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Hey everybody. Sorry I don´t post that often - long days and not that much computer time available. Weekends here are awesome. We´re all getting to know the city of Cuzco very well, so lots of running around the city and eating lots of food - but boy do I miss my LA version of Mexican food. There are a few clubs here - the nightlife is fun but definitely different from the US. So weekends have so far consisted of shopping, eating, doing homework in coffee shops (amazing mochas btw) and then going out to dance. Everyone seems to be having a very good time, and pretty much everyone who was sick is now almost completely recovered. Sunday afternoon the manager of our hostel, Ignacio, rented a field for us and we all went down to play soccer. Really fun! We stayed about 2 hours and then came home for movies and lots of sleep before starting excavation work again this week. The hike is getting a lot easier, and digging is fun but a bit slow going. Hopefully we will get more done next week. Tomorrow is a holiday so we will work and then we have thursday, friday, saturday, sunday off. Me and a few others are trying to arrange a horseback riding / hiking / camping tour - So I may not post until after I get back on Saturday or something. Anyway, everything´s good - just trying to make the most of my next 2 1/2 weeks.

ok that´s about it... miss you all, hope everyone is good!

facebook stopped working...

hey so... I don´t have time for a terribly long post, but just wanted everyone to know that I´m still alive. Facebook, for whatever reason, isn´t loading on the computer properly, and hasn´t been for a day or two now, so hopefully that will be up and running soon. Until then...

My week has gone (this is the short version) something like this:

Monday took my first hike up to the site. takes an hour and a half all up stairs and really steep hills. high altitude, very hard to breathe. But it´s absolutely beautiful. Anyway we get to the site (called Devil´s Balcony), split up in to groups and learn about the site and start excavating. We dig until around 3, then go back down the hill. Monday I ate something not so great, went to bed early and then....

Tuesday I had food poisoning. It sucked, stayed at the hostel with a few other sick roommates and slept and watched movies. Tres boring.

Wednesday I recovered, got to take a taxi halfway up, climbed the rest of the way, excavated from 9 until 3 again, came back down the hill. Went to dinner, took salsa lessons, fell asleep.

Today I walked the whole way again, excavated till 3, again went to dinner and salsa.

Suffice to say I am very tired, but doing well, and definitely getting in shape! Tomorrow we only have a half day of excavating, then lecture. I´m sure more salsa after that.

Our site is fantastic, complete with river and huge rock/cave formations with waterfalls. I´ll go into more detail later, but basically the site is believed to be an Inka sacrificial/ ceremonial site. We are looking to find the canal the Inkas built which would mark the perimiter of the site. So far in our unit we have unearthed the wall and will dig deeper to see if we can find any ceremonial items or anything else that would give us clues about how the Inka used the site. Very interesting stuff, I´m learning a lot about what it´s like to excavate and I´m also getting a lot stronger wielding pick axes and caring buckets of dirt back and forth up and down a hill as we dig deeper.

Anyway, hope everyone´s doing well. Miss you all, talk to you later!

festivals, pottery, and lots of rocks

Hey! so it´s taken me a few days but I have plenty to tell -

So Wednesday was pretty chill, which was good because I needed it, the altitude and everything had finally caught up to me. In the morning we went to 2 museums - the museum of the Inka and the museum of pre-columbian art. both were very cool. The Inka museum had a series of dioramas for native Peruvians from 10,000 or so years ago through the different main societies and periods including the Moche, wari and Inkans and up through the onset of spanish rule. They had a few collections of projectile points and obsidian cores, pottery throughout the different time periods, and agricultural tools. The coolest room by far in it though was the mummy room. They set up a display of skeletons and mummies with artifacts to look like a real tomb. Very cool.

Then we went to the pre columbian art museum, which was set up a bit differently. each room contained similar types of art and artifacts - wooden statues, pottery, jewelry, etc. Some of the pottery was really cool. One of my favorite pieces was a jog shaped like a deer. but the deer was very cartoon - like and very expressive. The jewelry room was also very interesting - they were very good with gold. A few of the displays included huge gold ear plugs (at least 5 or 6 inches in diameter - these were worn to show wealth, the larger the plug, the wealthier the person was) and an example of a golden crown.

After lunch at twonations we got some free time. I took a really long nap which was so nice, and caught up on homework. Then we went to dinner and after a few of us went out to an Irish pub (interesting) and a British pub (even more interesting - the UK the Peruvian way!). We had a really good time though and it was nice getting to know a few of the other students better.

Thursday was amazing beyond words. we left the hostel at 8 and went on a 3 hour bus ride to a village called Racqui (Rock-chee). But before we got there we stopped to look at some ruins...

