The work really wore me out. Like I said before, it was hard work. everday. in the sun. We cleared A LOT of land. The best part was being dead center on top of a town that has seen so many eras pass on through (every era except the Bronze Age, apparently). Halai was a major site for so many civilizations gone by, and now the Athenians claim it as their vacationing spot, and for good reason! There's quite a bit of waterfront. The water is exteremely calm. You can jump in and swim nearly anywhere in the area. There are also a few fresh water springs. A downside: it's rocky. And I'm not talking about just any rock, these are sharp, pointy rocks. We called one waterfront Razor Rock. Everyone in our group came out of this trip with scrapes and scratches all over from various rocks, but we're all sorts of rough-and-tumble like that.

The people of Theologos treated us as though we were celebrities. Everyone knew about us. Everyone knew where we were anytime we were in the town. They had scouts watching us. I suppose they didn't have much else to do. It wasn't quite vacationing season yet, so the town was really empty for the time being. Beyond the whole being watched all the time, the townspeople were really friendly and dealt well with the fact that we didn't know much Greek. Sometimes the owners of various bakeries would give us free food. Yes, free food!

The area is really interesting. The town is so non-global: a big change compared to everywhere else I've been in Europe. They reuse the glass bottles for Coke and Sprite. They make their own Retsina (wine) and sell it in large plastic water bottles and huge jugs. Before the Athenians got there, it was very chill: a place to just work really hard and then relax the rest of the day on a beach or (even more preferable) in the shade reading about Greek history or art. It was easy to get accustomed to this place. The camping wasn't so bad. The tents were nice, and the weather was, for the most part, fair. There were a few thunderstorms, but we handled them well. No casualties.

When the Athenians came to town, which was pretty much our last night, Theologos was extremely different. It was packed. There were people everywhere, every restaurant, every everything. Not that the town lost it's charm... we just lost our celebrity status. People could easily tell that we were not Greek, but I don't think they knew as much about us as before.

Today, I headed off to Theologos, a resort town in central Greece that a lot Athenians travel to. I'm volunteering through Volunteers for Peace on an archaeological site.

I met all the people I'll be working with, the professor and his wife (also a professor), our camp director, the people working on the archaeological site this summer, and eight VFPs. The VFPs are from all over the world: 3 Americans, 1 from Poland, Canada, Kora, Finland, and France.

We're staying in tents on the Coleman/Purdy property in the pistaccio tree grove. Our job is getting the archaeological site of Halai ready for digging/tourism. It's one of the only visitable dig sites in the East Lokris region. Our work included A LOT of weeding, wheelbarrowing earth, and digging a trench. It was sweet. The work was long; we would work 7 hours a day from 6:30am to 1:30pm Monday through Friday and half a day on Saturday. Even though it was hard work, we did have a chance to do a tiny bit of archaeological work at the end, and WE WERE IN GREECE! Who could ask for more?

It's a little odd, because everyone in Theologos and Vivos knows us as the non-Greek people. We're mini-celebrities. It's a two-mile walk over a hill from the Coleman/Purdy house to the city and the dig site, but we often get a ride in the mornings to work. This place is very enchanting. At night, you can see all of the stars. I mean all of them!

Odds and ends:
Travel: a van.
Lodging: Hotel Nausika, and then the tents we set up in the pistaccio grove
Food: making our own at the camp site!