22 January 2006
Is it possible that the bureaucracy pulls through, and works in my favor?
If there is any question to the answer to the question, you have not been reading closely to previous entries of the journal. The answer is, of course not.
Gustavo's phone remained off until Monday afternoon. I finally got through, and was informed that Gustavo has been on vacation and was taking an exam. So he knew nothing about the result of the permit request. To find out more, I would have to talk directly to his boss, Licenciado Salvador, or to his boss's secretary, Aurora.
And the result of the meeting last Thursday between you and Salvador where you discussed my proposal? Remember? That is what you told me on Thursday?
No. He has been on vacation and taking an exam. He doesn't know anything. I will have to talk directly to his boss, or to his boss's secretary, Aurora. So I call Aurora – she is the one who gets things done in the office, and she is out to lunch, and should return in a half hour. Half hour later, she is still at lunch. Half hour later, no change. Finally at 4:30, she returns to pick up her coat and is stopped by the ringing phone.
Who?
When did you submit this?
Who did you submit it to?
Who are you again?
She had not heard anything. But she will talk to Gustavo on Tuesday and see what can be done.
Fortunately for me, there is very little time pressure. I can do the excavations starting tomorrow and follow with analysis, or I can start the analysis tomorrow, while waiting on word from the bureaucrats about the status of my permits. All the work needs to be done, and I have a couple of months in which to do it. The order does not matter.
I still dislike the runaround. It is frustrating and discouraging to be lied to by people who have the authority to turn down your application for permission to excavate.
Tuesday my screens came from DHL. I ordered some large-mesh screens from a company in the US at the beginning of December, and then got a runaround from them, culminating in a very exasperated phone call on the 28th. Vinnie promised me the screens as soon as possible, but it was unlikely that they would be made before I left for the field.
He was right. They finally shipped three days after I arrived in Antigua, and showed up at the house the next day. MARI sprang for shipping them DHL to me in Guatemala (thanks, Will), and after waiting for a month and a half, I can get to work.
Which meant a solo drive to Petén.
I fully expected there to be some sort of difficulty to face in getting to the Petén. After all, I cannot make a simple drive to the border without having something exciting happen. So maybe it is that I am getting better at this driving as a foreigner. Perhaps somebody realized that I am no longer equipped to deal with more stress, and gave me an easy trip.
Wednesday came, and I got a late start, but arrived early, and had no problems (a couple of photos of the trip are attached). On the way, I even stopped at a roadside stand to buy grapes the size of golf balls. Delicious.
Flores has not changed. It is a little cooler this time of the year, but still dusty and filled with Europeans.
I even arrived early enough to take a look at my new apartment. It is a small room with a bathroom off to the side, and I was promised a refrigerator and stove if I move in and pay two months rent up front. Since I was not looking for anything other than a place to crash and cook coffee and eggs in the morning, the place is perfect. And at about $100 a month, even signing up for three months is not so bad.
After signing on the dotted line, I got a tiny apartment in the postclassic capital of the Itzá.
Now when I say tiny, I mean miniscule. I never had a dorm room this small, but my apartment comes fully furnished, with a refrigerator, a desktop stove, a crude armoire and a full bathroom. All in an area roughly 8'x13'. My side porch is considerably bigger (but does not come with a stove or running shower). But it seems comfortable and is secure, and provides me with a place to crash in between times when I am working. After stealing plastic plates and a couple of heavily weathered pans from the project lab, I set up house in a pretty cozy location.
The only real downside is the shower. It is one of the typical Guatemala jobs, and does provide water is enough quantity to get clean. But the heating element is electrical. Some of you know what I am talking about, and are sadly shaking your head with me. Others, who haven't had the pleasure of standing in the shower and turning on an electrical element (and the subsequent electrocution) cannot imagine how truly terrifying that little apparatus can be.
Both fortunately and unfortunately, it doesn't work. A little disconcerting, because I went to adjust the stream at one point, and received a definite, albeit mild, shock. But no hot water at all. So I receive all of the drawbacks, and none of the benefits, of having the instant water heater..
All I can say is, at least I am well grounded.
Thursday I met with my excavation boss, Adriana. She seems pretty cool, albeit busy. We had to work pretty hard to get a schedule where she can accompany me to the field every day. But I think we succeeded. It will be good working for her.
The deal is, in order to bypass the bureaucracy, we made La Estrella a Guatemalan salvage project (I will now have been on almost as many salvage projects in Latin America as I have been in the US). Adrianna is the director, and I am simply there to help. The truth of it is that I am running it, and she is there to help. But we haven't got the whole hierarchy thing figured out yet, so we will just keep working on it until we get to the field.
The thing is, if I am nice, I might be able to enlist her help in getting my material from the field to the US. She has that power, and can likely make it happen. It is in my interest to be very nice to her.
And she makes it easy, or at least has so far. We'll see how things happen in the field.
The end result was a win, I suppose. On Friday I got the letter giving me permission to excavate at the site and make a map. Does that mean that persistence pays off? I suppose so. And once I start working (it will begin a week from Monday) I will be pretty psyched about it. Right now I am a little less enthusiastic about more work. As it stands, I have a huge quantity of material to sift through (literally – I am screening everything through the screens that came in this past week), but it is going pretty quickly. I have completed analysis of two large boxes of lithic debitage in two days, and am working on a third today.
The very good news is that I miscounted. I remembered 70 boxes of lithic material from the site, all waiting for me in the lab. The truth lies closer to 40. Still awe-inspiring, but at a box per day (and my average should improve over the coming week) I can finish this in a month and a half. Add two weeks for the excavations and a few weeks in Antigua working on stuff from previous seasons, and I could have it all completed on schedule, and be able to come home for May.
