Page 7 January 2009

CAMPUS

PANTHER POST

UPEI student excavates in Hungary

UPEI student Tasia Bulger took time to go to Hungary

By Tasia Bulger Post Contributor

I had the fortunate oppor- tunity to travel to Gyér and

Salgotarjan in Hungary to volunteer on two separate excavation sites with fellow classmates from UPEI. One

“experience was completed in correlation with a directed studies course which I re- ceived credit for from UPEI. After completing the volun- teer work, I wrote a short paper documenting the ex- cavation along with a brief historic summary of the ex- cavation site. The second excavation was solely orga- nized on a volunteer basis; one of my professors sug- gested the site and organized the contract for myself and another classmate to volun- teer at the excavation.

The two excavation sites were very different, both yielding unforgettable learn- ing experiences.

The first excavation site was located 15 minutes outside the city of Gyor, in North Western Hungary. The excavation was located in an agricultural field, ad-

to take part in an archaeological dig

jacent to the river Danube. The site was thought to have been a Roman watch tower AD 150 when the excavators originally begun to survey a few months prior. However, the site turned out to be a rest station for Roman sol- diers. Becky Wedge, a fel- low classmate of Art History and I worked under the su- pervision of two archaeolo-

gists, Szilvia Biro and Attila

Molnar, and also had the op- portunity to work with five students of archaeology of the University of Pécs. spent two weeks on the site. The second excavation site was located inside the small town

-of Salgotarjan, in Northern

Hungary, underneath a by- pass highway adjacent to a Tesco supermarket. The site was an urn cemetery abun- dant with pottery urns, bones of humans and animals, and other artifacts dated approxi- mately to the Migration pe- riod. In Salgotarjan, another

. UPEI student Sarah Gilis

and myself were super-

_ vised by Dr. Andrea Vaday, a

prominent archaeologist and professor at Pécs University, and with another archaeolo- gist, Antal Szabo. Again, as

if a bizarre twist of faith, I was reunited with some of the same students I had met

the summer prior in Gyor, which made the experience even more enjoyable.

Being able to travel to Hun- gary and participate in these excavations was an extreme- ly beneficial journey for my- self to experience. It enabled and challenged my network- ing and communication skills from my Bachelors of Business Administration de- gree, improved my French language skills, developed new friends and personal connections globally, and fi- nally I experienced a culture relatively unknown to my- self before the voyage. My reasoning for writing this article is to promote aware- ness with regards to the pos- sibilities for travel which UPEI offers through various departments.

My experiences began as requirements for a Fine Arts Directed Studies course and resulted with being asked to return to participate in more excavations by the archae- ologists who I worked with. Definitely a rewarding expe- rience!

Diversity Office to host UPEI Diversity Week

By Maria Durling Diversity Office

The Diversity Office at the University of Prince Edward Island will be hosting its first annual Diversity Week from Jan. 19 - 24.

A highlight of the week will be an address on Jan. 22 by Ben Yang, well-known throughout Canada as an insightful and inspirational speaker on issues of global- ization and_ cross-cultural communication. He will speak at 1 p.m. in the W.A. Murphy Student Centre Yang is currently Director of the University of Toronto’s International Student Centre and an instructor for the In- ternational Educator Train- ing

Program at Queens’ Univer- sity. He also serves as chair for the Canadian Bureau for International Education Im- migration’s advising com- mittee.

Other activities during the

week will include movies, displays, cultural activities, international foods, presen- tations, and much more.

Ruth Freeman, coordinator of the Diversity Office, envi- sions the week as an oppor- tunity to explore and share the increasing diversity of the university community.

“The spirit of diversity rec- ognizes, acknowledges, and celebrates what makes us different from one another,” she says. “But it also seeks to build on what we have in common and what unites us across boundaries of class, gender, ethnicity, religion, language, culture and abil- ity.”

All Diversity Week activi- ties are free and open to the public. A schedule of events will be available in early January on the Diversity Of- fice’s website at www.upei. ca/studentservices/diversity- office. For further informa- tion, please contact Ruth Freeman at 628-4332 or rfreeman @upei.ca.

The week starts on Monday, January 19 at 12:00 Noon, McMillan Hall, WA Murphy Student Centre Opening Ceremony Awarding of Prizes for the “Diversity at my Uni- versity” Photo Contest Slide show presentation of all photos submitted to the photo contest Free cake, refreshments and Diversity Ribbons International Foods available in the Courtyard Café all week long

Time:7:00 pm, The Wave UPEI’s first ever Drag Queen Beauty Pageant, hosted by the Rainbow Alliance