Noortje only likes one type of box – Presidente boxes, capable of holding x24 65ml bottles. This is the national brand of beer. These are big and strong enough to hold large amounts of archaeological material and still be lifted (just). One of the aims of this fieldseason is to pack everything we have excavated over the last 4 years, and send it to the museum in a big lorry. This material fills 100 Presidente boxes. A lot of shell, stone, bone, pottery and coral.

The streets of Beron are awash with rubbish – cardboard, plastic, old shoes, food remains scavenged by mangy mutts, and the only thing people drink next their rum, is Presidente. Hence this is the ideal and most widely available box type in the country…you would think.

Every day for the last 2 weeks, delegations from our group have been sent into Beron to scout for boxes. We visitied every supermarket in the entire town from Supermercado Camilo, Comercial Manzanillo and Colmado Luis, Supermercado Ciabo and Uridy, every small colmado store, several times, sometimes within the same day. Colleen (American friend who lives in Beron) recruited one of the boys from her barrio to comb the streets for us…he managed 6 in a whole day, and they were good, but not Presidente. Colmado Antonio has been the only regular saviour, supplying on average 3-4 boxes per begging visit. Myself, Alexander and Samantha have poked through unappetising rubbish dumps for usable specimens with no success but plenty of ant-bites and encounters with interesting smells.

Today we went on the last scavenge, the same shop to shop trawl, only visiting those who had supplied before and whose promises of “mañana” filled us with hope, but proved empty. On the way back, we went for a last ditch attempt at the club de empleados, just next the the Fundacion where we drink and play pool every night, and who have repeatedly denied our requests for boxes in the past….success! Noortje was happy.