Reflections: So long and thanks for all the fish.

So this is how it all ends. In a middle eastern airport with tears. I can honestly, hand on heart say that this time in Egypt has been some of the best moments of the past year, and that the crew are amoungst my most treasured friends. Leaving it behind is not easy.

The lead up to leaving was filled with moments. The kind of moments that whilst frivolous and fleeting, stay with you for life. The final toast of the season over a beer in the field. Roasting smores over a peterol fire on the roof of the dig house. Dressing up as drag-queens. Sining the robot unicorn attack song for several hours on repeat. All moments which to outsiders seem ridiculous but to me will be fond memories of a truly enjoyable time, and reminders of the end of an era.

This season of field-work has been a lesson in great archaeology but more importantly as an opportunity to be around some of the coolest-kids in the business.

In this light I have some thank-yous and other sentimental bullshit to convey:

To the people I worked with: You are among the most stand out archaeologists, and people that I know. The season would have been a different, and less pleasureable, experience without you.

To the fairy princess palace inhabitants: Im gonna miss the shit out of you. Im not sure we could have had a better group of people in that room, and the interior decoration that was completed was pretty outstanding too. Ducky #1 you are pretty much a mother to me now, and your makeup skills are immesurable. Tash, I will never understand how you fit so much food into such a tiny body, or why your end of the room constantly smelled like pickles. Slaggy, you get your own goddam farewell. Bitch.

To Slaggy: I CRII!!!! Im not sure how life is going to operate without you L this year in general and through the time in Egypt you have been like the black sister I never had. Go do good things with your life.

To Egypt, for all its faults, is cemented in my mind now as a place that I truly love working. Amazing memories of great archaeology, great people and great times. It might take afew years, but I will definitely be returning to this country. Hopefully to work alongside many of the amazing people I have had the opportunity to this season.

To NZ: GG NO RE. It was fun. Sheep. Stuff.

End sentimental crap.

I am now faced with a life in a country that I am unfamiliar with, with people that speak weirdly and enjoy tea too much. Life over here will be different without the great gamers, archaeologists and friends that I had back in Egypt and NZ, and im not sure that I will ever get used to the tea and jam shit, but I do know that this is the start of a brand new adventure. And that is kinda exciting. So I have shaken the dust out of my indianna jones hat and am looking forward to the gaming, archaeology and excitement that awaits in this strange new country.

So. Yes. This is the end of this blog. Anyone still stupid enough to be reading it is now relinquished from the daily trials of its existence.

So long and thanks for all the fish!!!

PS: for any one stupid enough to actually want to read more I will be continuing my blogging about life as an archaeological gamer and my travels through the UK HERE:

http://thegamingarchaeologist.blogspot.co.uk/

L8rz nerdz.