Knor Nawarat

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Knor Nawarat, Sudan, Africa
25 Feet Great holding
160 Miles Ave 5.7 Knots
Another Low Island Anchorage where we met a local Bedouin who gave KT a ride on his camel

Kt gets her Camel Ride

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Megalopolis: 'A quarrel is a capital thing'

The interpretation of the theatre at Megalopolis caused a major disagreement between the British excavators and Wilhelm Dörpfeld. Eugénie Sellers wrote a letter in support of Dörpfeld (and critical of Ernest Gardner, the Director of the BSA) to the Athenaeum ('The Theatres of Megalopolis', July 4, 1891). In addition, a short note from her, dated March 29 [1891], was published by the Classical Review (5, 5, May 1891) along with a summary of Dörpfeld's comments summarised by Louis Dyer.

Sellers' letter, and the wider dispute, was noted in the weekly theatrical newspaper The Era ('Theatrical Gossip', July 11, 1891).

A quarrel is a capital thing in a family, but, like all other good things, it should come to an end some time or other. There was a theatre built several hundred years B.C., of which a good deal still remains to be quarrelled over; but we must say that we think it would show better taste if people just dropped the subject now. The theatre (or its ruins) is at Megalopolis; but it is quite a long time since there were any performances there—a thousand years, very likely. Probably the Megalopolitan Lord Chamberlain would insist on its being relicensed if they wanted to play the Agamemnon or the Seven Against Thebes there now; and, anyhow, we think Mr Gardner and Dr. Dörpfeld might leave off squabbling about it in the highly respectable page of the Athenaeum. No doubt the point they are fighting over is one of supreme importance. Dr. Dörpfeld says that the lower steps could not possibly, any more than the wall at the back, belong to the original structure, and Mr Gardner says contrariwise. But, after a thousand years or so, even a subject like this palls, unless, indeed, it is treated by Mr Rider Haggard; and Mr Gardner's obstinacy has actually brought a pretty girl into the controversy. Miss (or Mrs) Eugénie Sellers—we do not know her, but she must be pretty with that name—has only last week written a letter to say that Mr G. is a bold, bad man and has no right to chaff Dr. D. about the scænæ frons when he makes such gross errors himself about the logeion. Eugénie even goes so far as to say some very cross things about certain Skenengebäude mentioned by Mr G.

Image
© David Gill

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Me Gusta El Mar!

Since my last post, CK and I spent some time in Mendoza, drinking more wine, enjoying the Mendocino life. We went on a wine tour, which is not what I was used to. We only got to taste two types of wine at each place, however, the tour was interesting. It was all in Spanish, so I only understood half of it, but I still feel like I learned something. We stayed in perhaps the worst hostel ever while there. It was so dirty and nasty; I didnt even take a shower for a couple of days because I was so disgusted by the shower. Also, they were supposed to have breakfast included, and there was none. They were supposed to have internet access and there was none. They totally falsly advertised and were so dirty to boot! The worst thing is, it was the wine festival and so we ended up having to stay there regardless. However, in spite of this, our stay was very nice.

After Mendoza, we went to Buenos Aires to apply for our visa to Brazil. S had done this earlier in the year and had had a really bad time of it. He had to stand in line for 6 hours or something. We went early on Monday, thinking we would have the same experience. However, we were in and out in about 15 minutes, leaving us a whole extra day to hang out in the city. We had even brought lunch, thinking we would be stranded in line and not able to leave to get food! It was a welcome surprise.

From Buenos Aires we came to Mar Del Plata, where we are now. It is a beach town about 5 hours south of the city, where all the city dwellers come for the summer months of January and February. However, since we are here in March, it is still warm, but not very busy, which is perfect. So, we are back at the beach again. In Argentina this time though. Yeah, I know, we just cant get enough of Argentina, really. We actually like it so much, we decided to find an apartment in Buenos Aries again. I will take a Spanish class, and we will sit at the cafes and watch all the beautiful people go by.

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Night 1

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Southerly Winds North of Massawa

Those teeth

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Melos: the churches

In April 1896 Robert Carr Bosanquet, who had been left in charge of the excavations while Cecil Harcourt-Smith was in Athens, was joined on Melos by two contemporaries from Trinity College, Cambridge: Henry Martineau Fletcher (1870-1953) and Sydney Decimus Kitson (1871-1937). Fletcher and Kitson had both matriculated at Trinity in 1889 (the year above Bosanquet) and were on an extended trip through Italy and Greece. While on Melos they made a study of the Byzantine churches. Neither was admitted as a student of the BSA.

Fletcher had been educated at Marlborough, and had been awarded a first in Part 1 of the Cambridge Classical Tripos (1892). He was articled to Mervyn Macartney. He later worked as an architect (FRIBA 1908) and served as Vice-President (1929-31) Honorary Secretary (1934-39) of RIBA. He helped to design the War Memorial at St John's College, Cambridge.

