I really miss this crazy bunch!  Of course this is not ALL of the students.  Sometimes it is difficult to round us all up ;)

Our beautiful Agatha with her intact cranium

Every year the students throw a costume party...I went as a bag of ceramic fragments (please note they red painted designs and tag around my neck, indicating the location and layer I was found in and how many fragments were diagnostic)

Here you can see the label on my arm.  Everyone thought it was super creative (and cool because it was free to make).

We also visited Cao Viejo where archaeologists found a famous priestess who challenged the roll they thought women played in Moche culture.

This is the area where they found her burial.

Our pit!  I can't believe how much has changed in a month.

I got to put my artistic skills to good use during mapping.  I absolutely LOVE to map skeletons and burials!

A famous Peruvian dish-Guinea Pig

Another field trip to some gorgeous free standing structures

On the 28th of July (their independence day), a school visited our site to perform some traditional Peruvian dances.

We celebrated the 28th with a day-long party.  There was music, good food, good drinks, and good company.

Me and Luis Jaime Castillo (a generous man and scholar) on the last day in Chepen 

We loaded up on the bus and visited Huaca del Sol and Huaca de la Luna, a famous Moche site.  The paint visible in the above picture is all original.

A residential area lies between the two huacas and is still being excavated.

Inside the plaza of Huaca de la Luna

On my very last day in Lima, I decided to make a mad dash to the Larco Museum just hours before my flight to see the fantastic ceramics.

I found maces, a very popular image in Moche iconography...

...naked, bound prisoners...

...wrinkle face/iguana face...

...ear spools...

...nose rings...

...head dresses...

...

...head dresses...

...

...and ceramics galore!

Some of them have such personality

aisles and aisles of ceramics!

I will miss this very much and can't wait to come back :D

Finally the internet is working and I can do a quick update!

Below are two pictures of the chamber burial found at our site.  From the detailed photo you can see more ceramics and that there are more than one skeleton present.  

Here a couple of us are working on another burial.  It's a poor burial (we know this due to the lack of grave goods) and belongs to a woman that we lovingly named Agatha.  

Amazingly here cranium was almost completely intact which is extremely rare!  Usually they are already crushed by the time we get to them.

Some new friends

Posing with our invaluable workmen.  Without them, we would hardly be able to get as much work done.

This is just an update to tell everyone that I will not be attempting to thoroughly update this blog from here on out.  The internet here has become completely unreliable and a nuisance to deal with.  Therefore, I will only be doing minimal updates until I return home.  So sorry!

I'm almost done with an amazing Sunday.  Below are two pictures from last night.  One of our police guards from the hotel made our dinner by digging a hole, putting rocks inside of it, setting it on fire and then putting the food in.  I'm told this is similar to luaus?  But it's like an underground oven or grill.

This is the table of crazy people I usually sit with.  I have met so many interesting folks on this trip.

Here I stand in front of the amazing Sipan museum, shaped like a huaca.  You enter from the top and work your way down about four floors.  I was so overwhelmed that at times I got tears in my eyes (the same thing happened when I saw Da Vinci's Last Supper).

Following the museum we stopped at an American style mall for some food and shopping...

...and of course Starbucks.

Hooray for the weekend!  I can't believe that my second week is almost over.  We have been doing a mixture of things in our sections which include: shoveling, sweeping, brushing, emphasizing features, photographing and mapping.  Then we repeat the process.  After a long week of working there is nothing like celebrating with Beer Fridays :)

Here I am posing with my new friend Elisa who goes to school in Illinois (which actually means I might get to see her after the field school is over).

Checking for bugs LOL

It's tradition to drink with the workers at the site of San Hose de Moro on Fridays.  But as the sun goes down the bugs come out, so we have to be careful with our precious beverages.

On Saturdays we eat lunch at Los Patos which has amazing Peruvian food such as...

I have to ask my friend what this was, but basically it's fried sea food

Notice how the sauces are served in shells!

 and Tacu Tacu-rice and eggs of course and fried plantains (my fave)

followed by some play time in the area next to the restaurant

Here are some international students (looks like a pretty happy fella)