Hello again! It's been a while since I last made a post, so I thought I would write one today. I am in Tel Aviv with Melissa and Bronwyn. Creighton is back home in Canada, Laurine is in Jerusalem and Noah is in Akko. I will be here in Tel Aviv until probably next Sunday, at the latest. After that I will go to Beit She'an.
We were supposed to meet at the French Hospital in Jaffa to get introduced to our work site Tuesday morning, so we decided to go down Monday and stay the night. We stayed at the Overstay Hostel, the same one I stayed at over Passover, and then went out to explore the area. While we were out we got a call saying that we were no longer able to work at the French Hospital, so they were changing our plans and would let us know Tuesday morning. This last-minute change of plans caught us off-guard, so we decided to have a "crazy" night. First we ate a barbecue dinner at an American-style barbecue restaurant we found in the Jaffa Flea Market and drank some wine. When we got back to the hostel we bought a bottle of vodka and partied on the roof of the hostel. We got quite drunk, but had a good time.
Tuesday morning we went to the hostel we were staying at for the next two weeks. We met Alison there who got us situated. We then went on a tour of the French Hospital with the head of the company that we were supposed to be working with. We worked with him previously in Akko learning masonry. The tour was interesting. The hospital was built in the mid-19th century on a site that had crusader ruins as well. We saw the church as well as some of the corridors, and learned what they were doing to conserve and renovate the building. The building is being transformed into an apartment and hotel complex, so it needs a lot of modern renovation. The church is being transformed into a ballroom-type area, to suite its already fancy nature. The tour finished up our day Tuesday.
Wednesday we started with a tour of Jaffa given by the head archaeologist of the Tel Aviv area. He focused his tour on the history of Jaffa since the middle of the Ottoman Period, and it was very interesting. He is currently directly overseeing two excavation sites in Jaffa, one in a French School near the French Hospital and another in the "Greek Market," and let us into the French School to show us what he was doing. After we left the French School we traveled to Lod to visit Shay Farkash's studio. The studio is where they do their work if they can't do it on site. It also seems to be Shay's personal garage. There are old signs, posters, doors and other knick knacks. Some of the stuff he had was pretty cool. After our tour of the studio we headed back to Jaffa and finished the day.
That was the last of my structured time here so far. Thursday Melissa went to work with Shay, but there wasn't enough work for Bronwyn or me to join her. These last three days I've been wandering around. Walked through the Carmel market in Tel Aviv, walked along the beach promenade, walked through Old Jaffa. Today I spent most of the day lying on one of the beaches in Tel Aviv. Next week I'll post what I do. There won't be much work since Tuesday and Wednesday the country is off for the holiday of Shavuot.
Until next time!
Saturday, May 31, 2014
Friday, May 23, 2014
Concluding Week
Well, this is it! The last week of the group program. Next week starts our individual practicum. This was our last week all together, and now we are dispersed.
Sunday morning we did a run-through of our final presentations before the official ones so that we could get feedback and fix things. Then we had the rest of the day off until the afternoon when the last Hebrew lesson was scheduled. Monday we had an agricultural tour of the Western Galilee with an archaeologist who works closely with the farmers. He knows everyone that lives and works on the farms, so he was a good tour guide to talk about life out there. We went to several different farms, learned about the produce, and then were given bags of vegetables to take home. We ended up with a bag of cucumbers, tomatoes, zuccini, and a head of lettuce each, plus a communal bag of potatoes. It was way too much for the last days of the program, and even after giving some of it away as a gift and using a lot for salads, a good portion will still go bad. We also had an extravagant lunch where we didn't finish half the food on the table. Everyone was very welcoming and hospitable. We had a lot of fun.
Tuesday was the "official" final day, the day we gave our presentations at the center. We presented to several of the experts we had worked with during our stay in Akko, as well as heads of areas in the Conservation Department. The presentations went well. They were very informal and short. I was expecting them to be formal, final presentations that were supposed to be sophisticated and professional, but they weren't. They were quick, sometimes humorous, and somewhat unprofessional. They weren't meant to be final presentations, but summaries of what we had done. After the presentations we each received a certificate of completion, and then ate a nice lunch. After lunch we filled out a long evaluation of the program, and then went home.