Furthermore, we have gotten requests from students who need to volunteer for projects for their degree requirements. Add one person to the mix, and I can more than double my analysis speed, and can spend some time teaching the analysis to Guatemalan archaeologists, as well.
Should be fun.
As lagniappe, I have added a picture of a truck I passed on my way out of the capital. The hand/lettered sign across the rear says "Yes you hate me because you look at me".
Is it possible that the bureaucracy pulls through, and works in my favor?
If there is any question to the answer to the question, you have not been reading closely to previous entries of the journal. The answer is, of course not.
Gustavo's phone remained off until Monday afternoon. I finally got through, and was informed that Gustavo has been on vacation and was taking an exam. So he knew nothing about the result of the permit request. To find out more, I would have to talk directly to his boss, Licenciado Salvador, or to his boss's secretary, Aurora.
And the result of the meeting last Thursday between you and Salvador where you discussed my proposal? Remember? That is what you told me on Thursday?
No. He has been on vacation and taking an exam. He doesn't know anything. I will have to talk directly to his boss, or to his boss's secretary, Aurora. So I call Aurora – she is the one who gets things done in the office, and she is out to lunch, and should return in a half hour. Half hour later, she is still at lunch. Half hour later, no change. Finally at 4:30, she returns to pick up her coat and is stopped by the ringing phone.
Who?
When did you submit this?
Who did you submit it to?
Who are you again?
She had not heard anything. But she will talk to Gustavo on Tuesday and see what can be done.
Fortunately for me, there is very little time pressure. I can do the excavations starting tomorrow and follow with analysis, or I can start the analysis tomorrow, while waiting on word from the bureaucrats about the status of my permits. All the work needs to be done, and I have a couple of months in which to do it. The order does not matter.
I still dislike the runaround. It is frustrating and discouraging to be lied to by people who have the authority to turn down your application for permission to excavate.
Tuesday my screens came from DHL. I ordered some large-mesh screens from a company in the US at the beginning of December, and then got a runaround from them, culminating in a very exasperated phone call on the 28th. Vinnie promised me the screens as soon as possible, but it was unlikely that they would be made before I left for the field.
He was right. They finally shipped three days after I arrived in Antigua, and showed up at the house the next day. MARI sprang for shipping them DHL to me in Guatemala (thanks, Will), and after waiting for a month and a half, I can get to work.Which meant a solo drive to Petén.
I fully expected there to be some sort of difficulty to face in getting to the Petén. After all, I cannot make a simple drive to the border without having something exciting happen. So maybe it is that I am getting better at this driving as a foreigner. Perhaps somebody realized that I am no longer equipped to deal with more stress, and gave me an easy trip.Wednesday came, and I got a late start, but arrived early, and had no problems (a couple of photos of the trip are attached). On the way, I even stopped at a roadside stand to buy grapes the size of golf balls. Delicious.
Flores has not changed. It is a little cooler this time of the year, but still dusty and filled with Europeans.I even arrived early enough to take a look at my new apartment. It is a small room with a bathroom off to the side, and I was promised a refrigerator and stove if I move in and pay two months rent up front. Since I was not looking for anything other than a place to crash and cook coffee and eggs in the morning, the place is perfect. And at about $100 a month, even signing up for three months is not so bad.
After signing on the dotted line, I got a tiny apartment in the postclassic capital of the Itzá.
Both fortunately and unfortunately, it doesn't work. A little disconcerting, because I went to adjust the stream at one point, and received a definite, albeit mild, shock. But no hot water at all. So I receive all of the drawbacks, and none of the benefits, of having the instant water heater..
All I can say is, at least I am well grounded.
Thursday I met with my excavation boss, Adriana. She seems pretty cool, albeit busy. We had to work pretty hard to get a schedule where she can accompany me to the field every day. But I think we succeeded. It will be good working for her.
The deal is, in order to bypass the bureaucracy, we made La Estrella a Guatemalan salvage project (I will now have been on almost as many salvage projects in Latin America as I have been in the US). Adrianna is the director, and I am simply there to help. The truth of it is that I am running it, and she is there to help. But we haven't got the whole hierarchy thing figured out yet, so we will just keep working on it until we get to the field.
The thing is, if I am nice, I might be able to enlist her help in getting my material from the field to the US. She has that power, and can likely make it happen. It is in my interest to be very nice to her.
And she makes it easy, or at least has so far. We'll see how things happen in the field.
The end result was a win, I suppose. On Friday I got the letter giving me permission to excavate at the site and make a map. Does that mean that persistence pays off? I suppose so. And once I start working (it will begin a week from Monday) I will be pretty psyched about it. Right now I am a little less enthusiastic about more work. As it stands, I have a huge quantity of material to sift through (literally – I am screening everything through the screens that came in this past week), but it is going pretty quickly. I have completed analysis of two large boxes of lithic debitage in two days, and am working on a third today.
The very good news is that I miscounted. I remembered 70 boxes of lithic material from the site, all waiting for me in the lab. The truth lies closer to 40. Still awe-inspiring, but at a box per day (and my average should improve over the coming week) I can finish this in a month and a half. Add two weeks for the excavations and a few weeks in Antigua working on stuff from previous seasons, and I could have it all completed on schedule, and be able to come home for May.
Furthermore, we have gotten requests from students who need to volunteer for projects for their degree requirements. Add one person to the mix, and I can more than double my analysis speed, and can spend some time teaching the analysis to Guatemalan archaeologists, as well.
Should be fun.
As lagniappe, I have added a picture of a truck I passed on my way out of the capital. The hand/lettered sign across the rear says "Yes you hate me because you look at me".
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