Kitson had been educated at Charterhouse. Kitson's father, James, was a locomotive engineer; his half-brother was the First Baron Airedale. Kitson was articled to E.J. May in London. He practised as an architect in Leeds as the senior partner of Kitson, Parish, Ledgard and Pyman. Among his designs was the Leeds School of Art. Kitson was an authority of John Sell Cotman and the Norwich School of painting. His collection of Cotman drawings and watercolours were bequeathed to RIBA; a former BSA student, Adolph Paul Oppé, prepared the catalogue.

Reference
Fletcher, H. M., and S. D. Kitson. 1895/6. "The churches of Melos." Annual of the British School at Athens 2: 155-68.

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Sheikh El Abu

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Sheikh El Abu, Eritrea
25 Feet Hard Bottom Reef Anchorage

Sand Haze Sunrise

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Why Cardio Doesn't Work for Fat Loss

By: Craig Ballantyne, CSCS, MS
www.TurbulenceTraining.com

For some people, cardio doesn't work, and in fact can make them gain weight. Find out why here...

Cardio exercise is such a strange thing. In theory, it should work so perfectly well for all men and women, but as anyone who has tried it knows, the practicality of it just doesn't add up.

After all, some men and women do cardio 6 hours, 9 hours, or more per week, and still have belly fat to burn. On the other hand, it works just fine for others.

British researchers wanted to get more insight into this paradox, and studied 35 overweight men and women, who weren't previously exercising.

(Reference: International Journal of Obesity 32: 177-184, 2008).

Subjects exercised 5 times per week for 12 weeks. That's a lot of exercise, but it helped the subjects lose an average of 8.2 pounds, which is great - I was positively surprised by the results.

So cardio will work for some people, however, in my experience, it works best in young men, who need the help the least!

Back to the study, the variance in fat loss between individuals was huge. Check this out...

The best subject lost a staggering 32.3 pounds in 12 weeks, while the worst subject actually GAINED 3.74 pounds.

The scientists think they know where things went sour. They classified the subjects into 2 groups, called the "Compensators" and the "Non-compensators".

The Compensators were hungrier, and as a result consumed an extra 268 calories per day, all but wiping out their cardio efforts.

Therefore, the Compensators lost the least amount of weight, and scientists believe that was due to the huge "compensatory" increase in appetite experienced by this group.

Does your appetite increase when you do slow cardio? If it does, research shows it will ruin your cardio efforts.

So if your cardio program is not working for you, check your appetite and calorie intake to see if you are "compensating" for your efforts. If you are, you might be better off using a program of high-intensity resistance and interval training (i.e. Turbulence Training) for your weight loss efforts.

As Australian Professor Steve Boucher has shown in research, interval training increases hormones called catecholamines. And increased catecholamines can reduce appetite, among other fat-burning benefits.

In the real world, few people lose 33 pounds after 12 weeks of cardio. Heck, few even achieve an average weight loss of 8 pounds with aerobic exercise.

So again, check your appetite, and consider giving high-intensity exercise a go for your next workout program.

Beat the curse of cardio with high-intensity Turbulence Training.

Craig Ballantyne, CSCS, MS
Author, Turbulence Training

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Cyzicus and Robert De Rustafjaell

Robert De Rustafjaell --- changed from Robert Fawcus-Smith in October 1894 --- first visited the site of Cyzicus on the south coast of the sea of Marmara in 1900. He quickly obtained a firman for excavating and initiated work in the summer of 1901. However he needed additional archaeological expertise and approached the British School at Athens.

In December 1901 Robert Carr Bosanquet, director of the BSA, and Frederick W. Hasluck visited the site of Cyzicus with De Rustafjaell. They made a preliminary report on the site, making particular note of the inscriptions:

Dost remember the Poseidon monument, a pedestal or altar with tridents and fish and galleys thereon, which was represented on several of De R.'s photographs? We went this morning and dug it out and made paper impressions of the inscriptions.

Bosanquet continued with a description of his visit to the amphitheatre:

And Hasluck and I took the village watchman, a Tcherkess from the Caucasus, who patrols the fields armed with an old musket, and went to the amphitheatre, a most beautiful spot outside the walls. A stream has burst through the mighty fence and careers through the arena; a great part of the walls has fallen; but great piles of masonry still tower to heaven, and the hillsides are full of overgrown vaults; the whole hollow is a mass of luxuriant thickets, bay, arbutus, ivy and honeysuckle; sprays of unripe blackberries hang over the water.

In the end Bosanquet decided to excavate at Palaikastro on Crete, but Hasluck and the school architect, Arthur Henderson, continued to plan the site and record inscriptions.