Wednesday we did one last thing with the program. We went to Tzippori and got a tour of the archaeological park there. First we met Ornit, who lives on the moshav, at a small spring at the entrance to the moshav. Then we went to her house and had a small breakfast. After our respite we went to Al Alim, a large herb garden in the moshav. We got a brief tour of their fields and processing facilities. After the gardens we went to a goat farm and had a cheese tasting. The cheeses were flavorful and delicious. A little bit after 12pm we went to the archaeological park and got a tour with one of the head archaeologists in the area. We saw the main attractions and talked about the conservation work that had been done. We saw the ancient synagogue with its famous zodiac mosaic, the theater, and mosaics in several public buildings. Three of their most famous mosaics are one of Orpheus playing his lyre, scenes of Dionysus beating Herakles at a drinking contest, and a depiction of the Nile River and the wilderness around it. In addition to learning the history of the site and the mosaics we learned about the different conservation techniques that have been done at the site. Some of the mosaics have been put back together to partially complete missing elements, while others were consolidated and strengthened without adding any new tiles. It was a very interesting tour, as well as a very interesting site. When we were done at the archaeological park we went back to Ornit's house and ate lunch before heading back to Akko.
That's it! The program is finished. Creighton leaves to return to Canada tomorrow so she and the other girls went to Tel Aviv today for a last hurrah. I have to stay in Akko to pick up some checks for the places at which we will be staying during the practicum. I will spend the rest of the weekend uploading pictures and getting ready to leave. My next post will come from Tel Aviv during the first part of the practicum.
Sunday morning we did a run-through of our final presentations before the official ones so that we could get feedback and fix things. Then we had the rest of the day off until the afternoon when the last Hebrew lesson was scheduled. Monday we had an agricultural tour of the Western Galilee with an archaeologist who works closely with the farmers. He knows everyone that lives and works on the farms, so he was a good tour guide to talk about life out there. We went to several different farms, learned about the produce, and then were given bags of vegetables to take home. We ended up with a bag of cucumbers, tomatoes, zuccini, and a head of lettuce each, plus a communal bag of potatoes. It was way too much for the last days of the program, and even after giving some of it away as a gift and using a lot for salads, a good portion will still go bad. We also had an extravagant lunch where we didn't finish half the food on the table. Everyone was very welcoming and hospitable. We had a lot of fun.
Tuesday was the "official" final day, the day we gave our presentations at the center. We presented to several of the experts we had worked with during our stay in Akko, as well as heads of areas in the Conservation Department. The presentations went well. They were very informal and short. I was expecting them to be formal, final presentations that were supposed to be sophisticated and professional, but they weren't. They were quick, sometimes humorous, and somewhat unprofessional. They weren't meant to be final presentations, but summaries of what we had done. After the presentations we each received a certificate of completion, and then ate a nice lunch. After lunch we filled out a long evaluation of the program, and then went home.
Wednesday we did one last thing with the program. We went to Tzippori and got a tour of the archaeological park there. First we met Ornit, who lives on the moshav, at a small spring at the entrance to the moshav. Then we went to her house and had a small breakfast. After our respite we went to Al Alim, a large herb garden in the moshav. We got a brief tour of their fields and processing facilities. After the gardens we went to a goat farm and had a cheese tasting. The cheeses were flavorful and delicious. A little bit after 12pm we went to the archaeological park and got a tour with one of the head archaeologists in the area. We saw the main attractions and talked about the conservation work that had been done. We saw the ancient synagogue with its famous zodiac mosaic, the theater, and mosaics in several public buildings. Three of their most famous mosaics are one of Orpheus playing his lyre, scenes of Dionysus beating Herakles at a drinking contest, and a depiction of the Nile River and the wilderness around it. In addition to learning the history of the site and the mosaics we learned about the different conservation techniques that have been done at the site. Some of the mosaics have been put back together to partially complete missing elements, while others were consolidated and strengthened without adding any new tiles. It was a very interesting tour, as well as a very interesting site. When we were done at the archaeological park we went back to Ornit's house and ate lunch before heading back to Akko.
