We got to the site yesterday, ready to do a bit of posthole digging, to encounter the whirring blades of a military chopper, and a group of national narcotics police – dressed to the nines in flak jackets, automatic weapons and helmets. Thinking we had surprised them in the middle of a drugs heist, we stayed in the truck and intended to make our way to Belto’s house for refuge until the nasty men had gone. They hollered at us to stop however, and not being fans of Dominican uniformed, weaponed men, we stopped.

“Can we borrow your flippers?”

“Can we borrow your flippers?” ?? We checked the translation with Erlend (fluent Spanish speaker in the team), but yes, the narco police had indeed just asked us whether it would be possible, please, to borrow some flippers and a snorkel. We stared at them incredulously - had they forgotten to pack them in the heli when they left Santo Domingo that morning? I mean, sometimes we forget things too – the finds list, a spare trowel…

We ate some melon at Belto’s, and as soon as the heli departed, went back to the site. After a bit of a fly and a swim however, they came back and lounged against the fence (see pic, check out heli in background) and asked for telephone numbers and offered a hand with the digging. We spurned their offers and eventually they got bored and left. Meanwhile Kelin and Manolo turned up with that morning’s catch – far more impressive behaviour.

Pido Auxilio!!

Copy and paste this link for a feel of the bachata performance we went to last night

http://nl.youtube.com/watch?v=uGHLS_E4kzk

The short chap in the white suit is the famous Dominican bachatero, Joe Veras. The beer-drinking dutchies are trying to work up the courage to hit the dance floor….

The Irish and the American beat them to it!

A dominican bar in Beron is quite an experience. The cost of a live concert is too much for the average Beron citizen to afford, and so many of them hang around on motorbikes or on the fence outside, whereas inside its full of Dominican players, young Dominican women, rich white men, and us…a perfect people-watching experience, all to the backdrop of deafening music and a pervasive sweat which gets worse with every dance [read: inept shuffle]. The routine dancefloor conversation with Dominican men goes something like this:

Juan: “Tienes novio?”[have you got a boyfriend?]

Unsuspecting archaeologist: “Que? Hablo poco espanol.” [sorry, I don’t speak much Spanish].

Juan: “You have boyfriend?”

Playing it safe archaeologist: “Si, tengo esposo..y ninos tambien” [Yes, i have a husband, and children].

Juan: “Estan aqui?” [are they here now?]

Naïve archaeologist: “no”.

Juan, triumphant: “Entonces, no tienes novio! Yo soy tu novio dominicano.” [Ah ha! So you have no boyfriend in the Dominican Republic. I’ll be your boyfriend!]

Nonplussed archaeologist returns to seat unable to puzzle over this Dominican logic.

El Cabo is still there! The site, and the village. More importantly the village – it’s good to see old friends again. Nicolas, still bonkers – he cut all his fingers off in a mortorbike accident (but still climbs trees with his machete to hack at coconuts), and Belto and Margot are still running the only shop (colmado) in the entire area – we delivered them a load of ice, soap, salt fish, beer, rum and tobacco in our truck to replenish the stores and since then Belto has been lying in his hammock complaining of kidney problems…..the pile of empty rum bottles by the chicken shed may point to the origin.

The village has given the school a new lick of paint – it’s transformed from blue to green (do we have to change the colour key on all the maps we made?). It looks fantastic…apart from the fact the door is off its hinges and there is no teacher, and no children to attend, even if there were a teacher. El Cabo is on it’s last legs. The school is empty and the bright pink paint has faded on the church, doors of once inhabited houses are bolted and used as weekend fishing lodges, the mayor and his family have moved to Higuey. Inevitable given its position between private land and the rest of the country.

Other than that we’ve been counting shells and weighing pottery in a processing frenzy. Vital to this work is music, and patience with each other’s tastes. Fortunately for me (not for anyone else), I am able to impose my tunes on the whole group by dint of the fact that I have a laptop and speakers….perhaps that’s why everyone migrated to the other lab this afternoon.

We visited Higuey on our day off excursion. I had forgotten about the shoe-shine mobs which follow you from street to street – small boys carrying wooden boxes with bottles of shoe polish (black paint and spit I think), insisting on cleaning your shoes even if you have bare feet in flip flops. Local bars employ men with sticks to chase them away from clients, and the tourist police at the cathedral set dogs on them.

It’s fantastic to be here again.