Caolan Head

I have spent a full month in belize as i am writing this. the people i have met and the experiences i have had have changed me profoundly. The experience i have gained in the field will be a foundation upon which i will fortify my undestanding of archaeology and the cultures of the past. I have been excavating the same unit at our site for the entirety of my time here. Every day has brought new discoveries and exciting moments. I would like to share the most fond moment of my excavation. This occurd approximatley 2 weeks ago, in the first half of the day. I was bringing back a section of the unit down to the level we had just uncovered. as i was bringing the fill back my trowel tapped upon something that gave off a loud clang. I continued to uncover this large piece of stone until it literally popped out of the dirt. as i turned it over and cleaned it off i realzied tha i was holding the end to a decently sized granit mano. I remember my eyes bugging out of my head and my heart rate sky rocketing. I immediatley replaced the mano back where i had found it so that it could be sketched, but could of nothing else but taking it out and examining it for the rest of the day. This experience along with many others have set my heart in the world of archaeology. it is with great sorrow that i think about my departure from this wonderful country five days, i will miss it whole-heartedly.

Sincerely,
Caolan Head

Alison Rand

I can’t believe the end is so near. We’ve dug so much yet there’s so much to do still. It’s been an amazing dig. When we first started our dig we originally thought our unit would hit the back wall of a structure and we thought we did because we had a relatively nice alignment of rocks. However when we dug past those rocks we found some really nice huge rectangular blocks that look more like they would be part of a wall. Unfortunately we did not find a wall, but we did find a couple steps which looked really nice. So from these last three weeks of digging, I’ve basically learned that you can never expect anything.

Archaeology is all about surprises and I think that’s my favorite part about it. The mosquito situation has also gotten better here, nothing compares to those first two days.
I feel like I know San Ignacio really well now. I can’t believe I have 10 more days when everything is making so much more sense to me. I’m going to miss Belize from the plantains to the beautiful nature. It still shocks me at how green it is down here. This is one of the best trips so far.

Never say goodbye…Kandee G

As my trip to Belize is nearing its end, it has me wondering when I’ll come back, because I will be coming back! J This Belizean experience has been absolutely unforgettable. From the—

• Totally chill, island life at Caye Caulker
• Waking up before dawn to the crazy sounds of  head out to the excavation sit
• 15-minute walks through the sporadic jungles in the Mennonite fields
• millions of “tourist dogs”, aka your friendly neighborhood dogs, that follow us! (Shout outs to: Droopy!)
• Visits to some Mayan sites (Cahal Pech, Baking Pot, Caracol, Actun Tunichil Mukhal, Tikal, and Xunantunich)
• Nights out with the UMAP & Foothill crew
• Friendly, diverse locals who are always up for a chat
• Mouth-watering, finger-licking good Belizean cuisine!
• Bootleg movie channel that allowed me to watch all the new movies! (I don’t have to go to the theater anytime soon!)
• …but most importantly are the great people (professors, friends, locals) whom I have met and had the fortune to form great friendships with! J (hopefully we meet again!!!)

Although there are more experiences than I can list here, I will cherish every moment of this trip!

Thanks to everyone for making this a wonderful experience and special shout outs for Sam, Andy and John for everything that you guys for all that you have taught me about archaeology this summer! 🙂

PS: Op 4 has be greatly successful this year! Our team exposed a 4m long x 1.6 m wide bench/bed, and five 2x2m units down to the beautiful, white plaster floors of this supposed L-shaped structure. Wonder what we’ll learn from structures A4 and A5 next year???

peace&love, ya mon!
kandee

Josue Moraga

Belize is awesome! Digging in the field, trips to other sites, and fun weekends have made this month go by so quick. The operation I’m in is the one excavating a trench between structures A2 and A3. We’ve uncovered a plaster floor and exposed the northwest corner of structure A2. Other than that, not much else has been found. But working alongside my fellow digmates (OP NINE!!) has made up for the lack of findings in our units. Either way though, I wholly enjoy being out in the field and going through buckets of dirt. Being a part of this field school has made it clear to me that this is what I want to keep doing. Just one more week and I’ll be back in smog filled LA, so I’ll be sure to make the most of this last week. 🙂

The Ending of a Great Trip by Leonella Gudiel-Jimenez

It is upsetting to think that my time here in Belize is coming to an end.  I have had so many good experiences in the past four weeks that I don’t feel that it’s time to go home to my daily routine just yet.  The stress free lifestyle, beautiful scenery and great people that I’ve met so far have made me feel comfortable here.  Looking back on the past weeks, I realized that I have learned so much about Mayan Archaeology, Belize and its rich culture. I did not expect this country to be so diverse and so this entire trip has been an eye opener for me.