That's it! The program is finished. Creighton leaves to return to Canada tomorrow so she and the other girls went to Tel Aviv today for a last hurrah. I have to stay in Akko to pick up some checks for the places at which we will be staying during the practicum. I will spend the rest of the weekend uploading pictures and getting ready to leave. My next post will come from Tel Aviv during the first part of the practicum.
Friday, May 16, 2014
Italian Lecture Week
Welcome back! The end of the 3-month program is in sight. This week was the last week where we learned things. This post is going to be a little short, since we didn't really do much this week. Next week we have a few fun tours and then give our final presentations. One more blog post before the practicum starts, but I will also make new posts during my practicum. I will continue writing for as long as I'm in Israel, so you won't miss a week!
This week was pretty uneventful. Saturday there was a parade of church groups playing instruments that went down the road outside our apartment. It was neat watching them go by from our balcony. Other than that we got back to work Sunday morning. This week the International Conservation Center was hosting an Italian professor from Rome who was giving a seminar about the history of conservation in Europe since the Renaissance, and we attended the lectures. The lectures were very long and sometimes my attention drifted, but the information was generally interesting. He separated the lectures by country, talking about different approaches to conservation and reconstruction in Italy, France, Germany, and England. He spent a long time talking about individuals who had opinions about conservation and reconstruction, and read lengthy quotes by them about the subject. This part was a little boring for me. He also talked about different styles of conservation since the Second World War, what the reasoning and methods behind them were, and a few case studies of conservation projects. These talks were more interesting. These lectures were given Sunday, Monday and Tuesday.
Tuesday we also had individual meetings with the staff to discuss more details about our practicum projects. I will be starting the practicum working at the W Hotel in Jaffa for two weeks. Then, depending on external factors, I might work with a team going to Banias and work there for another three weeks or so. After that project I will be joining the conservation team that does maintenance work at the archaeological site in Beit She'an for the remainder of the practicum. If all goes well, I should be doing some very interesting work! I hope everything works out.
The rest of the week was devoted to working on creating our final presentations. Each of us chose a location that we worked at and will present on the conservation methods that we learned and used at the site. My presentation will be about the methods used to conserve mosaics, plaster, and marble that we did at Caesarea and Beit She'an.
That's all we did this week. Stay tuned next week to read about the last days of the project!
This week was pretty uneventful. Saturday there was a parade of church groups playing instruments that went down the road outside our apartment. It was neat watching them go by from our balcony. Other than that we got back to work Sunday morning. This week the International Conservation Center was hosting an Italian professor from Rome who was giving a seminar about the history of conservation in Europe since the Renaissance, and we attended the lectures. The lectures were very long and sometimes my attention drifted, but the information was generally interesting. He separated the lectures by country, talking about different approaches to conservation and reconstruction in Italy, France, Germany, and England. He spent a long time talking about individuals who had opinions about conservation and reconstruction, and read lengthy quotes by them about the subject. This part was a little boring for me. He also talked about different styles of conservation since the Second World War, what the reasoning and methods behind them were, and a few case studies of conservation projects. These talks were more interesting. These lectures were given Sunday, Monday and Tuesday.
Tuesday we also had individual meetings with the staff to discuss more details about our practicum projects. I will be starting the practicum working at the W Hotel in Jaffa for two weeks. Then, depending on external factors, I might work with a team going to Banias and work there for another three weeks or so. After that project I will be joining the conservation team that does maintenance work at the archaeological site in Beit She'an for the remainder of the practicum. If all goes well, I should be doing some very interesting work! I hope everything works out.
The rest of the week was devoted to working on creating our final presentations. Each of us chose a location that we worked at and will present on the conservation methods that we learned and used at the site. My presentation will be about the methods used to conserve mosaics, plaster, and marble that we did at Caesarea and Beit She'an.
That's all we did this week. Stay tuned next week to read about the last days of the project!
