This was my second year working with the KBP group. So when reflecting on this summer there are a lot of comparisons that I naturally make. Last year was a summer of transformation for me - I felt that I came home from a journey of both scientific and personal discovery. This year was more transitional - no big discoveries about myself and rather the opportunity to build upon the things that I had learned the year before. Last year, I arrived in Russia without clothes, without a single clue about Cyrillic or the Russian language, with little or no understanding of the culture, having only met the other participants once or twice, and with only a rudimentary understanding of the objectives of the project itself or the nature of working in the Islands. In general, this year I knew more what to expect. I carefully packed and arrived with all of my luggage, had taken 6 classes in Beginning Russian, had some limited experience with the culture, not only knew but had lived and worked with most of the participants, I had worked in the locations that we would revisit and came in feeling accepted as a valuable, contributing member of the team - not a newbie. I felt like I was picking up where I had left off, but also felt the pressure (much of it of my own creation) of needing to do more - of increased expectations that came with NOT being a newbie and with being granted the amazing opportunity to return again to the field. I felt incredibly fortunate but also anxious about living up to what I perceived to be expected of me.
There are two main characteristics that stand out for me from this summer as I compare it to last summer. First, since I was much better prepared I feel this DID allow me to step up to another level in my contributions and second, I worked MUCH harder and was much busier than last summer.
Even though our logistics this summer were different - we camped a week at a time on the islands rather than transferring to and from shore each day at a new location - knowing what to expect about the weather, food and living conditions helped me to feel more confident about my ability to live and work comfortably. I knew what kinds of clothes to pack, what kinds of food and snacks that I would want to have, and what kinds of entertainment I should bring for myself. Of course, I still had to deal with the unexpected and sudden changes of plan, weather and conditions, but all of these things were easier to deal with when I knew that I had the proper clothes, food and experience. I was also able to implement earlier on in the summer some of the "tricks" that I had learned toward the end of the field season last year. I took advantage of the video function on my camera, used my audio recorder, posted audio journals, was better organized and proactive about naming, labeling and documenting my journals and photos, etc. But I also discovered that I still had a lot to learn about geology and archaeology field work. When working on a longer term excavation or in a field camp, the researchers took a different approach to the work. So much more can and should be done when you have more than 4-6 hours to work at a location.
Despite my feeling of not having to learn everything from scratch (or perhaps because I didn't have to do that...), I worked very hard this summer. All told, I had very few days or even evenings that I was not working on something. Whether it was documenting or catching up on field work from that day, working on inventorying, organizing and photographing at the museum, downloading, naming and documenting photos, writing, editing and preparing my journal or waiting and waiting for a fleeting satellite signal so that I could send all of my work to ARCUS for posting, I was busy nearly every night. I remember many nights I either worked or went to bed, exhausted - while my team members played a game of cards or watched a DVD movie. I just didn't have the energy. I think that part of this was a result of my own increased expectations for myself and part of it was the shorter and busier field season this year. We "only" spent 4 weeks working in the field and I spent a total of 6 weeks away from home. Last year we spent a full two weeks longer in the field. However, last year we probably only actually worked about 3-5 more days total because there were so many "down" days - days the ship wasn't on site when we expected it or that we weren't able to go to shore to work for some reason, whether it was just that there were so many people on the ship, we were transporting crews to/from other field camps, we were loading water, waiting for bread or, even, visiting a hot springs. Those were days where we could more leisurely catch up on our work - I could write a journal, download pictures - or if we were caught up, we could "recreate". That situation rarely occurred this year. One definite indication of this for me was that between my science related work and my teacher related work I had no energy left at the end of the day to write in my personal journal. Last summer I wrote nearly every night before bed. This summer, I wrote a total of 3 times.
All this being said however, I desperately hope to return again next summer for the final field season. This was the second of three field seasons and much like "The Empire Strikes Back" or "The Two Towers" it has a feeling of incompleteness without the concluding element. I very much would like to be able to complete my contribution to this project - I know that I really am a part of this team and I think of it as "we" not "they". But I recognize that this may not happen for any of a large number of reasons. When we left the Kuril Islands this year, I was struck by two realizations - one, that our time seemed like it had been SO short, we were done already! And two, that I might be looking at the Kuril Islands for the final time. I felt distinctly sad about that. I hope for the best, that I will return and work there one last time, but, of course, prepare myself for the reality that I might not.