End of the Dig

Today was day 34 in Jordan and the end of the dig season. It has been a great time and we have enjoyed this beautiful country. I have become addicted to digging and Helen is ready to move on. She has just said to let everyone know that she is suffering from RSI in her left shoulder from scrubbing pottery everyday. Our time is over and with the increasing tension here we are both releaved to move one. Last night the USA followed up the Aussie advisory on an imminent and credible risk of terrorist attacks in Amman shopping malls. In other words there is some intelligence coming in that ISIS is coming to attack Jordan targeting malls. Members of the team who are staying on for a week or two more to finish off the paper work have been told not to go near a mall for the rest of the time they are here. Every policeman and soldier must have been on the streets today, all heavily armed, check points everywhere, armoured vehicles at intersections with mounted machine guns, just like on TV!. On site today one of the Egyptian labourers was wearing a Smith & Weston revolver in a shoulder holster. Thankfully he took the bullets out when he showed it to us, but put them back in the chamber when he finished doing so. He wore a tee shirt with John 3:16 in English on the back, a picture of Jesus on the Cross with the caption "Have you heard me yet?" Our Egyptain labourers are Coptic Christians and they said they would not be taken by ISIS like the Egyptian labourers were in Libya. We felt for them and noticed they were treated badly by our Bedouin hosts. They are in a tough place but it is safer and there is work for them in Jordan. I am sure my pacifist colleagues would not be happy with them being prepared to defend themselves. Last two words on revolvers. Was told with the security in the city as it is, many civilians would be carrying revolvers too. Yesterday Helen and another lady were walking on the lower tell when a shot rang out from the other side of the banana plantation that gave them a real fright so they hid behind some Roman ruins. Another shot was fired and the bullet richocheted off somewhere. Meanwhile a dig team was also a bit apprehensive in sight of the shooter who was taking shots with his revolver at a stray dog. The wild west of the Jordan!

Photo 1: Dr David Graves one the leading biblical archeologists in the world took charge of excavating the pot I found yesterday with me helping. It was an infant burial. The gray blob is a small ceramic vessel that would have had something like olive oil or perfume in it buried with the child. Only trouble is the dating is uncertain. We were hoping it was Middle Bronze, it might actually be Iron Age, meaning it is still at least 3,000 years old. Everyone was saying this was actually a rare find and the trained archeologists were jealous so I feel chuffed. I also found out today that if it was Middle Bronze Sodom or Iron Age Canaanite they sometimes sacrificed infants in the same manner they buried them if they died of natural causes. The best guess at cause of death is that it stopped breathing at some point. We also talked about travelling back in time to be in Sodom as moderns. The experts say we would probably die within a fortnight from the diseases in the place.

Photo 2: We all became attached to the dog called Gomorrah here sleeping in the shade right where everyone wanted to walk on a 27C day.

Video: A farewell to Sodom from King Bera's palace.

Tomorrow we head onto the next stage of our adventure, a week in Israel. From what everyone says who does the crossing regularily the Jordanian's process things quickly and efficently while the Israeli's take hours to do the same thing. Will wait and see, which reminds me of one more "this is Jordan story".

When I went to top up my broadband dongle for the internet I went to the counter of the shop where there were four people behind the counter waiting to serve customers. I was the only customer so went up to one of the people. I asked if he could speak English and he said yes. He then said to go over to this machine at the end of the counter and get a customer number. I went over to the machine and all the instructions were in Arabic. I shrugged my shoulders and gestured at the guy so he came over to help me. What did he do? He followed the Arabic instructions that chose English as the preferred language and left me to it and went back behind his desk. I followed the instructions until I came to the place where it asked me for my Jordainian cell phone number. Don't have one, so shrugged my shoulders again. He came around once more, did some more button pushing, then walked off again behind the counter. I waited and out came a print-out in English with "Customer Number 0. Please wait in line until called." I didn't see the funny side at the time. So I lined up on the spot and waited a second until a nice young woman called my number - 0. She spoke good English and the transaction was done in no time. She even managed the pun of done - "we are done now Mr Dunn."

Hopefully I can blog from Israel tomorrow night. In the meantime, farewell from Amman, Jordan.