Friday, May 9, 2014
Painting Tel Aviv
Another week is done, and it is time for a new blog post. This is the end of week 12. The educational part of the program is almost done, we only have two more weeks left before the practicum begins! It feels like the last three months have gone by really fast, and very soon we will be splitting up to go work on our own projects. But until that happens, we are still working together, and you will get to hear about our adventures.
I ended my last post with us arriving in Tel Aviv and getting set up with our host families. We were split up into four houses, Noah and I together, Bronwyn and Creighton together, Laurine with her brother, and Melissa in another home. We stayed with a woman and her army-age daughter in an apartment in Neve Avivim, a neighborhood of Ramat Aviv in northern Tel Aviv. Everyone else stayed around Neve Tzedek, so we were far from everyone else. Being so far from the center of the city and from the rest of the group made doing anything after hours nearly impossible. Cabs were expensive, and we had to pay for transportation ourselves. Buses were available, but unreliable. Several times we waited for a bus for more than a half-hour after it was supposed to come. Everything else about our accommodations was good. The family was friendly and the apartment was nice. Saturday was a lazy day. I walked around northern Ramat Aviv, and then went to the beach and hung out there for the afternoon.
Sunday we got to work. Shay Farkash, the man in charge, split us up to do different jobs. Noah and I started cleaning the backs of removed wall paintings, and the girls worked on cleaning and exposing a green snake stencil in different parts of the room. After we were done cleaning the backs of the paintings they put Noah and I to work painting new stencil around the room, Noah on once side and me on the other. They had created a stencil guide by tracing what they found on the walls so that it was identical to and would line up with what remained. With help from Shay's team, we learned how to paint stencils onto the wall. We got about a third of our walls stenciled before the day was done. That evening began Yom HaZikaron, Israel Memorial Day, and there was a MASA memorial service at Latrun. While it was a decent service, I would have preferred to have gone to one that was more Israeli and less "American". The memorial was attended entirely by MASA participants, which meant hundreds of mostly religious American teenagers doing extended MASA courses that all new each other. There were of course groups from other countries, but it was mostly Americans. The ceremony itself was also somewhat strange, with several interruptions made for people to start singing songs that I did not understand their connection. Whatever. It wasn't my cup of tea.
Monday at work we switched our stations so that we could all get experience doing the different jobs. Laurine and Melissa went to paint the snake stencil and I cleaned and revealed the old one. The walls had several different layers of paint, each with its own stencil design. The area I was working on had three stencil designs, the snake, a light blue design, and a brown one, and I had to leave them all while cleaning around them. That meant that parts of the snake that were underneath the newer designs remained hidden. The cleaning was a long, slow, and delicate process. Using a scalpel you had to remove each layer of paint without destroying what was beneath it. Several issues made this very difficult. One, some of the paint layers were extremely thin and it was easy to go too deep and remove too much paint. Other places the paint was really hard and didn't come off easily. Adding too much force could damage the paint underneath. Also, the snake was on a light beige background, and a layer of white paint was directly above this. The white blended in with the beige, making it difficult to tell the difference between the layers. The work required a lot of patience. I really enjoyed it though. Monday night began Yom HaAtzma'ut, Israel Independence Day, so we got off work early. That night I went to a party on a rooftop in central Tel Aviv to celebrate.
I ended my last post with us arriving in Tel Aviv and getting set up with our host families. We were split up into four houses, Noah and I together, Bronwyn and Creighton together, Laurine with her brother, and Melissa in another home. We stayed with a woman and her army-age daughter in an apartment in Neve Avivim, a neighborhood of Ramat Aviv in northern Tel Aviv. Everyone else stayed around Neve Tzedek, so we were far from everyone else. Being so far from the center of the city and from the rest of the group made doing anything after hours nearly impossible. Cabs were expensive, and we had to pay for transportation ourselves. Buses were available, but unreliable. Several times we waited for a bus for more than a half-hour after it was supposed to come. Everything else about our accommodations was good. The family was friendly and the apartment was nice. Saturday was a lazy day. I walked around northern Ramat Aviv, and then went to the beach and hung out there for the afternoon.
