23 March 2006
I have achieved a level of comfort in the Petén. And being complacent scares the wyllys out of me. Fear puts me on edge, keeps me alert. I got fat and sassy in the two weeks at home, eating everything under the sun:
Even with all the “pendings”, I am feeling slow and sluggish. Part of the problem, undoubtedly, is that I changed cultures twice in as many weeks, and am suffering a little bit of culture shock. Part of it is that I am overfed (although four days of quesadillas in Petén has taken care of some of that).
And part of it is that the work I am doing is changing since the debitage analysis is over.
And some of it is depression from what I saw in New Orleans.
Life in Uptown is pretty close to back to normal. There are hoodlums, there is crime, there are long, frustrating waits at the grocery store checkout lines. Restaurants are open for business, hotels are booked for Jazz Fest, and the university is operating as inefficiently as usual. Garbage is being picked up once a week, mostly (there was a one-month lag where it was not picked up at all). There are some FEMA trailers here and there, and there is a lot of renovation taking place, and there is far more Spanish in the air than before, but there is a sense of purpose – we are coming back.
And then Kathe took me out to Lakeview. And then to the Ninth Ward. Lakeview looked like what I imagine as the effect of the neutron bomb – houses still intact with no people anywhere. Everything is covered in dust, as the mud from the houses has dried out and blown around. It is seriously creepy. Nobody seems to be rebuilding here, and who can blame them? Every indication is that it will happen again and probably at or near the same place.
But if Lakeview was creepy, the Ninth Ward was terrifying. Entire blocks were leveled. Houses on top of cars. Cars in trees. Utter destruction of row upon row of houses. Most surprising was the result when we looked for the water line – a Kilroy-esque gauge of destruction for New Orleans. In Lakeview, the water line was as high as seven feet. Some areas of Uptown had six. In the Ninth
Ward, there was no water line – these houses had been completely under the water.
And, seven months later, the mangled remnants of houses still sit. No federal cleanup. No debris removal. The streets have been cleared, but nothing more. And the federal government, in infinite wisdom, has sent the “extra” trailers west to help the thousands left homeless by the fires in Texas and Oklahoma.
Meanwhile, in New Orleans, tens of thousands are still waiting.
For any of you who don’t know the name Chris Rose, he is a columnist at the New Orleans Times Picayune. Before Katrina, he chased Britney Spears around town, trying to get an interview with whatever celeb was in New Orleans that weekend. After Katrina, he wrote articles about his experiences, who he met, what the city felt like, during the months after the storm. For a really intense view of the aftermath of the hurricane, check out his book: 1 Dead in Attic.
Petén life is pretty much unchanged. Today I head out to San José to start my experimental archaeology – I am using flakes and tools that I have manufactured to chop wood, scrape leather, dig dirt, drill shell, and cut meat. I will take the flakes and tools afterwards and look at the wear patterns on them, to see what I would expect to find on similar flakes and tools from excavated contexts.
With any luck, I will not be working at La Estrella any time soon. As impossible as it seems, Don Diablo actually agreed to let me dig. The cost, however, if far too high. I am pretty upset with the wording on the contract. As it stands, there are four conditions to me digging.
1) No police presence.
2) Stipulated that the looting was done before he purchased the land.
3) The three mentioned in the poem cannot work with me. And
4) I have to turn over any cool artifacts I find to the family.
And for some reason, the government official seemed to think that was an acceptable detail to include in the contract. I don’t really expect to find anything out of the ordinary, but if I do, I’ll be damned if he is going to get it. I’ll rebury it first. Heck, I’ll swallow the thing, dirt and chert and all, before I hand anything over to the jerk.
And I have other things to do. And since IDAEH is not keen on righting the situation, I will use my time to do those other things. Artifact photography. Soil sample processing. Packing artifacts for export. Letter-writing campaign. At this point, I have better uses for my time and money.
I have achieved a level of comfort in the Petén. And being complacent scares the wyllys out of me. Fear puts me on edge, keeps me alert. I got fat and sassy in the two weeks at home, eating everything under the sun:
- Biscuits and gravy? Check.
