m stocked up to the eyeballs right now in meat and cheese. But a barbecue is a bit different, of course, so we tucked in with relish. There was also a generous supply of lagers, a bottle of homemade schnapps from the mayor of the village of our site, and several bottles of last year’s wine from Msr. K in the village, who makes his own wine like most of the folks here. The schnapps was like burning floor cleaner (I think is was supposed to be plum), but the wine wasn’t too bad, and the beer disappeared quite rapidly, too. We stayed on until late that night chatting and laughing and carrying on. The best night we’ve had here.

To be continued…