As archaeologists accustomed to encountering new situations we are, on a basic level, adept at adaptation, problem solving, quick fix-its to boots and tires, communicating across languages and cultures, working with strangers and extended field seasons with minimal home comforts – how many of us have been weeks without running water, never mind toilet paper? You may live similarly. You retain for decades friendships formed over a few shared meals. Your families are both nuclear and extended and you adopt each other’s concerns as your own. You are a tribe of action and movement and thrive on mystery and eking out clues to the complexity of peoples’ lives. You feel a keen sense of connection to places – witnesses to millennia of social, political, economic and environmental changes. You also feel intimately linked to living communities and the individuals who live among ruins or the vast grassland or desert between oases. You follow other professions but experience people and places like an archaeologist. It is why we have a shared heritage and why we care about each other.

Global spread of Covid-19 has shifted all our daily lives. Even those who normally work from home still feel empathy for our colleagues who dearly miss their office companions and well-worn-in work space and understand the fragility of life. Postponement of fieldwork is wreaking havoc on long running projects and academic deadlines. Instead we concentrate energies on desk work: remote sensing is continuing unabated and scanning of the archives as well – thanks to the proactive efforts of team leaders who brought books, notebooks, files and equipment home. Individual research continues such as Gavkhar DURDIEVA’s scientific analysis of earthen architecture. Our Chinese colleagues emerge from their lockdown and begin to prep for digitising their archives.

It is true there is an undercurrent of anxiety, work pressure, transition, boredom but you are connecting in new and different ways and sharing aspects of your lives you might not normally have occasion for. Despite being physically more distant than ever, you are somehow closer emotionally and intellectually and communing on entirely new levels. Some of you may find your lives more balanced. While work continues, you are also cycling, running with dogs, talking to houseplants, weaving and baking, teaching and exploring with children, reading actual books, and stopping to smell the roses and observe bees at their work. We want to hear from you too so please stay in touch and let us know what’s new with you via Facebook and Twitter and take good care of yourselves.

Here, we share some of what’s new with us (scroll down for comments from a few of our Central Asian colleagues in Russian👇):

Bryan:  I spend more time at the kitchen table where there is the best light, which means that I work with my laptop obstructed by affectionate cats and delicious smells.  I have commandeered my bike back from my wife after an 8-year gap and have taken up cycling. It’s actually quite fun.

Tim:  Enjoying my new office companion Smudge and the long walks with her and Jackie in the woods of Walthamstow. Finding online MS Teams meetings good, but missing hugs and hate the sound of my own voice recording lectures.

Sarah:  New life in lockdown includes creating a new pet in the form of a sourdough starter, having the time to finally practice watercolour painting after five years, and taking care of my own little urban jungle.

Gai:  I spend some time staring at computers, as always, but these days balance it out with time in the garden. Excite myself with taking pictures of different things, old maps and by building more and more complex models of heritage sites. [Thanks to Gai for the amazing photo of a bee enjoying lunch!]

Rui:  …no new hobby or delightful events. Life has become delicate and challenging so far, when it’s structured around three meals a day, retaining/entertaining a 10-year-old monster, not to mention the constant defeating feeling of never being able to get on top of things…

Kim:  strategically patronising the local French patisserie (raisin danish is the most popular and you have to time your visit just right to obtain this newly precious commodity), wandering through the Wim Wenders catalogue, dancing it out with United We Stream Berlin and more.

Галина КАРИМОВА (Galina KARIMOVA):  Рада за твое стремление поддерживать всех в хорошем настроении и желании как то всех вводить в курс событий. Да. Ты права. Очень сильно изменился подход к работе. Больше сижу за компьютером дома. Практикуют  скайп семинары, конференции, консультации и просто  общение. … Не надо падать духом. Продолжать работать (Пусть даже приходится сидеть всё время дома). Продолжать общаться (пусть это будет скайп, видиозвонки или просто тел.разговор, электорнная переписка). Будьте все здоровы. Удачи в преодолении возникшей трудности. Всего хорошего.

Гавхар ДУРДИЕВА (Gavkhar DURDIEVA): В настоящий время я начало систематизировать собранных материалов по памятников Южного Приаралья и одновременно продолжаем сканировать файлы по проекту МИЦАИ. время продолжаю работу – анализа древних методов реконструкции и восстановления архитектурных памятников и использованных при этом строительных материалов (необожжённый и обожжённый кирпич, глина, пахса и различные добавки), а также описываются возможности применения традиционных методов и материалов архитектуры древнего Хорезма в настоящее время.

Анастасия СТЕПАНОВА (Anastasia STEPANOVA):  Работа дома напоминает бесконечный квест – как совместить свои дела с жонглированием горячими кастрюлями, резвым ребенком, новорожденными животными, пылесосом. Нет больше графика и режима. Люди, с которыми я разговариваю по телефону, зачастую жуют и жалуются, что толстеют. Никогда не ходила я за покупками с таким удовольствием. Улицы напоминают мне те, что были в моем детстве: мало людей, почти нет машин и слышно, как поют птицы.