A Journey To The Desert!

 “When you travel, remember that a foreign country is not designed to make you comfortable. It is designed to make its own people comfortable.” –Clifton Fadiman

Will is from the beautiful desert/mountainous city of Albuquerque, New Mexico. He lived there for several years before his family relocated to Virginia Beach. His grandparents still live there and we had planned a trip to visit them over Christmas this year. Our flights were booked, Atlas had a sleepover planned at Will's mom's house so he could play with the pit bulls, and we had everything planned that we wanted to see!

Now we had to wait a month for our flights. Luckily time flew by. Next thing we know it's already Christmas Eve! We dropped our fluffy child/dog at Will's Mom's house so he could have a weekend of play time with the pit bulls, small children, and get some snuggle time in. We made it to the airport nice and early because we thought we would have to battle the masses of people flying out on Christmas Eve. However, we were pleasantly surprised that the airport was near empty! We breezed through security in under 5 minutes, which I'm sure most of you are jealous of that time.

Now we had to figure out how to kill a little under 2 hours in the airport. We ended up sitting at the bar having a refreshing drink and delicious dinner! By the time we finished eating we were pleasantly full and went to our gate to relax, read, and people watch.

Our flights were pretty uneventful and by that I mean we both passed out and I actually had a pillow aka Will's shoulder. We arrived in Albuqerque at 1130 after both of our flights were delayed, but it wasn't a big deal.

Before we left, everyone, and I mean everyone, in Will's family warned me that I was going to be EXTREMELY well fed while I was there and that his grandparents would try to feed me at every chance they got. They weren't kidding. Almost every decorative bowl in the house was filled with candies, chocolates, and other goodies. Every drawer either held cooking utensils or more food. Their pantry looked something like a bomb shelter supply that could last 50 people several years.

When we arrived at their house both adorable grandparents greeted us and of course offered us food. We politely declined and went to sleep almost immediately. In the morning, breakfast was promptly served and this the feasting began! Christmas day was off to a delicious start! Since we had just gotten there and Will hadn't seen his grandparents in a few years we decided to have a lazy day and just spend it with his family opening presents, talking, and watching movies. And of course, we had a FEAST that night!

The second full day consisted of driving around town, seeing where Will used to live, taking in the sights of the desert, and going to Old Town Albuquerque, which had lots and lots of stores that boasted handmade items, Native American pottery and other makes. It was really neat to explore all of the stores with nothing but handmade Native American crafts. As an anthropologist I loved seeing the drastic and sometimes subtle differences between the pottery and jewelry of different tribes.

One thing that I really loved about Albuquerque was the openness of the terrain. There were tons of mountains that you could always see in the distance, but there was also very flat desert all around you as well. It was completely different, as you'd expect, from the East Coast and I really enjoyed it. It was a very refreshing feeling.

The next day we were supposed to go skiing in Santa Fe. I was beyond excited because I had never been skiing before and the mountains were phenomenal looking. Plus I wanted to get some really neat action pictures for my portfolio. However, life had a different plan for my Christmas vacation...

First of all, I get sick about once every 2 years. Nothing in between, but maybe a small cold. I guess my 2 year sickness interval was up and of course it had to come while I was on vacation the NIGHT BEFORE the day trip I was looking forward to most. I was lucky enough to somehow get norovirus...I got it once before on a cruise and let me tell you it is no picnic. I don't want to get too graphic, but it is essentially like throwing up out of both ends, continuously for 8 hours straight...

My wonderful boyfriend should get an award for picking me up off the bathroom floor and carrying me to bed every few hours. I felt a little better by the morning, and by that I mean I could drink water and keep it down. I decided that I would come with the guys (Will and his brother, Nick) to the ski lodge and just rest there in hopes that I would be able to ski later. In reality, I just slept all day on a table and some chairs in a corner. It was a huge disappointment that I couldn't ski there, but I'm glad I got to see the mountains and that Will had fun day of skiing. The only upside to this part of the story was that I lost all the weight I had gained by eating until I couldn't move for a few days straight. Not that I would ever condone losing weight this way..ever. I'm just looking on the bright side.

We spent our last night there enjoying spending time with his family, playing scrabble, relaxing, and of course eating. We had a very nice trip minus the illness setback. We decided we will have to go back soon so we can add more adventure to our New Mexican repertoire!   I did get to see tumbleweeds and a road runner so I can call it a success ;-)    I've always wanted to see both of those and I finally got to! (Nick and Will did a bunch of eye rolling when I got so excited over them)

All in all, New Mexico was a great success and I finally got to meet that side of Will's family. It was also my first time to the West coast and I absolutely enjoyed myself. If you ever get the chance to go I would definitely recommend it. It was very picturesque and had a homey feel to it even though it was such a big city.