Sunday we got to work. Shay Farkash, the man in charge, split us up to do different jobs. Noah and I started cleaning the backs of removed wall paintings, and the girls worked on cleaning and exposing a green snake stencil in different parts of the room. After we were done cleaning the backs of the paintings they put Noah and I to work painting new stencil around the room, Noah on once side and me on the other. They had created a stencil guide by tracing what they found on the walls so that it was identical to and would line up with what remained. With help from Shay's team, we learned how to paint stencils onto the wall. We got about a third of our walls stenciled before the day was done. That evening began Yom HaZikaron, Israel Memorial Day, and there was a MASA memorial service at Latrun. While it was a decent service, I would have preferred to have gone to one that was more Israeli and less "American". The memorial was attended entirely by MASA participants, which meant hundreds of mostly religious American teenagers doing extended MASA courses that all new each other. There were of course groups from other countries, but it was mostly Americans. The ceremony itself was also somewhat strange, with several interruptions made for people to start singing songs that I did not understand their connection. Whatever. It wasn't my cup of tea.
Monday at work we switched our stations so that we could all get experience doing the different jobs. Laurine and Melissa went to paint the snake stencil and I cleaned and revealed the old one. The walls had several different layers of paint, each with its own stencil design. The area I was working on had three stencil designs, the snake, a light blue design, and a brown one, and I had to leave them all while cleaning around them. That meant that parts of the snake that were underneath the newer designs remained hidden. The cleaning was a long, slow, and delicate process. Using a scalpel you had to remove each layer of paint without destroying what was beneath it. Several issues made this very difficult. One, some of the paint layers were extremely thin and it was easy to go too deep and remove too much paint. Other places the paint was really hard and didn't come off easily. Adding too much force could damage the paint underneath. Also, the snake was on a light beige background, and a layer of white paint was directly above this. The white blended in with the beige, making it difficult to tell the difference between the layers. The work required a lot of patience. I really enjoyed it though. Monday night began Yom HaAtzma'ut, Israel Independence Day, so we got off work early. That night I went to a party on a rooftop in central Tel Aviv to celebrate.
Tuesday we had the day off for Yom HaAtzma'ut. I went walking through
central Tel Aviv, crashed a few open parties to celebrate and eat, and
then went to the beach. The late afternoon became very windy, so I
headed home early. Wednesday I resumed revealing the different layers of stencils. I was in a different place on the wall, but the process and results were exactly the same. This location was a little more difficult because it was in a corner, but I think I managed fairly well. Thursday, guess what I did? If you said, "more cleaning", you're right! I was on another wall, but I was doing the same thing. This area was significantly more difficult because there was a hard layer of green cement-plaster over everything. It was extremely difficult to remove this layer, and when you could, it usually took everything beneath it off as well. We tried several different methods for removing the green layer, including light hammering, applying a vinegar solution, and adding an epoxy mortar that was supposed to bond with the upper layers making them easier to remove. Nothing really worked, but I found that the easiest way to remove the cement was to add the epoxy, let it sit for a few minutes, and then use the hammering technique. It wasn't perfect and I destroyed plenty of the snake motif, but it was really only way we were able to work. We were also running out of time, so as long as I revealed some parts of it they were happy. That night we went out for long-overdue celebrations for Laurine's birthday. We went to an anglo bar near the beach that is known for its Tex-Mex menu, and then we went to the Max Brenner chocolate restaurant for dessert. We ate and drank way too much, but it was a lot of fun.
Today (Friday) was our last day in Tel Aviv. We only had half the day to work before the bus came to pick us up, and even that was shortened because there was going to be a performance put on in the room before lunch. I started by (you guessed it) cleaning the wall. We couldn't finish the entire area before we had to clean up for the performance, though. Then we all moved to the hallway and did some work on creating stencils that Shay's team would use for other jobs they had. I was working with a stencil that showed a scene of two men leading camels near the pyramids. The design wasn't complicated, but it had several layers that needed to be drawn and cut separately. I was only able to get through cutting half of one of the layers before we had to clean up and get ready to leave. The bus came, we packed up our luggage, and then drove back to Akko.
