Sara Dahy- University of Alexandria- MA-2023
I am Sara Dahy from Egypt; graduated from the faculty of Arts Greek and Roman Archaeology department, Alexandria University. I had lots of trainings in museums and volunteering experiences because of my public engagement capacity, as I wanted to find my place within the archaeological community, and once I had a field school with the Center d’Études Alexandrines, which gave me a new perspective for archeology in which I found myself interested in the site formation process, besides the maritime archaeology course in the college, these two things made me curious to know about maritime archaeology and how the sites are formed. By the end of the course, Dr. Emad told us about the HFF and the scholarship, which sounded remarkable, so I chose to apply with great ambition to undertake the MA, driven by the passion of the priceless moments to be the first one to get close to facts from hundreds or thousands of years ago. Also, diving into some tragic stories on the sites is a very human thing. I want to experience these things, to feel what they went through and learn from the history that can be told by wood, bones, and various materials, and I want to show the people the beauty of this science. It is not just the moment we find something new that triggers me; it is once we publish its results to the world, therefore I want to achieve real results in the field of sunken antiquities.
I would like to thank the Honor Frost Foundation for the exceptional opportunity.
I would like to share my achievements for this year as an HFF scholar. Basically, I have two new milestones, the first one is the accomplishment of the diploma degree in Maritime Archaeology at the Alexandria Centre for Maritime Archaeology and Underwater Cultural heritage, which I could not have achieved without the support of the Honor Frost Foundation.
As much as it was a new experience for me, but by the help from the professors and all the staff in the Centre it was achievable and in a way I am satisfied with it.
My professors were aware of my training experience in the archaeological field and my interest in the stratigraphy, so I was nominated to be one of the Marsa Gawasis mission this year and I would say it is another milestone, because being in a new site that differs from the sites I used to experience in Alexandria is great, besides working with a team of Egyptian and Italian professors and students is definitely something that added to my mentality. For sure I would like to go back to Gawasis next year, and I am looking forward for all the new sites and people I will be able deal with during my time in this field.
I would like to thank Dr. Ziad Morsy, Prof Adrea Manzo, Prof. Chiara Zazzaro, Dr. Mahmoud Emam and all the team of Gawasis 2024 for this opportunity.
The second great milestone is that I completed the CMAS one star diving course. Now I can take this to the next level and practice the underwater archaeological work. Thanks to the efforts of Prof. Emad Khalil and Mohamed Khedr.
I am looking forward to the next update in my profile which will mean I am successfully taking steady steps towards my career in this challenging field.
