Kiuic (first Jungle Experience)

Leaving Merida a city of over 1 million people for the middle of nowhere jungle was a very strange bus ride. I was excited to see something new, but scared to see something so drastically different than what I have been used to for the past 5 weeks. However, to Kiuic we went and I wasn’t aware of the fact that it had an archeological site on it as

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well as the biological things we would be doing. The interesting thing is that we for 2 weeks are living on the site of an ancient Mayan city, not only did people inhabit this thousands of years ago, but by this point we know about the people inhabiting which is even more exciting. All of the buildings at Kiuic were built on top of little hilly areas and all of the architecture was very reminiscent of the Puuc style. Kiuic was a terminal classic site and very different than the other sites we have seen. There were no HUGE temples and the site was obviously still being excavated because there were rocks and stone outside the buildings. It was cool to hear about the excavation of this site from Rebecca (my Mayan teacher) because she was involved in the process of excavating the site. Consistent with a topic I have discussed before it is very obvious that Kiuic gets little to no money from INAH for excavation because it is not a well known tourist stop. It was defiantly not one of my favorite sites, but still very interesting because I was living there within the vicinity of an ancient Mayan site. We were living so close that one day, we took a walk to visit a Mayan family living the same way that they lived when the Spanish conquistadors came in the late 1500s. This visit was one of my favorite days so far, it was an experience that I can truly say I will never forget.

    We arrived by walking on a trail that had been used in the past, obvious by the holtun (natural water hole) right along side of it. The walk was far, but not terrible and when we did finally arrive I didn’t even realize someone could live there. Through the brush there were about 5 thatched houses each with one room and a family consisting of a wife and husband, two of her relatives and two small children. The family seemed very excited to see us even though I was assured that them showing us the way they live was not something that happens often. My favorite part of the visit was when Dr. Dawley showed them the photo albums he made for them from their last visit in March. When they received the gift they were so excited and happy for such a small bit of something. And then I realized that they probably have no pictures of themselves, let alone pictures of their entire family enjoying themselves. Being given an entire book I can only imagine will be something that they will treasure for a very long time. I cannot imagine living the way that they do, gathering water when it rains, constantly upkeeping a milpa that is used to grow the food you need, in addition to being completely cut off from most of civilization all the time. I truly don’t think that I can live like that, living with a limited power supply for 2 weeks was hard enough, living with no power…EVER seems impossible. However, I have a lot of respect for the family because it seems everything in the world is telling them to just pack up and accept civilization; however they choose not to which is something I can imagine most people would not choose. When the Spanish conquistadors came the Mayans they met lived as this family does over 400 years later, and for me that is mind boggling.

Below are some biology pictures. They are of Cindy and Allison decked out in their biology field clothes. the next two are pictures of me holding a box turtle and a white eyed vireo which we caught in our mist net one day.

            Below are some more pictures. The first of our hut which Five other people and I lived in for 2 weeks. Those our our hammocks, mine was the purple one in the back left. The next is of some friends swinging on hammocks which i must admit is very very fun! The last picture is my cabin and I ready to play a game of sardines in a can where a group of 2 people hide and the rest of the group has to find them quietly until just one person is left looking. We wore all black in order to be able to blend in with the dark forest around us. Remember Kiuic was solar powered so at night there were essentially NO LIGHTS.