Saturday, May 3, 2014
Holed-up on Masada
Hello everyone! Sorry for my long hiatus, but this past week we were at Masada and there was no internet connection. Therefore I could not write any blog posts. So I will get you all up to date with this post. It's going to be a very long one. Everybody ready?
We will start with last Sunday. It was less than a week ago, but it feels like it has been a very, very long time. We didn't do any work on Sunday, and were still in Akko. We presented the information and work for the conservation reports that we had prepared about each of our sections in the International Conservation Center's courtyard. It was a quick presentation where we talked about the condition of our area and the conservation that needed to be done to preserve it. My section was an area of wall underneath the façade of a vaulted archway. The wall had extensive water damage and some of the stones needed replacing. A lot of the wall was missing the mortar between the stones, and large gaps were present. The façade of the vaulted arch had relatively little damage, and only needed a little mortar in between the stones to fix it up. The rest of the wall needed a lot more work. Ultimately the drainage of the water coming from above would need to be addressed so as to prevent further erosion. After our presentations the instructor for our work in Tel Aviv, Shay Farkash, came and presented information about the wall painting stencils we would be restoring. Then we gathered kitchen materials from the ICC's storage that we would need at Masada. The day ended with Hebrew lessons (for everyone else) while I started to prepare dinner. At the end of the lesson there was a mini surprise party for Laurine, who's birthday was the next day. We couldn't really celebrate on her birthday because it was Yom HaShoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day.
Monday morning we left. We stopped at a rest stop north of Tel Aviv when the siren went off for the moment of silence for Yom HaShoah. After we continued on to Yad VaShem in Jerusalem. There we met with a child survivor who told us his story of how he had been given to a Dutch family so he could be saved. Unlike the stories of survivors who had actually been in the camps, his story mostly focused on his life after the war and when he made aliyah to Israel. It was an interesting story, but it didn't carry the same emotion in it like stories of survival in the camps. I kind of feel bad saying that, but it's true. We then ate lunch, and then had a tour of the memorial. After we went through the memorial we left for Masada. The drive to Masada was long and boring. The scenery was okay, but we went through the center of the country instead of along the Dead Sea and through the desert. Apparently there was a miscommunication with the driver and we took the long way We got to our 'house' on the west side of Masada at the base of the Roman Ramp a little later than expected, but that was no problem. We did a little exploring of our surroundings and then called it a day.
Tuesday we started our work at Masada, and worked there through Thursday. These three days every morning we had to hike up the Roman Ramp. It was tough but I managed! Tuesday we had a brief tour of Masada and saw the different places where they were doing conservation work. They recently received a donation and are now able to conserve some frescoes that had been removed from the commandant's residence on the northeast side of the mountain. We were supposed to learn about fresco preservation and then help this project. After the tour and lunch we went to the onsite fresco lab that was built into one of the rooms on the south side of the mountain. The leaders of the program are two Italian conservators, and they explained the conservation program and what they were doing to conserve the frescoes. Then we got to fill in some of the holes in the frescoes with plaster. After the work day was done we visited the northern palace before heading back down. The Masada Sound and Light Show is held every Tuesday and Thursday, and we were given tickets to go see it that night. The show surprised me by focusing mostly on the story of Masada, with lights added to it to highlight locations. Most sound and light shows that I have attended in the past were more like lights dancing on the site to music, but this show was a narrated storytelling as lights shown on different places on the mountain. It was very corny and played up, but still entertaining.
Wednesday we went back up the mountain, expecting a full day of work with the frescoes. However this is not what happened. Apparently the conservators had worked too fast over the past weeks and there was no longer any work for us to do with the frescoes. They were at a stage where the work was too sensitive and important for interns to do. Instead we did a lot of sitting around while they tried to find work for us to do. Also the person that was supposed to be in charge of us didn't come to work. We first helped the conservators move the frescoes from the lab to the room where they came from so that the plaster that was on the walls could be measured. The amount of plaster needed to fit the size of the frescoes. After taking the frescoes back to the lab Noah went to work mixing mortar, I was sent to sweep some rooms of dust, Laurine was put in the commandant's room applying a layer of plaster where the frescoes were going to be put, and the other girls went to clean mosaics in the western palace. After they had enough mortar for the day Noah joined me in sweeping. It was not the work we had in mind. We did this work until lunchtime. After lunch Noah and Laurine went and joined the others cleaning the mosaics. I started working on filling holes in plaster on the wall outside the commandant's room. This is what we did until the end of the work day.