- Crawfish? Check.
- Shrimp? Check.
- Steak at Degas? Still pending.
- Etoufee? Not this trip.
- Biscuits with cane syrup? Check.
- Chunky peanut butter? Check.
- Coffee and chickory? Bet your bottom dollar.
- Beignets? Check.
- Barbecue? Check.
Even with all the “pendings”, I am feeling slow and sluggish. Part of the problem, undoubtedly, is that I changed cultures twice in as many weeks, and am suffering a little bit of culture shock. Part of it is that I am overfed (although four days of quesadillas in Petén has taken care of some of that).
And part of it is that the work I am doing is changing since the debitage analysis is over.
And some of it is depression from what I saw in New Orleans.
Life in Uptown is pretty close to back to normal. There are hoodlums, there is crime, there are long, frustrating waits at the grocery store checkout lines. Restaurants are open for business, hotels are booked for Jazz Fest, and the university is operating as inefficiently as usual. Garbage is being picked up once a week, mostly (there was a one-month lag where it was not picked up at all). There are some FEMA trailers here and there, and there is a lot of renovation taking place, and there is far more Spanish in the air than before, but there is a sense of purpose – we are coming back.
And then Kathe took me out to Lakeview. And then to the Ninth Ward. Lakeview looked like what I imagine as the effect of the neutron bomb – houses still intact with no people anywhere. Everything is covered in dust, as the mud from the houses has dried out and blown around. It is seriously creepy. Nobody seems to be rebuilding here, and who can blame them? Every indication is that it will happen again and probably at or near the same place.
But if Lakeview was creepy, the Ninth Ward was terrifying. Entire blocks were leveled. Houses on top of cars. Cars in trees. Utter destruction of row upon row of houses. Most surprising was the result when we looked for the water line – a Kilroy-esque gauge of destruction for New Orleans. In Lakeview, the water line was as high as seven feet. Some areas of Uptown had six. In the Ninth
Ward, there was no water line – these houses had been completely under the water.
And, seven months later, the mangled remnants of houses still sit. No federal cleanup. No debris removal. The streets have been cleared, but nothing more. And the federal government, in infinite wisdom, has sent the “extra” trailers west to help the thousands left homeless by the fires in Texas and Oklahoma.
Meanwhile, in New Orleans, tens of thousands are still waiting.
For any of you who don’t know the name Chris Rose, he is a columnist at the New Orleans Times Picayune. Before Katrina, he chased Britney Spears around town, trying to get an interview with whatever celeb was in New Orleans that weekend. After Katrina, he wrote articles about his experiences, who he met, what the city felt like, during the months after the storm. For a really intense view of the aftermath of the hurricane, check out his book: 1 Dead in Attic.
Petén life is pretty much unchanged. Today I head out to San José to start my experimental archaeology – I am using flakes and tools that I have manufactured to chop wood, scrape leather, dig dirt, drill shell, and cut meat. I will take the flakes and tools afterwards and look at the wear patterns on them, to see what I would expect to find on similar flakes and tools from excavated contexts.
With any luck, I will not be working at La Estrella any time soon. As impossible as it seems, Don Diablo actually agreed to let me dig. The cost, however, if far too high. I am pretty upset with the wording on the contract. As it stands, there are four conditions to me digging.
1) No police presence.
2) Stipulated that the looting was done before he purchased the land.
3) The three mentioned in the poem cannot work with me. And
4) I have to turn over any cool artifacts I find to the family.
And for some reason, the government official seemed to think that was an acceptable detail to include in the contract. I don’t really expect to find anything out of the ordinary, but if I do, I’ll be damned if he is going to get it. I’ll rebury it first. Heck, I’ll swallow the thing, dirt and chert and all, before I hand anything over to the jerk.
And I have other things to do. And since IDAEH is not keen on righting the situation, I will use my time to do those other things. Artifact photography. Soil sample processing. Packing artifacts for export. Letter-writing campaign. At this point, I have better uses for my time and money.
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