The field school officially began on Sunday, so I woke up early and packed everything out of my hostel and trekked the ten blocks up hill to move into the much more expensive, but so much grander, hotel in which the project is putting us during our stay in Arequipa. The picture is the sunset view from my room. Nene, one of the project directors, has been making sure we are well fed and well watered. Every night we go out we have excellent food and a round of pisco sours, which is the classic Peruvian cocktail. It´s made out of pisco, a grape liquor, lemon, and egg whites.
A picture of the first night out:
A picture of the first night out:
In the mornings we have an excellent breakfast provided by the hotel--its about the only time I get fresh fruits and vegetables because we are supposed to avoid them--water contamination. On the bar they set out all kinds of fresh fruit juices (pineapple, orange, and papaya), dried local cereal grains (trigo, soya, quinoa, and a special granola), honey, yogurts, marmalades, three kinds of breads, fruits (banana, clementines, papaya, and pineapple), tomatoes, avocados, queso andino (a local cheese- its very salty and yummy), and scrambled eggs. For drinks there is a really dark coffee served with hot milk, and different kinds of tea including coca tea, anis tea, and other herbs. Breakfast is one of my favorite meals here!
Then we are all driven to the university which Nene attended when she was growing up in Arequipa to hold classes in the morning. We lunch and then head to local educational/cultural sites. Yesterday we visited two museums. The first is a local private museum which houses one of the most important recent archaeological discoveries. Her name is Juanita, and she is a mummy. They have her preserved in a giant glass box with two layers of thick glass, special aeration and temperature control, etc. Its very fancy stuff, and costs a fortune to keep up. Her body is so well preserved that the grimace of fear on her face is legible. She was a sacrifice - that is, the Inka brought her up to the mountain specifically to sacrifice to the gods, so no wonder the poor girl´s last emotion was fear. Fun fun.
Then we are all driven to the university which Nene attended when she was growing up in Arequipa to hold classes in the morning. We lunch and then head to local educational/cultural sites. Yesterday we visited two museums. The first is a local private museum which houses one of the most important recent archaeological discoveries. Her name is Juanita, and she is a mummy. They have her preserved in a giant glass box with two layers of thick glass, special aeration and temperature control, etc. Its very fancy stuff, and costs a fortune to keep up. Her body is so well preserved that the grimace of fear on her face is legible. She was a sacrifice - that is, the Inka brought her up to the mountain specifically to sacrifice to the gods, so no wonder the poor girl´s last emotion was fear. Fun fun.
The second was a textile museum, funded by a company that sells fine textile clothing (alpaca and vicuña sweaters).Kind of interesting. There were live llamas, alpacas, and vicuñas which we could pet. There were also live Andean women weaving. They were on display too but we couldn´t pet them. Only take pictures.
The next day we visited the Santa Catalina Monastery, which is actually a convent that has been in use for centuries. I think it was founded in the 1500´s or so. They´ve got the whole thing, which was built to be a tiny city, still upkept to show to tourists, though there´s a section that is off limits to everyone because there are still nuns living there. The order´s specific restrictions are that once the women enter, they are never allowed to leave or have contact with the outside world again. Only God (and the other nuns, though they tried to limit contact between them as much as possible). We learned a lot on the tour and its all pretty creepy and lonely-sounding.
The day after we went on a 4 hrArequipa tour which I was at first cynical about but later really loved. We were put on a GIANT double decker bus that was painted a flamboyant blue and barely fit on the roads and the tour guide´s voice was projected with a very loud speaker. There were many many stares from the streets. But we went to lots and lots of places around the city and I really enjoyed seeing more than just the historic district. We finally got to see the parts of Arequipa that people actually live in.
At nights we usually went out to the bars and clubs. It was during the week so they were all pretty dead, but we had a good time among ourselves, anyway. Being a giant group of gringos, we were stared at wherever we went, but now we´re just used to it.
We head to the field tomorrow after lunch at one of the nicest restaurants in Arequipa. Tomorrow morning will be busy with packing, preparing for the field (which really means buying alcohol to make sure we´re not bored at night), and getting to the site. I won`t be in touch for another week, and I´m sure there will be plenty to share. Until then!!!
Love, Augusta