My time spent in Belize has also taught me a lot about myself.  This trip has allowed me to challenge myself to come out of my comfort zone and take risks. Being out in the field Monday through Friday was the most time that I’ve ever spent out in the wilderness and I loved every minute of it.  It is sad to think that I will be leaving the jungle and returning to the concrete jungle of LA where smog, traffic jams, and 9am-5pm works schedules run the lives of many including myself.  I hope that I am able to come back to Belize and continue learning about the history,  people and culture that belong to this beautiful country.

Jen Christopher

Since my last post we’ve spent most of our time in the field. I’m working on the dreaded Operation 11, where the huge bags of artifacts come from. We started out looking for an entryway, but may have found a trash dump instead. My favorite part about digging is the interpretation and how it changes as we find things. When we started digging, we were excited to have found a stair, because that meant that we probably did find what was once an entryway. However, the huge amounts of artifacts caused us to doubt that this was used as an entryway, at least near the end of its existence. The fact that a lot of the artifacts were in the top (humus) layer led us to speculate initially that looters may have gone through and left behind the broken debris. As we continued to dig, we realized that the post-depositional processes were probably just far more active than usual, because the volume and distribution stayed consistent as we continued down. There is also the possibility that the broken artifacts could have been involved in a termination ritual, but I don’t know at this point how well the evidence supports that idea. Also, the large amount of lithic debris suggests that this area could have been the secondary refuse pile for a workshop. We also noted that many of the artifacts looked burned, and the lowest layer of soil looks ashy. This is consistent with many of the other digs in the area, which show evidence of having been burned. In the middle of last week we opened up a new unit in the middle of the plaza, hoping to find a floor. We found something that could possibly be a highly degraded floor at almost exactly the same height of a well preserved floor just above the steps, but the differences in preservation have yet to be sufficiently explained. Below this we found a deteriorated but far more intact floor, which we are excited to follow. Another interesting piece of info is the fact that there is more lithic debris in the plaza, so maybe the workshop was there if it existed.

Anagabriel Loeza

Limestone in my dirt
Don’t pretend to be something
You are just a rock

This is the last week in Belize and my feud with the treacherous limestone continues. Is it a lithic? No! It’s just limestone. Is it a ceramic? No! It’s just limestone. It’s only junky limestone. Tomorrow is one of the last days in the field, and I’m excited to continue finding it in my screen and in the dirt. It’s a very bittersweet feeling. In a few days I can go back home, to a place where I don’t wake up to put on bug spray. I don’t sweat bullets just sitting down. But at the same time, I don’t get to hear howler monkeys yell at the group, and I don’t get to see big fluffy caterpillars that give you a fever. Even if it is only a few days, I’ve got to make sure to make the best of it right?

The site has been amazing so far. We’ve found stairs, a room, a wall, tons of ceramics and lithics, and elite items like shell and obsidian. I really wish I could drink some coffee in the morning though. I don’t because I’d rather not go to the bathroom in a mosquito infested jungle.

Too my roomies: You guys are awesome 😛

Sara Starzyk

These past few weeks have been really amazing here in Belize. The foremost experience was definitely working at the site, uncovering area that hasn’t been touched for such immense amounts of time. But we also got to go other already excavated sites like Xunantunich. The view from the top of the Castillo was breathtaking; you can see Guatemala and the landscape. Also the weekend before I went to Caye Cauker and it was lobster fest, delicious! Unfortunately it rained all weekend, but I still got to go snorkeling the morning before taking the water taxi and bus back to San Ignacio. The reef was absolutely beautiful; we had stingrays brushing our feet, little colorful fish all around and even a shark passed by us. I am definitely going to miss this amazing country when I go home in a week.

Brittany Smith

Oh Belize, the only place where you can begin the day in clothes already filled with deet from the week and mildly stiff from the dirt and mud from the day before.
Things in my backpack when we leave for the day at 6:00am:

* two bottles of bug spray (high in deet)
* regular water battle plus one small plastic one
* tape measurer
* flip flops
* bandanna / hat
* ipod and camera

While the field is the highlight of my day, the nap on the way home is a welcome way to pass the 40 minute drive home. I’ve even got my own playlist for the ride home 🙂 . I’ve finally learned how to write a good journal entry, unfortunately we only have two days left of digging the field 😦 . I think that we are all either itching to come back here or simply itching from the mosquito bites on our hands.

The Final Countdown – Valda Black

Although it is almost over, I had an fun and educationally stimulating time (which is usually hard to combine). I love being able to dig and get gross and sweaty, it is like experiencing childhood all over again! I quickly picked up the basics of digging, taking depths, mapping, etc. and that left room for analysis of what we found which is obviously the best part.
I was delightfully surprised to find out how accommodating the program was with people’s final projects. I can combine my love of osteology and archaeology by writing about the burial found last year at the site. It is great practice for me and especially exciting because I personally know the site.
If this is our last blog I just want to say thank you to everyone for an amazing time!