Fun Day Trip: La Puerta del Diablo and Panchimalco

To break up the days of official meetings, talking with people about our future research, and of course manioc harvesting, we took a day trip to La Puerta del Diablo and the nearby town of...   As we chugged along in our little car climbing the mountain to get to La Puerta del Diablo, we all commented on a two things in particular-

1. The road of El Salvador are amazing! I wish that Seattle would come talk to the city planner of El Salvador because the roads here are amazing. There are many cars on the road and lots of traffic but with a series of round-abouts and a commitment to keeping the roads maintained it is honestly so much better to drive around here than in Seattle!  Now you will see so many things you'd never see in the States when it comes to driving- for example if there is room on the road, then it is considered a lane, if you can hold on while it is moving then you are welcome to ride on top of a semi-truck, in the bed of a pick-up holding  a bar (taxis here but we refer to these as 'death traps' given if they roll you are likely to not survive) , and a family of five or six riding on a motorcycle or scooter. You are less likely to see car-seats for children (I never have here in the Joya de Ceren area)...and during rush hour the buses can be packed so full that the back of the bus has people riding standing on the bumper and holding onto the roof.  I'll try to get some vehicle pictures for you so that you'll believe me! Oh and when driving here but sure to keep your eyes open for people running across the freeways. It is a common practice and somewhat startling to those more familiar to U.S. driving.

Not even a main highway- but none-the-less a beautifully paved road!

2. The beautiful views and amazing countryside are not what people generally think of when we tell them about El Salvador. As you read in my earlier post, I was warned often while in Guatemala to look out for Salvadorans and be very careful.  In my experience, El Salvador is just as safe as Guatemala and other regions of Central America. It is common when I tell people in the U.S. that my fieldwork is in El Salvador to be met with worried looks and questions about my safety.Sometimes the view of El Salvador and Salvadorans is far from accurate. Much of this is colored by the 20+ year long civil war or the horror stories of nuns or Archbishop Romero having been killed here.   But in reality, El Salvador is a  beautiful place and I have always been touched by the friendliness and helpfulness of the people I've met here.  This doesn't mean it is without danger (there is no place without danger and big cities always carry their own type of dangers).  There are bus robberies, gang activities, high rates of poverty and joblessness, and a system of justice is one where you are guilty until proven innocent! So, while not without dangers it is interesting to see the perception of danger by outsiders.

Us Climbing La Puerta del Diablo

Okay, so more about our trip. We arrived at the top of the mountain and pulled into the area at the base of La Puerta del Diablo. Many people were visiting and climbing the various parts of the rock formation. Stairs have been put in and visitors take many photos of the amazing panoramic views of El Salvador. (For you archaeologists out there: As we passed an area where people had thrown trash in a cave Payson was sure to point out that we were watching the formation process of a midden!)  We climbed up to a cave area overlooking the valley and snapped few photos of course!

La Puerta del Diablo

After our trip to La Puerta del Diablo we descended the mountain to the town of Panchimalco. This is a colonial style town. Check out the pictures of the town and church. There were multiple church services in place and prayer groups were meeting in the Catholic Church when we stopped by for a brief visit. We left just in time to escape a major down pour- it is the rainy season here after all!

Turned out to be a fun visit! 

Panchimalco as seen from La Puerta del Diablo

A Street in Panchimalco

The Catholic Church in Panchimalco

Down-pour in Panchimalco (Hello Rainy Season)

Manioc Harvest Day 2: Not what we expected

Our second day of manioc harvesting was not exactly what we expected. We had planted our second test plot on the land of a friend of ours, Oswaldo.  A few days before our harvest there, we visited to confirm the date of our harvest and to catch up. This proves to be a useful way of distinguishing a social visit from when we are actually working.  Without this initial visit we'd likely get nothing done on harvest day due to the social obligations to visit.

Having fun catching up! From left to right: Me, Oswaldo, and Zan

As always happens here in Joya de Ceren, we were greeted with the hospitality that El Salvador is known for. Once given plastic chairs and sat on the porch, we were then offered food and finally handed elote (young corn) to eat. (side-note: I have never visited a house in Joya de Ceren or the surrounding area and not had someone rush to bring out plastic chairs for all of us.) Also, if you have not traveled through Central America, one note of caution... make sure to always have room for food. Families, especially in the 'campo' (poorer farming areas) have a very strong sense of hospitality and you are always offered food when visiting. It would also be very rude to refuse the food, so best to leave a bit of room for whatever food you might be given!  This is part of the network or reciprocity here- where a guest in someone's house is always treated well and provided for. Upon completing our harvest Day 1 with the Garcia family we were given a wonderful hibiscus drink (and just had to suck it up and hope the water in it didn't get us sick... it didn't! But as a good anthropologist and visitor you risk the sickness over insulting your hosts every time!)