References
Hasluck, F. W. 1901/02. "Sculptures from Cyzicus." Annual of the British School at Athens 8: 190-96.
—. 1902. "An inscribed basis from Cyzicus." Journal of Hellenic Studies 22: 126-34. [JSTOR]
—. 1903. "Inscriptions from Cyzicus." Journal of Hellenic Studies 23: 75-91. [JSTOR]
—. 1904. "Unpublished inscriptions from the Cyzicus neighbourhood." Journal of Hellenic Studies 24: 20-40. [JSTOR]
—. 1904/05. "Notes on the Lion group from Cyzicus." Annual of the British School at Athens 11: 151-52.
—. 1907. "Inscriptions from the Cyzicus district, 1906." Journal of Hellenic Studies 27: 61-67. [JSTOR]
—. 1910. Cyzicus: being some account of the history and antiquities of that city, and of the district adjacent to it: with the towns of Apollonia ad Rhyndoveum, Miletupolis, Hadrianutherae, Priapus, Zeleia, etc. Cambridge archaeological and ethnological series. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [WorldCat]
Hasluck, F. W., and A. E. Henderson. 1904. "On the topography of Cyzicus." Journal of Hellenic Studies 24: 135-43.
Rustafjaell, R. de 1902. "Cyzicus." Journal of Hellenic Studies 22: 174-89. [JSTOR]
Smith, C., and R. de Rustafjaell. 1902. "Inscriptions from Cyzicus." Journal of Hellenic Studies 22: 190-207. [JSTOR]

Inscription
Hasluck's image of the statue base of Antonia Tryphaena, excavated by De Rustafjaell at Cyzicus in 1901.

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Massawa, Eritrea Journal

Massawa, Eritrea, Africa

March 8 - 11, 2008
by KT



Busy War Torn Port Town

Battle Scars and Fishing Boats

March 8, 2008

Port Smythe to Massawa was an easy motor.  Although the winds were predicted to be southerly they came from the NE, luckily quite light and therefore not effecting our progress.  We entered through a narrow channel, first passing by a large port area for large ships, then past the local fishing fleet.  There was not a soul to be seen, ashore or on the water.  The entire area felt desolate and deserted.  Most the buildings we could see were either run down or bombed out.



 Eritrea and Ethiopia had been at war off and on for many years (starting as far back as 1961), the latest activity having just ended with a tense peace agreement in 2000.  Sadly, Massawa was left barely standing when in 1990 the Ethiopians almost leveled the city with bomb raids after losing the port to the Eritrean People’s Liberation Forces.  This was our first look at the destruction a war on one’s homeland causes, and it was devastating.

As we had arrived a bit late in the afternoon we decided to wait till the following morning before venturing ashore.  That evening was a most amazing sunset.  The sun glowed silver as hit the dusty horizon and the reflections on the water of both the sun and other yachts was magnificent.

March 9, 2008

Since Indonesia we have become more and more accustomed to hearing the early morning prayer of the Muslims.  This morning Chris (as I was still sleeping in bed) was treated to a mix of cultures and religions as he heard Catholic church bells ringing, African music playing with harmonized voices singing along, and of course the song-like prayer emitted from the mosque loud speakers.  All while the red morning sun rose above the dusty African town.  He thought it was extremely cool.

The first order of business, of course, was checking in.  It was easier for just the boys from the four yachts to go into customs and immigration.  Since it was Sunday customs was closed, but we were able to at least get our shore passes.

 As with the previous day, the town felt deserted – we saw hardly a single person walking the streets, and since it was Sunday no shops were open.  Back in the early 1930s Massawa was the busiest port on the East African coast, but you would never guess that now.  Beneath the rubble and ruins a discernible Italian influence exits.  In the second half of the 19th century, Italy invested heavily in the colonization of Eritrea, and it shows in the remaining architecture.  But not a single building dating from that period stands without some type of battle scar.

Amazingly, for a town barely standing due to years of war, and for a country known as one of the poorest in the world, the people of Massawa are extremely friendly and no one hassled or attempted to hustle us.

Walking along the dusty streets and alleys was an experience.  Although the town is destroyed it still exudes tremendous ambience.  It is unique with buildings made of coral rock with wooden screened windows.  Down many of the alleyways we could hear festive music or see people gathered for Sunday lunch, chattering away and laughing loudly.  Massawa is primarily Muslim, however instead drab black burkas the women wear colorful dresses with brightly patterned scarves.

