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...continued
Terrible
and Slow Dragons
The word "dinosaur"
was coined by a British scientist
Sir Richard Owen more than 150
years ago. It means "terrible
reptile" in Latin. We use the
word dinosaur without a second
thought and understand well its
meaning. But "dinosaur" doesn't
have a lot of meaning in Chinese.
The Chinese word for dinosaur
is "kong long" - meaning "terrible
dragon". Dragons were part of
Chinese culture long before anyone
dug up a dinosaur skeleton.
The area we
are working in is beginning to
reveal the "terrible dragons"
that lived some 90 million years
ago. One of these is the unusual
plant-eating dinosaurs we call
therizinosaurs. The word "therizinosaur"
means "scythe reptile," named
for the very long sickle-shaped
claws of the first named member,
Therizinosaurus. The word "therizinosaur",
however, donesn't have a lot of
meaning in Chinese. They refer
to these interesting dinosaurs
as "man long", meaning "slow dragon."
Therizinosaurs are characterized
by the rather short, stocky hind
limbs. Indeed, they would have
been fairly slow, compared to
most other theropods of their
body size. We hope to discover
additional bones of the "slow
dragon." In the meantime, it's
very handy to learn the Chinese
word for any dinosaur we are likely
to find while prospecting with
our international team. Learning
how to write "terrible dragon"
or "slow dragon" in Chinese, however,
is a nearly impossible task!
Paul
sifts through the confetti-like
matrix surrounding an Iguanodon-like
dinosaur site in search of a missing
fragment of bone.
May 4
7:30am, Base Camp
DAY OFF
We are in
the midst of a national holiday
in China; a seven-day vacation
to honor workers. Since May 1,
every night over dinner Zhao has
told us, "In rest of China, 7
day no work. Here, just a one
day no work," and he laughed showing
a tiny smile as he pinched the
air to emphasize the small amount
of time the Chinese team would
take off. "BUT," he stressed,
"if tomorrow nice day, no windy,
we WORK!"
Amongst
the Labor Day festivities - arm
wrestling! Andy's open invitation
to arm wrestle anyone was eagerly
taken up by most of the Chinese
team.
After three
days of saying "if the weather
bad tomorrow, no work," Zhao told
us today would be a day off for
everyone. We are going to have
a huge meal with people from the
local army base and there might
even be a game of basketball.
I am scheduled to learn how to
make traditional Chinese steamed
dumplings, or "jiaodz", (pronounced
"jow zuh") in the afternoon, and
everyone will get to take a shower.
11:00pm
We are all completely full, tired,
happy and clean. We had a great
day off - Andy arm wrestled everyone
in camp, I got to play mahjong
with the Chinese team, the basketball
game was a huge success, (even
though we lost 35-57) and we all
helped make (and eat) jiaodz!
CLICK
HERE
TO LEARN HOW TO MAKE JIAODZ
Home
court advantage!
Final score Army, 57, Dinosaurs,
35.
May 5,
9:00pm, Base Camp
The Bulldozer
arrives…
As we finished the final jacket
in our theropod quarry, we heard
a rumble on the horizon and looked
up to see an enormous pea-green
bulldozer driving towards the
site.
Within 15
minutes the heavy work started.
Before our eyes, thousands of
pounds of rock were pushed aside
with each pass of the blade. The
moment we had anticipated for
days had arrived.
Hearing
a rumble approach, the team looks
up from work on the jacket at
the therizinosaur site to see
the enormous bulldozer approaching
Gabrielle
Lyon
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