Thursday started out much the same way as Wednesday. We arrived ready to work long before there was work for us. Everyone sat around the National Park's office waiting to be given work. I went back to work on the plaster outside the commandant's room, and took Noah with me so that some of us were at least working. Eventually the girls were given work similar to mine on a different wall near the office and cable car. After lunch we were able to get some work with frescoes. There were some frescoes that were removed from an unknown location, and they said we could work with them since they weren't going to be shown to the public. The Italian conservators taught us the process of cleaning the surface of the frescoes using water and different chemicals. It was good to be working with frescoes, even if it wasn't the frescoes we were originally supposed to be working on. Since Thursday was our last day at Masada, after work I did a little more exploring of places that I hadn't seen, such as parts of the western palace and the cisterns at the bottom of the Roman Ramp.
Our time working at Masada was rather disappointing. We spent a good deal of time sitting around waiting and doing nothing instead of working. The person that was in charge of our work wasn't there, which meant other people that weren't prepared had to work with us, but they didn't know what we were supposed to do. Because the work that we were supposed to do had already been done we ended up doing other jobs that were less exciting and important. There was a lack of communication that prevented us from doing any real work. Finally, we were in the desert, which brought it's own difficulties that we had to cope with.
Friday morning we got on the bus and drove to Tel Aviv. We went straight to Neve Schechter, a Jewish culture center in Neve Tzedek housed in the Cafe Lorenz building, an old German Templar house. We met with Shay Farkash, our teacher for the week, who gave us a short introduction/tour of the building and the neighborhood. Then we went to Sarona, the old German Templar colony outside Jaffa. We ate lunch there and had a tour of the village. After the tour we split up to settle into the houses we were staying at during our week in Tel Aviv.
We will start with last Sunday. It was less than a week ago, but it feels like it has been a very, very long time. We didn't do any work on Sunday, and were still in Akko. We presented the information and work for the conservation reports that we had prepared about each of our sections in the International Conservation Center's courtyard. It was a quick presentation where we talked about the condition of our area and the conservation that needed to be done to preserve it. My section was an area of wall underneath the façade of a vaulted archway. The wall had extensive water damage and some of the stones needed replacing. A lot of the wall was missing the mortar between the stones, and large gaps were present. The façade of the vaulted arch had relatively little damage, and only needed a little mortar in between the stones to fix it up. The rest of the wall needed a lot more work. Ultimately the drainage of the water coming from above would need to be addressed so as to prevent further erosion. After our presentations the instructor for our work in Tel Aviv, Shay Farkash, came and presented information about the wall painting stencils we would be restoring. Then we gathered kitchen materials from the ICC's storage that we would need at Masada. The day ended with Hebrew lessons (for everyone else) while I started to prepare dinner. At the end of the lesson there was a mini surprise party for Laurine, who's birthday was the next day. We couldn't really celebrate on her birthday because it was Yom HaShoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day.
Monday morning we left. We stopped at a rest stop north of Tel Aviv when the siren went off for the moment of silence for Yom HaShoah. After we continued on to Yad VaShem in Jerusalem. There we met with a child survivor who told us his story of how he had been given to a Dutch family so he could be saved. Unlike the stories of survivors who had actually been in the camps, his story mostly focused on his life after the war and when he made aliyah to Israel. It was an interesting story, but it didn't carry the same emotion in it like stories of survival in the camps. I kind of feel bad saying that, but it's true. We then ate lunch, and then had a tour of the memorial. After we went through the memorial we left for Masada. The drive to Masada was long and boring. The scenery was okay, but we went through the center of the country instead of along the Dead Sea and through the desert. Apparently there was a miscommunication with the driver and we took the long way We got to our 'house' on the west side of Masada at the base of the Roman Ramp a little later than expected, but that was no problem. We did a little exploring of our surroundings and then called it a day.
