"I can only say this because I'm your friend...but.."

Hooray for catching up! I'm trying to catch up before I leave, wish me luck, let's see where I left off...

Time has passed by so quick I can't even recall what week this is. Oh well, it was the week after my last post! The week went by as normal, I feel like my blog posts come from the weekends because the weekdays are pretty normal from day to day-we get up early, excavate for a while, come back for two hours and eat or go to the pool, go back to lab, then we go back to the bungalows, eat dinner, maybe read, hang out with people, go to bed and do it all the next day. Wednesdays are generally the most interesting days because we have class from 4-6/7ish and it's the only day we can shower during break and feel clean for the rest of the day-I'm going to come back a dirtcase after being here, I'm so use to sitting around in sweat and dirt all day, I feel like nothing will phase me in NC! Except the heat, it may be hotter there actually.

Anyways, classes are awesome, we get to go out to a restaurant and get a good meal as compared to the canned food we eat in the bungalows-food is ridiculously expensive here, I'll spend $20 EC which is about $8US on a single thing of juice, something I'd never do in the states...my jar of salsa was about $5US and my thing of peanut butter was close to that..therefore we've been chowing down on some beans and rice and pasta for the past 5 weeks! We started doing class at Rumours but we switched to Pinney's and started getting better food-Rumours had a fabulous fish sandwich and is a great place to go otherwise (especially on Karaoke night!) but we get better food at Pinney's so I was thankful for the change...I've been able to get fish, steamed veggies, rice, and a salad for the past couple of weeks...and did I mention we can drink during class? How many times can you say you've been able to buy alcohol and drink it during class? Not enough!


I think the reason why I enjoy the weekends so much is because I've been fortunate enough to make friends on the island that take us out to different places I wouldn't normally see if I were just to hang out in the group. This weekend was the first weekend I was able to experience more of what I came here to do-see the culture in a different way. Thursday night the group went out to karaoke night at Rumours, but most of the group went back pretty early so my partner in crime, Kevin, and I stayed back for a little bit and hung out with our new friends. It was an interesting clash of island/American songs being sang by all different people, and man could some people sing! Needless to say I didn't get up there...Friday night we started off dancing to the local band Green House at the bar on Oualie, it's usually a good starting place for us to meet up with people and see what else is going on that night. So our friend Colis decided a small group of us should head over to this club called Enrique, but the numbers increased and before I knew it we were taking two cars crammed full of people. Enrique's is really nice, it's just outside of town and plays a good mixture of music...they were playing more American rap/hip-hop when we first got there by by the time we had left they were playing a good selection of reggae. Then Saturday night Rachel and I decided to go into town with Colis and his friend Andy for a "battle of dj's"...that's how it was described to me at least. I think it was just a couple dj's playing their music but it was interesting nonetheless...it was really nice to take one of my girlfriends out and go into town with the locals-I absolutely love the group but I tend to enjoy doing things differently than the majority does-many nights are spent drinking in the bungalows or out by the pool and while it's fun, I can play circle of death and drink by a pool back in the states. After listening to the dj's for a bit we decided to go back to Andy's place and relaxed and talked and enjoyed some great wine and cheese. It was nice to talk to different people and hear background stories, I guess you could say I came on this trip more for the cultural aspects rather than the archaeology...although the classes will still help me achieve my minor =)

Besides the nasty weather we had been experiencing all weekend, Sunday was one of the best days we spent on the island. We got up rather early for a rainforest hike with the group, which turned out to be AWESOME despite how much we wanted to cancel the hike. We were able to learn alot about the food/spice sources in the rainforests around the island, the fruit was incredible! I think I had about 5-6 mangos on that trip alone...we also tried soursop, tamarind, fresh cinnamon leaves, a leaf that tastes like licorice (yea, it was a little weird having say here, put this leaf in your mouth..and then being happy you listened), and the best daggon coconut I've had in my entire life-I bought a coconut to crack open later on but the results weren't quite as good...aka I made a hole to drink the water our of and then couldn't crack it open so I just collected ants instead...where's the Hulk when you need him?