“Adventure is a path. Real adventure – self-determined, self-motivated, often risky – forces you to have firsthand encounters with the world. The world the way it is, not the way you imagine it. Your body will collide with the earth and you will bear witness. In this way you will be compelled to grapple with the limitless kindness and bottomless cruelty of humankind – and perhaps realize that you yourself are capable of both. This will change you. Nothing will ever again be black-and-white.” – Mark Jenkins

Wales: Home of the Consonant Lovers

Earlier in the semester I went to a seminar presented by member of the Royal Army. After dating several military guys and knowing quite a few more this seminar hit close to my heart. These soldiers have set up a program to use archaeology as a rehabilitation program for soldier suffering from PTSD or depression. They brought the soldiers to a site and set it up as a military operation. They were taught all of the skills they needed and conducted a full excavation. At the end of the seminar one of the soldier who had gone through this program shared his story and told everyone that if it was not for this program he would have committed suicide. It had taught him skills that were applicable to many jobs and applied everything he learned in the military while giving him a sense of purpose.

I got the opportunity to participate in the beginnings of one of these excavations. Soldiers were present, but none who really suffered from anything. Everyone had an interest in it and it was nice to get to teach people what I knew. Low level archaeologists such as myself don't really get an opportunity to teach people anything. That is usually left to the supervisors and lead archaeologists. The dig was in Wales, in the city of Caerwent (Pronounced Carwen). I got up at the ripe time of 6am to be picked up at 7am. I was in and out of consciousness, but surprisingly to anyone who knows me I was in a great mood!

We got to the site and spent the entire day clearing off trees and sticks and everything else imaginable. We found a pile of tin and we were instructed to dig it out. My Dad will be proud of me for pointing out to every single guy on the site that they were shoveling in the incorrect way and proceeded to show them all how it was done and out-shoveled a very beefy 26 year old military man. That how Americans roll I guess. Underneath the tin we discovered an odd feature and we got to dig. I actually got to trowel!!!! The lead archaeologist stepped aside and told me to go for it. It was nice to have that opportunity. While working for my Dad is great I don't really get the opportunity to do much trowelling myself. It's more the people who know what they're doing due to time constraints. I'm there for brute force, all 120 feisty lbs of me.

The digs for the soldiers are more centered around making sure everyone gets to try something new and hone their skills. They are under time constraints, but everything is so efficient that things get done sooner than planned so there's time to teach people new things. Speaking of new things, I got to learn how to operate a magnetometer and a ground penetrating radar machine! I looked like I was dragging around a pathetic vacuum cleaner while imitating a scene from Ghostbusters, but it was pretty cool nevertheless.

Later that day we went back and were discussing plans for dinner. I got an agonizing pain in my stomach and was driven to the nearest hospital or A&E as they call it. Spent 8 hours there in various stages of pain from my stomach, the nurse who couldn't find my vein after 4 tries, an IV drip of some kind of drug one step below morphine and from throwing up due to all the drugs I was on.

8 hours later: no idea what was wrong with me except "you have an abdominal infection"  Why THANK you! I couldn't have figured that out by myself... Long story short. I'm fine now and back in Leicester. I had to take a LOT of medication and discovered codeine (don't worry it was prescribed to me) does hilarious things to me. For example, Laura (my best friend) spent the night with me to make sure I was okay and did not need to go back to the hospital. I ended up serenading myself singing my own version of jingle bells while accompanying myself by banging my lamp cord against my wall as a musical instrument simulation. Imagine Laura's face walking back into the room to that. Apparently I was a priceless spectacle to witness. Never want to experience that again that's for sure.

All in all I learned a lot that weekend.  1: Wales is gorgeous and they have a castle that hosts jousting competition. 2: My abdomen hates me. 3: Drugs are bad. 4: I have some great friends I wouldn't trade for the world. Yes that's cheesy, but you can tell who your true friends are when they spend 8 hours in the emergency room with you and wake up in the night just to check if you're okay.

I almost forgot!!! Every road sign is in Welsh and English. We had a field day trying to pronounce everything. For example spring water is: ffynnon yrystog.   Several towns are called: Blaenau Ffestiniog, Ebbw Vale, Machynnllyth, Usk, and Ystradgynlais.   Good luck pronouncing those lovely names. As we said on the drive there and back "Oh look! We're now in the town of.... asdknnefwuit...fffg...gll....?"