In order to get to these ruins we had to hike up a hill and then cross a (as the locals called it) bridge. What they meant by bridge was really a railroad track with open ties over a small fast moving river, of which you would not want to fall into because I´m sure there were all kinds of nasty bacteria. But don´t worry, it wasn´t a very wide river, and everyone made it across quite safely - hopefully the picture I took of everyone crossing on my disposable camera will turn out well. we then hiked up another series of hills using a narrow footpath. Quite fun (seriously). at the top of the small hill we came to some very large ruins, and could see clear across the valley below. Completely stunning, as everything here is. Our guest professor, Bill, taught us history about the site and what it had possibly been used for, including the series of niches in the walls, which apparently housed mummies. The Wari tended to bury their ancestors within walls, to keep the family close. We got a good 20 minutes or so to get a good look and then went back down the hill and across the ¨bridge¨.

Once at Racqui, we entered the main plaza of the town, most of us bought some souveniers, and then continued through the plaza to more ruins. If the walls at the previous sight had been astounding, the series of ruins here was indescribable, so I´ll just use the word ëpic¨. I can´t even explain so hopefully I´ll be able to post pictures to show you all later.

After learning and exploring about the ruins we went back into the plaza and hiked past the main village towards a small house on the end. We were invited by a local family to come into their 3-room dirt floor house, and we all sat and had the most amazing meal ever. It was very simple - potatoes and meat roasted for several hours in a pit, and home made cheese. The spices they used on the meat, however, were phenomenal, and the family was so unbelievably nice to do all the work they did for us (there were about 30 of us altogether). They also made special Christmas Chicha - a homemade type of beer - for all of us to try. usually chicha is made out of corn, but this was made out of strawberries and was really good.

After lunch we were invited to go across the road to their ceramic workshop. They showed us all of their wares and we were invited to learn how they made all of their ceramics. It was so wonderful! Their pottery was for sale, of course, and I think we cleared most of it out!

It was definitely a very special and very cool experience.

Finally today we went about an hour away to a city called Pisaq. We weren´t able to see the ruins there but they had an amazing festival. There were so many colors and the music was wonderful. We watched the parade from the plaza through the streets, and ate lunch at a local restaurant. After we got back to Cuzco we went to twonations again where matt and his wife were celebrating their wedding aniversary, and they shared some delicious roasted pig, vegetables, potatoes, and sweet tamales with us. And after, as is supposedly customary, we all had a few shots of Pisco, the local liquor. Pisco is very strong and made from grapes grown in the southern part of Peru. It tastes kind of like sweet tequila almost.

Tomorrow we are all going Pisco tasting, and will learn how to make a pisco sour (tastes a bit like a margarita). Then on monday we will start excavating.

Ok, there isn´t much more to tell for now. Miss everyone, hope you´re all safe, and yes - definitely missing some greasy pizza and a reliably hot shower, but so far I´m having an amazing time.

Love you all,

Meghan

long day

hey no time to post just yet... friends want the computer. but today was completely amazing. lots of ruins, hikes, an amazing local meal made by the nicest Peruvians ever, and a ceramics workshop. also, tasted chicha and pisco. hope everyone´s well!

ciao!

on safety in cuzco, and following Peruvians

what a crazy couple of days! first off let me give you all a few lessons I learned from matt, the co-owner of twonations, an amazing australian/peruvian restaurant here:

WASH YOUR HANDS!!!

BOIL YOUR WATER!!! A LOT!!!!

and Peruvian muggers are the nicest thieves you´ll ever meet...

apparently Matt, who is Australian, was exceedingly scared while traveling through the US, and he knows that muggers never just take your money and run in Australia.... but apparently here in Peru, muggers might take your money, but they won´t be mean about it. According to a few accounts from travelers in his restaurant, one man was kidnapped, taken to his kidnappers house and the wife and kids fed him a delicious home cooked meal of Peruvian soup while the kidnapper raided his ATM.

Don´t worry mom, the moral of this and a few other stories was that Cuzco does have thieves, so watch your money, but generally it´s a country of exceptionally nice people, and we should all stay in groups and be careful (as always, and we do).

And after today I can attest to that. But I´ll get to that later....

Yesterday we all got up around 8 AM... it´s really cold in the morning, and split up into two groups. My group went with Alexei, our professor, who is awesome. We went on a walk around Cuzco and he taught us how to tell real Inka masonry from Colonial, modern, and reconstruction. After a few examples of real Inka walls still standing in the city, we walked around drawing out the walls that were left, attempting to reconstruct what the city would have looked like 500 years prior, before the Spanish arrived. We visited the Cusicancha, which is a ¨museum¨of an original Inkan Cancha... I´ll upload pictures as soon as i figure out how. But basically the Inkas built a series of courtyards, with rooms on each of the four sides. You could kind of equate this to small apartment complexes today. Anyway, the ruins were absolutely beautiful, and yes, I did get to pet a llama there.

