Today was a sort of jimble jamble. We started out to the field around 8 and finished taking our units down the arbitrary 10 cm which we will be doing for each level until we start getting in to the prehistoric stuff, the goods, at which point we will slow down and take more precautions. So far as we have been updated by Tony, they still have yet to find any charcoal samples or usable artifacts in their test pits, going down 2+ meters with the auger, which basically tunnels down in to the earth and results a core which is subsequently screened for such things. Oh, and for rocks, lithics. The soil down there is verrrrrrry clay-y though and seems to be pretty sterile, so it may be that we don’t do much more at this site than take down our main unit all the way and then start work on another site in order to get that earlier date we are after.
Excavation was enjoyable today. We had good weather for most of the day, a bit cloudy but sunny as well and not too hot. I still managed to get a bit pink in the cheeks though! I keep thinking that the local Colombian archaeologists, botanists, etc must think we are crazy due to the wild banter that comes out of our units. Partly dehydration at times and partly just awesome, crazy personalities, Jen, Evie, and I tend to come up with some interesting jokes, comments, and songs; there are loads of obscure references and shenanigans. Good ol’ fashioned diggin in the dirt fun!
By the time we had finished up our respective units and gotten 30 cm below surface, we were ready to pack up and call it a day in the field. We stopped back at the apartment and headed to the lab to start paperwork and grabbed our laptops so we could check in with the rest of the world while we were at it. Counting the ceramic sherds from a 10 cm slice of soil might not sound that taxing, however, my unit had 699 and Jen’s section had 799!!
After working in the lab for a bit we grabbed some grub at a delicious little food shack on campus, followed by frozen coffee drinks made with some sort of Colombian Nesquick equivalent, caramel-condensed milk, and of course, coffee. Sounds maybe weird, but was soooo yummy! Called it quits at the lab around 5ish and turned around to head over to Santa Rosa to meet up with some friends doing work there. It was too dark to really take in the sites as we made our way over the mountains to the north, Rio Altun, and over to Santa Rosa, but it was worth it. Although Pereira is nice, Santa Rosa is a really cute town with lots of activity in the main Plaza and is easy to walk around in as well. Our friend Nico has told us that many of the cities in this area have plazas dedicated to Simon Bolivar; going along with this is the Plaza de Bolivar in our own town of Pereira featuring an unclothed and seemingly fleshless Bolivar riding horseback. In Santa Rosa, the statue in the Plaza is a bit more conservative and what one would typically imagine of him on horseback raising a sword in the air.
We met up with our friends and colleagues for a little rum and beer to start off the evening and then continued on to check out some of the well-known chorizo of the area. Aparrently we had just missed the Festival de Chorizo, so I can only imagine how delicious that must be, but the restaurant we went to was pretty good too. Had my first Colombian beer at dinner tonight, there are a few labels all of which are similar to a Pilsner, but the one I tried was Club Colombia which was quite delicious indeed.
After dinner we stopped over at Nico’s place for some more drinks before heading back to Pereira. Michael, the German archaeologist working in Santa Rosa, treated us all to his homemade aloe vera and honey licour which was interesting....not altogether terrible but had enough of a bite to begin with; it’s sort of dry stuff with a slightly sweet aftertaste that grows on you, but is most certainly an acquired taste. So far Colombia has been all about experiencing new and unexpected flavors; some bad, some realllllll good!! I am finding, though, that they seem to eat a lot of pastries here, cheesy, sweet, or otherwise, so we shall see just how much I weigh by the end of the trip lol : P
Met a lot of cool people at dinner, students working with Nico from another university here in Colombia; Andreas and Susanna. Michael, as I mentioned before, and Fransisco, this very talkative and interesting Spanish archaeologist; Nico and Susanna were telling a funny story about how Colombians have a hard time understanding Fransisco’s spanish and that, while he was trying to ask for directions to Pereira after first arriving here, people had confused his inquiry as a question to join him in his travels. So, while he thought he was simply asking for directions, people kept brushing him of saying ‘no, no thank you’ and promptly turning away from him.
The night finally came to an end and Michael dropped the three of us back in Pereira. It’s about midnight here, but tomorrow’s another day of work so I think I’ll turn in for bed and catch up with y’all later.
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