Rachel and I opted to spend the rest of the day touring the island and seeing a few interesting sites. Luckily, we had me a guy Zac, who goes to UNC Chapel Hill and was spending the week on vacation a few minutes away from us-small world eh! We were very thankful he had a car and we decided to spend the day finding random adventures. Our first stop was Cottle Church, perhaps my favorite stop of the day. It was built by a man named Thomas John Cottle in the early 1800's. According to the story, he owned slaves because of the British policy but fought to improve working conditions and even hired missionaries to improve their education and faith. He decided to build this church in which both black and whites could worship together-it was not meant as a place where slaves could meet and segregate themselves but rather a place they could be seen as equals among the white community. After spending a bit of time there we stopped by our dig site on Coconut Walk to show Zac what we had been up to-I was able to take some needed pictures of our excavation site and we even found a huge beehive and a "bat cave" in some old ruins near our site-I was glad we decided to adventure around or else I would have never though to look inside those buildings!

We then stopped by the Eden Brown Estate, which is supposedly haunted by a woman named Julia, who tragically lost her brother in a duel the night before her wedding. I found a random door and decided to take a look-it only led to a tiny couple meter by couple meter room, but Rachel and Zac thought it would be funny to throw rocks against the wall to scare me. Now Julia's going to haunt me because of them! Next stop was the Golden Rock, which is comprised of a trail, some ruins, and a gorgeous restaurant. It started pouring when we arrived so we opted to hang out and talk in the restaurant until the rain slowed-we then started checking out the hike until Rachel broke her sandal...poor thing! We did get a couple of mangos out of it though, I think that amounted up to 7-8 mangos in one day...We decided to check out Montpelier (spelling?) after, apparently this now-hotel area contains the oldest house in the Lesser Antilles-honestly, I wouldn't have known the difference unless I had been told, the house was pretty in it's Colonial style but I think it had been redone quite a few times. Last stop was the Jewish Cemetery located near Charlestown, it contained about 10 or so above ground tombs that were covered in different languages. After a good day of adventuring around the island, we stopped by Zac's to clean up and enjoy some homemade pizza! Pretty successful weekend if you ask me.

"How do you spell 'laps', as in laps in judgement?"

So I was just re-reading the last post about my first week in Nevis and how wonderful everything was, and now I'm winding down on time...how do the weeks pass by so quick!? I'm so sorry it's taken me a while to keep this ol'thang updated, it's incredible how little time I feel like I have in an average day. I was planning on emailing people daily, taking time to have at least one interesting adventure per day, accomplishing my readings on time, and still having enough free time to find other things to do...instead I still have a bit of reading to do, it's taken me three weeks to update this, and I've barely emailed anyone! At least I'll be home soon enough...scary!

So lets see. Let's rewind quite a bit shall we? I think I left off with the second weekend of being here...in any event, it was a wonderful weekend! After our first full week of excavating, what's a better way to celebrate our survival than a booze cruise? By some miracle, our professor was able to talk NC State into using our program funds to cover the cost of one of these cruises...needless to say it wasn't quite as interesting as the last cruise ;) (Differently disabled man and his small army of bikini clad women, I miss you guys!). The cruise was awesome, it took us out a ways from Oualie Beach and we got a really great sunset, unlike the last cloudy cruise we went on. We hung out with some of our new friends afterwards at the Oualie bar, and one of my friends graciously shared his crab with me...so I've at least had one really good local seafood meal! Unfortunately, seafood here can be dirt cheap as long as A) you know where to find it and B) you know how to cook it...two things I cannot do. Apparently lobster is about $6US here but it's that cooking thing I'm just a little rusty at...and by "rusty" I mean completely clueless =)

Saturday I went out with a small group into town in attempts to shop, but apparently a majority of shops are closed on the weekends. A bit ago I went back to get postcards and ended up talking to the lady at the counter about cultural differences, and how weekends are so different in the States compared to down here. Here, a majority of shops are opened Monday through Friday, and closed on the weekends so that chores can get done on Saturday and everyone can go to church and relax on Sundays. In the States as you all know, Saturday is our crazy shopping frenzy day, although our religious Sundays coincide. The nights are different around here too; I'm not exactly sure about the rest of the island but I know Oualie Bar is usually pretty poppin' throughout the week; they usually have different events going on like open mic night, local bands (Green House is a really good group around here, they put a little reggae spin on many songs we listen to back in the States such as U2) play, etc. Friday night is when Green House is usually there, and I think they close up early on Saturdays. Anyways, at this point in the trip I think we were a little on edge from being around people 24/7 so I decided to stay in for the night and take things easy. The problem with being in this location is that there is no way to get any peace and quiet alone time. We have work all day long, by the time we get a chance to go out it's dark and the bugs are terrible, and there's really no place around here to just sit alone. There is Breeze Beach but we don't really have enough time to get down the steep walk when it's light enough outside. It makes it especially hard when we're trying to study and everyone else wants to be social..there is nowhere to go close by to sit down and study outside of the bungalows except for the Oualie bar, and by this point I've gotten to meet so many people down there I'm bound to end up in hour long conversations with someone!