Tuesday we started our work at Masada, and worked there through Thursday. These three days every morning we had to hike up the Roman Ramp. It was tough but I managed! Tuesday we had a brief tour of Masada and saw the different places where they were doing conservation work. They recently received a donation and are now able to conserve some frescoes that had been removed from the commandant's residence on the northeast side of the mountain. We were supposed to learn about fresco preservation and then help this project. After the tour and lunch we went to the onsite fresco lab that was built into one of the rooms on the south side of the mountain. The leaders of the program are two Italian conservators, and they explained the conservation program and what they were doing to conserve the frescoes. Then we got to fill in some of the holes in the frescoes with plaster. After the work day was done we visited the northern palace before heading back down. The Masada Sound and Light Show is held every Tuesday and Thursday, and we were given tickets to go see it that night. The show surprised me by focusing mostly on the story of Masada, with lights added to it to highlight locations. Most sound and light shows that I have attended in the past were more like lights dancing on the site to music, but this show was a narrated storytelling as lights shown on different places on the mountain. It was very corny and played up, but still entertaining.
Wednesday we went back up the mountain, expecting a full day of work with the frescoes. However this is not what happened. Apparently the conservators had worked too fast over the past weeks and there was no longer any work for us to do with the frescoes. They were at a stage where the work was too sensitive and important for interns to do. Instead we did a lot of sitting around while they tried to find work for us to do. Also the person that was supposed to be in charge of us didn't come to work. We first helped the conservators move the frescoes from the lab to the room where they came from so that the plaster that was on the walls could be measured. The amount of plaster needed to fit the size of the frescoes. After taking the frescoes back to the lab Noah went to work mixing mortar, I was sent to sweep some rooms of dust, Laurine was put in the commandant's room applying a layer of plaster where the frescoes were going to be put, and the other girls went to clean mosaics in the western palace. After they had enough mortar for the day Noah joined me in sweeping. It was not the work we had in mind. We did this work until lunchtime. After lunch Noah and Laurine went and joined the others cleaning the mosaics. I started working on filling holes in plaster on the wall outside the commandant's room. This is what we did until the end of the work day.
Thursday started out much the same way as Wednesday. We arrived ready to work long before there was work for us. Everyone sat around the National Park's office waiting to be given work. I went back to work on the plaster outside the commandant's room, and took Noah with me so that some of us were at least working. Eventually the girls were given work similar to mine on a different wall near the office and cable car. After lunch we were able to get some work with frescoes. There were some frescoes that were removed from an unknown location, and they said we could work with them since they weren't going to be shown to the public. The Italian conservators taught us the process of cleaning the surface of the frescoes using water and different chemicals. It was good to be working with frescoes, even if it wasn't the frescoes we were originally supposed to be working on. Since Thursday was our last day at Masada, after work I did a little more exploring of places that I hadn't seen, such as parts of the western palace and the cisterns at the bottom of the Roman Ramp.
Our time working at Masada was rather disappointing. We spent a good deal of time sitting around waiting and doing nothing instead of working. The person that was in charge of our work wasn't there, which meant other people that weren't prepared had to work with us, but they didn't know what we were supposed to do. Because the work that we were supposed to do had already been done we ended up doing other jobs that were less exciting and important. There was a lack of communication that prevented us from doing any real work. Finally, we were in the desert, which brought it's own difficulties that we had to cope with.
Friday morning we got on the bus and drove to Tel Aviv. We went straight to Neve Schechter, a Jewish culture center in Neve Tzedek housed in the Cafe Lorenz building, an old German Templar house. We met with Shay Farkash, our teacher for the week, who gave us a short introduction/tour of the building and the neighborhood. Then we went to Sarona, the old German Templar colony outside Jaffa. We ate lunch there and had a tour of the village. After the tour we split up to settle into the houses we were staying at during our week in Tel Aviv.
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