Plaza Murillo

 

 June 21, 2013

Today is the winter solstice here in the Southern Hemisphere. We went to try and find an open museum but had no luck as the whole city was pretty much shut down. We came upon this square, filled with pigeons and people. It seems like every day we explore a new part of the city, and every day we find a new place that could be considered a 'center' of town. We found out that this square was in front of the president's house and other important governmental buildings. In the quiet city, this square was bustling with families eating ice cream and feeding pigeons. We also noted the 'rainbow flag' that we saw always flying next to the Bolivian flag. We assumed it was the indigenous flag, and some research confirmed this. It is very interesting to see a country that is so tied to its indigenous heritage (mostly because the president is indigenous and mandated the flags fly together, and that the city be shut down in honor of an Aymara holiday that falls on the solstice).--RK

Parking Stickers

June 18, 2013

Saw this gem on the prado today. The UCF parking stickers registered as normal in my head, but anything registering as normal requires a second thought here. I can't believe, of all the places in the world, we found a car in La Paz with recent UCF parking stickers (one was from 2012). While the car was probably shipped here, it was fun to think about what the drive from Central Florida to La Paz would be like. Based on a quick glance at a map, you would have to go through 8 countries to get here: Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Columbia, and Brazil. Although, according to Mapquest, there is no actual route to do so. --RK

Shovel testing

After several days of rain, which made the dirt road impassable, we got to work this past Thursday at Isla San Francisco, a small island of forest just south of Santa Ana del Yacuma. Before we open a larger excavation, we are digging small "shovel tests", which are about 50 centimeters across, and help us determine whether or not people lived at this place in the past. In this picture, Mary Luz Choque, Alex Rivas and Mabel Ramos (left to right) are discussing the shovel test that can just be seen at the bottom center of the picture. This was one of the first tests on Thursday, and it is out in the open savanna just north of the forest. The line of shovel tests continues to the south, through the forest and out to the other side. -JW