Oswaldo with the manioc plants

Okay, so on to the harvest. When we returned to Oswaldo's on harvest day we were immediately surprised to see that the planting beds we established last year were not present and that all of the manioc looked small.  It turned out that something was lost in communication and Oswaldo didn't realize that the beds needed to be continually maintained throughout the year. We didn't explain this since he'd already been somewhat upset that his manioc field didn't grow very large. So, not at all what we expected, however very interesting. What this helps us see is that manioc bed built a year ago will completely disappear without maintenance. This wasn't at all what we intended to test, but one of the great things about fieldwork is that things so rarely go as planned. Thus, we had unintentionally tested what happens when beds are constructed but not maintained. The result is that the ground is very compacted and there are not the slightest signs of beds present. A very cool finding, we hadn't intended to test!

The manioc was extremely small and many plants even lacked any tubers at all. This was in very strong contrast to the manioc we harvested in field 1. We think it is likely that the very densely packed soil (compacted) resulted in very poor manioc growth. Manioc needs loose soils and not too much water for proper growth.

Stay tuned... we'll be harvesting Manioc Field 3 on Saturday and will let you know how it works out.

An image of a manioc plant without tubers and two stakes that did not grow

Oswaldo and Payson with our harvested manioc

 Not what we expected, but a great test case none the less!

Fernando Llort Museum

We visited the Fernando Llort Museum the other day and I thought I'd share a few photos with you from this trip.  The museum moved locations within the last few years. Payson and I had visited it three or four years ago and thought we'd stop by the new location and check it out. We were surprised that in this new location there were now few displayed pieces and instead an extensive gift shop!

In any event, Fernando Llort is an important cultural figure here in El Salvador.  Fernando Llort was born and raised in El Salvador and his cultural heritage is widely visible in his art. He pursued his education in Europe, but upon returning to El Salvador he established training for Salvadorans in artistic techniques and education. This has provided many Salvadorans with a vehicle for economic survival and advancement through this craft. Many of his designs have become cultural icons for the country and can be seen widely in tourist gifts produced by these artisans.

An Example of the gifts and artwork inspired by Fernando Llort

Fernando Llort Design

Fernando Llort Design

Fernando Llort

Manioc Harvest Day 1: An Organic Farmer is Born

Our first day of manioc harvest was very successful. Our first (of three) test plot was located at the house where we stay when doing fieldwork at Ceren. The family who lives there was very eager for us to see our manioc plants and expressed their surprise at how big the plants had grown in a year, especially since no chemicals were used in the growing. As often happens with our strange anthropological research, we drew a bit of a crowd of onlookers- all seemingly wondering about our strange practices (though somewhat accustomed to that by now) and as excited to see the results of our experiment.

Payson and I conducting a manioc harvest

None of us researchers had ever harvested manioc, though we'd both read about it and seen it done, but it is safe to say we are the slowest manioc harvesters on record!  Before we began the harvest we first mapped the location and spacing of each height and then we took a series of measurements including the height of any beds (surcos), the distance between rows, and the spacing of each plant along a row. After a series of individual plant photographs and measurements of soil hardness around each plant, we were ready to begin!

We had such a terrific time laughing as we struggled to uproot our manioc plant!  Once pulled from the ground, we took a photo of the roots still attached to the manioc plant, measured the height of the plant above and below the ground, as well as the diameter of the stalk.  Then, we removed our tubers and did a series of measurements on these (size and weight of each tuber).

While our real results will await calculations, upon first look we all agree those growing in the planting bed appeared larger and to have more and larger tubers than those not in a planting bed. Don Julio was so thrilled by the growth of our manioc that he said he will now replant a larger area with manioc plants and market these as Chemical-free, Organic manioc! He is waiting to hear about how our research study turns out before deciding if it is worth the effort to  build the beds. What a fun project this has been.

An organic manioc farmer is born...