Sunday was the most exciting and 100% nerve wracking part of the weekend-and perhaps of the entire trip! We woke up early Sunday morning to climb the dun dun dun…Nevis Peak. This peak is the 3232ft. volcano that lies in the center of the island. There are literally no words to describe the trip, it was an excruciating 6 hrs. of climbing but amazingly worth it, I was just happy to see flat land afterwards! I remember talking to one of the guys staying in the wedding group at the bungalows a couple days before the hike and he was saying how challenging it was and that you had to use ropes for a majority of the trip…and here I was thinking he was just yanking our legs…nope. He was in fact 100% serious! A good third-half of the trip involved using arm muscles to climb up these ropes, trying to balance on roots and rocks along the way. It literally involved swinging one leg over a rock and having to pull ourselves up with the rope-a few guys in our group go hiking often and complained that now every other trail looks boring compared to this experience. Upon arriving back to the bungalows I was talking with Rachel and Alyson and we mentioned how at no point throughout the hike did we feel completely secure-even our breaks consisted of balancing on roots and rocks, hoping no one would fall backwards and bowl the rest of the group down! It was an incredibly challenging experience for me personally because I’m apparently terrified of un-secure heights, but I’m really glad I made it through-now I can officially say I pushed past my fears and completed one of the Caribbean’s most dangerous hikes!

So after the excruciating 6hr hike, we made it back in time just to watch the World Cup finals-VAMOS ESPANA!!!! A couple of our directors are Dutch so we were kind of made to go for the Netherlands, but common...Sarah Shepherd was in Spain studying abroad, and my babygirl needs to get to experience being in a country during a World Cup championship so of course I went for Espana! Plus it was fun opposing the majority (oh wait, do I sense a bit of my mother in me!?). So we went down to the Oualie bar and packed 20 of us around this tiny TV, it was an awesome memory to say the least-years from now I can say "I remember where I was during the 2010 World Cup finals...crowded around a TV in a bar on the beach in Nevis." Oh, did I mention we won? Cheers to you, Sarah Shep!

"It's the Boom-Boom Circle"

So right now I'm sitting in our little living room space, listening to "Wavin' Flag" by K'naan, enjoying the gorgeous view that is Oualie Beach, while drinking Donrika's Mango Drink...tough life right? Donrika's drinks are I'm assuming homemade juices brought to the local grocery store...I make it my habit of picking up a few mango drinks when I visit, it's the best juice here (besides passion fruit..a new favorite of mine as well). The bungalows are incredible, but Mom, Dad, you were right. I do miss AC on occasion...it's incredibly hot from about 9am to dinner time...at night it cools off significantly but we've grown accustomed to sitting around in our sweat and filth all day...everyone looks gross but it's okay because we're not alone =) We have a few visitors that enjoy our bungalow as well-there are two birds that visit us on occasion, they either flirt on our hanging light or try to build a nest on it...I have decided to name them Bob and Betty (don't ask, it's just fitting!). We also have a little cat that likes to roam around the bungalows, we archaeologists decided to name him "Chert"...how nerdy and wonderful all the same time! He's actually sitting with me now as I write this, it's a very friendly cat...of whom we're trying to igure out how to smuggle him through the airport on the way back...hee..

I could do without the monsterous cockroaches (as you will see in my pictures), beetles, spiders, and bees, but other than that this place is perfect. We have everything naturally wonderful around us-there is Oualie beach, a popular place to go during the day or for a little late night swim. It also has a bar and some really nice locals so it's a good place to grab a drink on the weekends. This morning one of the guys found a few stairs that took us down the steep side of our hill-area and down onto this rocky beach...by 11am this morning I had already come back from an awesome adventure! We walked along the rocks for a while and discovered our little unknown area, I think some of the people went swimming and snorkeling-I hear it's a good place to go swimming, so knowing my luck I'll check it out and see just as much as we did when we paid for a snorkeling tour!