After lunch (which was, as usual, strange looking but delicious) we went to Qorikancha. Which is supposed to be one of the most sacred places for the Inkas. Also beautiful, again, pictures when I figure out how to upload. After we all ate dinner at twonations, where we got our fine lecture from matt and some others from the TAs and Alexei.

After a great night´s rest we woke up again around 8 and left the hostel about 9. morning activities included a tour of a museum filled with beautiful religious art, followed by ordering a custom pair of bright teal blue handmade peruvian boots. So. Awesome.

the real adventure of the day however was our afternoon activity. We were told to get in groups of 4 and were handed a packet of old pictures of Cuzco. The mission was to find the things in the pictures and take pictures of what it looked like now.

In our search for locations we asked three seperate locals if they new where some of the locations were. All gave the same answer; a plaza a few blocks from the main one. We asked directions every few blocks and finally found a woman who told us to follow her, she was going near there. Her trek landed us several blocks away from where we were supposed to be, but right on top of a hill with the most gorgeous view of Cuzco and the outlying city ever. While we didn´t quite accomplish the goal originally set out for us, we had a wonderful time chatting with a few of the locals and taking breathtaking pictures (again, hopefully to come soon). All of them were extremely nice and very welcoming. We did have a mad dash down several stairs and across the plaza in order to find a cab and be back at the hostel in time for dinner though. Still worth it.

Anyway, hope everybody´s doing great. miss you all very much! I still have some reading to do so I´ll post again in another couple days.

second day in Cuzco

Hey!

So the first thing I have to say about Cuzco is that it´s absolutely fabulous, and all the other students are fabulous too. I have a feeling the next 5 weeks are going to fly by. So I miss you all back in the states, but this is definitely quite the experience, and if you get the chance, I´d highly recommend it.

Anyway the flight wasn´t too bad, but the 10 hour layover in Lima was only excusable because I was in good company. My now roommates, Chris and Erika both met me in LAX and we had a pretty good time trying to avoid boredom and attempting to catch up on our already assigned homework.

We were met at the airport by Ignacio and Alex, managers of our hostel, which is a gorgeous refurbished 18th century house. The ride to the hostel (and every cab ride we´ve taken so far) have been adventures in and of themselves as the streets are all narrow cobblestone alleys and pedestrians beware - cars will NOT stop for you to cross. All the buildings are made out of old stone masonry, with hidden mazes of shops inside them. There are tons of stray dogs just sleeping on train tracks and outside doors. It´s definitely an interesting place.

Watching the descent from the plane was amazing - it was like the mountains stretched out forever, totally unlike anything in the states. The altitude difference was a little hard at first, but with the help of altitude pills and many many cups of coca tea I seem to be doing just fine, and so does most everyone else.

Erika, Chris and I got to the hostel a bit early and got settled in, our room is like a mini apartment or suite, with a TV and small couch and kitchenette in a main room and two bedrooms, one below and one above. I´m rooming with a girl named Jess, who is from London, and Erika and Chris are with a girl named Sandy whose parents are from Cuzco. Sandy has been really nice and helpful the whole time - she´s been to Cuzco a few times before and speaks fluent spanish. Most of us speak enough to get by, but nowhere near fluent.

Anyway our first day we walked to plaza de armas, which is a big square with shops and a few cathedrals. We ate at a vegetarian restaurant off a side street. I keep having the same reaction to the food - looks very strange and colorful, tastes absolutely delicious (and no Jennifer, if you´re reading this - I haven´t eaten guinea pig yet - apparently it is quite the delicacy though).

After eating we met up with some others who had just gotten in, and a few who had been here for a while but had been watching the soccer game at a bar. It took us about 4 cabs, but we all got to another shopping market that sold all discounted modern stuff. Kinda like a peruvian style mall. (By the way, all cab rides are about 3 soles, no matter where you´re going - which is about one US dollar). The market was crazy packed with all kinds of people, and oh god the amount of cute shoes and boots! Still salivating a little bit over it. I didn´t buy anything but chipped in for a DVD player so we can watch movies at night since we have a TV. So many discount movies were being sold too. Not everything is great quality, but let me know if anybody´s looking for anything specific, because they all sell for around a dollar.

After we went to an andean market. All alpaca, everywhere. great stuff. I need gift orders guys. email me.

Today I went to mass at the local cathedral. So beautiful, and a very interesting experience. Then all 20 of us that have arrived so far went to a bar to watch the world cup. It was completely packed. great stuff. Then more shopping and finally dinner was again, fantastic.

ok so I think I´ve used up way too much computer time as there´s only one, so I´ll check in again in the next couple days. This week is museum visiting week, so it should be good.

Miss you all!!!