We were mostly approached by children … always the most outgoing.  You know that your in a poor area when kids ask for pencils and pens rather than candy and clothes.  A couple of older boys (around 12) walked with us a for a bit, and eventually got up the courage to ask some questions.  Surprisingly the thing they were most interested in was our political views on the upcoming US presidential election.  Who did we prefer?  Who did we think would win?  And so on.  They even offered their opinions on who they liked and why.  And of course they had to give us the usual “we don’t like Bush” comment that we now expected whenever we said we were from America.  It wasn’t until recently that I really began to understand what it means to be from one of the world leading countries.  In my prior life I was never one interested in politics or policy.  I never really thought what I or America did (in most matters) had that much of an influence on the world as a whole.  But here I was in a country that most people don’t probably even know exists and these 12 year old boys could tell me more about the upcoming election than probably most American college students!  So much for my theory on being inconspicuous!

March 10, 2008

It was a mixture of tasks for us today.  In the morning Chris went back ashore to try and clear-in with customs, but nothing was accomplished as the official didn’t like that we weren’t using an agent (which cost money) and so told him (and the others) to come back later.  We weren’t too concerned as he hadn’t taken any of our paperwork, so worst case was that we’d just leave, still having our clearance papers from Aden.  During his jaunt ashore he passed out pencils to the mobs of children … once word gets out the rumor spreads like wildfire and soon you are surrounded!

A large part of our day was spent with various chores around the boat, Chris fixed our VHF antenna and added more fuel to the tanks while I cleaned up the boat and worked on our website and photograph organization.

 Later in the afternoon I joined the other women for a trip to the market just outside of town.  It is hard to blend in when (a) you are white and (b) you are with three other white women and one white man.  From the moment we stepped out of the taxi all eyes were on us.  The local markets are always a fantastic place.  It is there that you get a true feel for the people, watching them shop and mingle amongst themselves.  Many time Chris and I go to the markets just for exploring and don’t end up even buying anything.  You never know what to expect and they are so different from any place back home.  This market was small, but still interesting … men hand weaving beds, donkey carts bringing in supplies, women selling colorful fabrics and vegetables.  (Photo above/left by Stardust)

The one thing about the Arab countries that you’ll read over and over again in all the guide books (besides covering every inch of your body if you’re a women) is that most of the locals do not like having their photograph taken, and that you should always ask before taking the photo, especially if it is of a women.  Because of this Chris and I tend to be extremely consciousness and hesitant about pulling the camera out.  I can’t stand the thought of further embellishing the stereotype of rude white tourists ignorant of their surroundings.  It’s too bad really because these same countries have some great photograph opportunities.  It seems amongst our cruising friends that we are the most sensitive and conservative in this regard.  Just about everyone we know just clicks away, sometimes asking, sometimes not.  Although I’ve seen some harsh looks here and there none of the locals have gotten overly cranky from this, so who knows maybe they don’t care as much as the guide books say.  Anyway I only point this out because it might be noticed that in our PDF photo albums many of the photos are not taken by us, and some might wonder why.

After the market our taxi driver (now our hired guide) took us to another small shopping area that consisted of four small shopping stalls.  There was nothing much of interest, although we did try and buy bread rolls until we discovered that there were only four left (as this is the only bread we’d seen in Massawa we figured we ought to leave it for the locals).

March 11, 2008

In Massawa you get a 48-hour visa for free, after that it is $40 per person.  Originally we had planned on staying longer and taking the inland trip up to the capital, Asmara.  The city is supposed to be equivalent to a 1960’s southern Italian town, and was not as touched by the bombings of the war.  And the bus ride travels through some scenic mountain areas.  In the end we opted not to go.  Unfortunately two yachts who had visited Massawa just a week before us were both boarded at night, one was robbed (the other woke up and scared away the would-be thief).  Because of this we didn’t feel comfortable leaving the boat overnight without someone watching it.  And since we weren’t going to Asmara it didn’t seem worth the extra visa money just to stay in Massawa.  So, our 48 hours were up and we were once again off.

In order to check out we had to re-anchor Billabong in the main port area and pick up immigration to come aboard to check for stowaways.  I found this a little ironic as it seems to me that most countries are worried about people illegally entering their country not leaving it.  It’s not a big deal though, and they were pretty quick about – the only real hassle is that we couldn’t depart early because we had to wait for them to open and then do all the paperwork and boat checks the morning of our departure.  This limited our options for our next destination.  But the one thing we’ve learned cruising is to go with the flow and adjust to make it work!

Leaving Massawa I couldn’t help but think about how lucky I am to never have been through a war on my homeland.  It is good to see (and know from various readings) that Massawa is finally starting to rebuild and more and more business is starting to come back into the port.

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Life with GOD is Good! :-)

Often times, Life is good because GOD is good. I dare say in my life that GOD is so good, not because I have been good. But rather, He is good because that is who He is.

So, here' s just a short post to signal the reality of Life is Good when Life is in GOD.. :-)

Life is Good in GOD!

21This I recall to my mind, therefore have I hope. 22It is of the LORD'S mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not.　23They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness.　

Lamentations 3:21-23

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