Most other things you have to take a taxi or a bus to get to on the island-there is Charelstown, the capital of Nevis, where most of the shops, banks, icecream parlors, etc. are. Besides that this is a pretty chill island. Definitely not as much to do as St. Maarten or Puerto Rico but we make our own fun ;) I don't even know what to say about the group here...we've been here for about a week now? And already I love every single person here. I couldn't imagine having a better group-everyone is really outgoing and sociable, if anyone decides to go somewhere they go to all the bungalows and ask who wants to join. It's nice to have a close group of people to explore the island with, we've already had some hilariously entertaining moments together, I can't imagine what's in store for us. At the orientation meeting back at State, everyone appeared quiet and shy, so I think many of us were a little worried about this group, but there is a perfect blend of "work hard, play harder". This weekend has been one adventure after another-Friday night, let's just say there were large quantities of rum invovled. British accents, island accents, people dancing, hammock swinging, all the above...and so, so much more. Then last night we opted to go into the city for a little music festival; at the end of July/early August, Nevis (and maybe St. Kitts) has their own carnival event called "Culturama"...so every Saturday until carnival starts they have this crazy music/food fest on the streets of Charelstown. It was AWESOME-I tried this incredible dish called "goat water"..yea I was insanely hesitant to try it but it has been one of the best authentic meals I've had on the island-it tastes like a gravy, or KFC melted into liquid form. So there was about 15 of us that decided to enjoy the live music and we started our own dance party in the street-it was a sweaty/gross/fabulous good time. I'm pretty sure the locals thought of us as "those crazy white people" but we didn't care, we had our own fun! I'm so impressed with this group I'm speechless-everyone's personalities blend together so well and I'm so glad everyone's down to try whatever-food, music, dancing, adventures, etc.

...So I began writing this yesterday and then had to interrupt my writing process to go out to a wonderful 4th of July lunch/island tour with our professor and the gang! We went to a restaurant called Nisbet's, I've been there previously with Rachel, Lindsey, Kristen, and Johnathan so I knew exactly what I was getting...They have the best fish sandwhich topped with a fruit chutney and a side of this spicy coleslaw-amazing meal. We enjoyed the beach near the restaurant for a few minutes and then visited the Nisbet plantation in front of the restaurant. Afterwards we went over to this local pottery shop called Newcastle Pottery-it's a little shop where this family has carried on the tradition of handcrafting clay into some pretty incredible stuff. They gave us the tour and explained step by step how they accomplish their pieces; they had a variety of handmade things like animal figurines, bowls, candle holders (guess what I'm bringing home!), firepits (used to hold and cook pots, one of the older ways of cooking as she explained to us), etc. Afterwards, we stopped by Fort Charles and learned the history behind the area. They still had some cannons and ruins left out for us to roam around and enjoy. Later on we visited an area with a few natural hot springs, since the island is a volcano afterall-the water was VERY hot, I don't know how people bathe in that! After our wonderful day adventure we went back and swam at our Breezy Beach hide out and watched the sunset-the water was a little rough but the sunset behind St. Kitts was gorgeous! Last night, instead of being productive, I decided to go down to the bar with a couple people and celebrate 4th of July (since I couldn't be at the lake! sniff!)-no fireworks but I did have a great mango/rum smoothie if that counts? We met some guys from the area and some of their family members, we now have connections to what's going on during the weekends!

Oh yea...we're here to work aren't we? Darn! Today was the first full day we've experienced so far, and needless to say it was brutal. Okay I know, we're studying abroad in the Caribbean, boohoo, but it's hard work bending over and digging in the sun all day! Our schedule goes as follows: board the bus at 6:30am sharp, get to the site and begin by 7am, work until 12:30, get back to the bungalows around 1pm, two hour lunch/shower break until 3pm, at which point we go to the graduate students' house for lab, where we wash off our findings for the next three hours. I know we'll eventually get use to the schedule but for the meantime I know our backs are killing all of us! So we have two sites, one 5X5m site which is divided into twentyfive 1m squares, and another which is 5X5m divided into four quadrants. I personally enjoy working in the quadrants because we're specifically looking for features like burials, waste sites, postholes, etc.-it hurts the body more because there is more physical labor involved in shoveling away the layers but I feel like I'm accomplishing more...plus there are generally more interesting things to find! Today I found a grouping of seashells which may have been the waste after someone's meal...it's not like I'm finding some famous burial but I find it really interesting to think these shells could have been the result of a meal-only now we're reconstructing it years upon years later! The other site focuses more on finding smaller objects so far, although it's getting more interesting as we're progressively digging deeper. The rest of the time on site should be pretty interesting...grueling, but interesting!

So I'm done writing my book now, but just as a sidebar, I have officially updated my pictures but you have to click on the actual picture for it to take you to my gallery...if you click "view my gallery" it'll come up as an error, I don't understand technology so don't ask me why that is! I miss you all very much, I hope everyone's doing well back home and would love for you guys to email me!