Don Julio with our Manioc Plants 

Science in Action

Background to my trip Part 2 (Continued): What we're doing here

As you read in my previous post we have found intensive manioc cultivation at the Ceren archaeological site. These manioc plants were planted in large earthen beds, which is not how manioc is currently planted by farmers in the region today.  We think the large, formal beds would have provided good drainage and probably looser soils, which manioc favors. The tuber casts we have found from the archaeological beds are seemingly larger than much of the modern-day manioc tubers grown in the region.  Hence an experiment was born...

As part of our National Science Foundation grant from last year, we set up experimental test plots of manioc. Manioc is planted by cutting the stalk into 20 cm stakes and planting these in the ground.  So in three different locations, with the help of three different farmers, we planted test areas. In each test location we planted half of the manioc plants in large beds somewhat similar to those found in the archaeological record and the other half just buried in the ground-surface.



Manioc Test Plot 1 (with proud famer Julio)

 These were planted last summer and we are here this summer to harvest the manioc plants and record their size and growth. We are collecting data to determine if these use of larger beds to grow manioc is more productive. This will help us assess why the large earthen beds might have been used by the Maya.  If this does prove a more productive way to grow crops, then our local farmers might adopt the old method of growing.

Vamos a ver!

Background to my trip: Part 2 (the summary of previous work)

 Here is a VERY brief summary of our work at Joya de Ceren to provide a little context for what we are doing here this year.  You can also go back to the beginning of this blog (from 2011) and read through my posts from the field while we were excavating at Ceren last year to get an idea of what we found and an idea of the research process. This is will just help you make sense of what we are doing this year!


Our research in El Salvador this year is based on some of our archaeological studies at Joya de Ceren in the past few years.  A little context to our research... the site I work at is called Joya de Ceren and is a Maya community that was buried by volcanic ash around A.D. 630 (Sheets 2002).  The eruption of the Loma Caldera vent (then it was just a fissure that opened in the ground surface) opened and as magma came to the surface it contact a river and resulted in layers of fine ash coating all of the surfaces present at that time.  So, the archaeological site is now buried beneath multiple meters of volcanic ash and the result is extraordinary preservation of the archaeological record. We have preserved earthen buildings, artifacts, and agricultural plants. Last field season we also encountered an earthen sacbe (road).

Earthen Ceren Sacbe (road) discovered in 2011 fieldseason

Plants and agricultural are extremely difficult to study in the archaeological record and are often limited to a few carbonized plant remains if you are very lucky and microbotanical evidence (pollen, phitoliths, etc.). At Ceren, the nature of the volcanic ash packed around plants in such a way as to preserve their impressions in the surrounding ash.  While the plants themselves have largely decomposed, their forms in the ash create a mold. Thus, as we excavate down to the Ceren horizon we encounter hollow spaces in the ash above the site (where ash layers surrounded plants during the eruption).  We fill those hollow spaces with plaster, allow it to set, and then excavate these. The result is the ability to see the plants that were being grown at this site approximately 1400 years ago.  





In 2007 we first discovered large manioc beds planted at Ceren. Manioc is a root crop that can be eaten, used to make flour, beer, or even a glue-like substance. It was suspected that the ancient Maya might have used root crops, such as manioc (Bronson 1966), however little evidence for root crops survived to the present day. Root crops do not have the same amount of pollen or microbotanical evidence that survives the archaeological record.

Me excavating the first discovered manioc beds at Ceren (2007)

Manioc Plant showing tubers that grow beneath the surface

(from: https://rauman.wikispaces.com/cassava)

When we first found this beds, we had never seen anything like them in the archaeological record. In later projects (2009 and 2011) we realized that the Ceren village was intensively farming manioc, much more so than we ever suspected.  We have yet to identify exactly how much manioc they were growing but interestingly all that we have found thus far was harvested around the same time. That is literally tons of manioc tubers that would have to be used or processed within a few days to avoid rot.
There is no way without the eruption of the Loma Caldera vent that we would ever have known that they were growing manioc or in such large quantities.  We know that maize, beans, and squash were very important in Mesoamerica and particularly the Maya area, but this research and other research on the topic of agricultural in this region, has demonstrated that those three crops were just a part of a much broader agricultural system. 

Warm Welcome But Sad News

Well we arrived in Joya de Ceren and began to catch up with our dear friends. Having spent so much time there over the years and become so close to many people in Joya, it feels a little like coming home. Our friends were glad to see us and we them.  Unfortunately, our arrival was saddened significantly as we began to catch up and learned that in addition to the one worker we already knew had died, two others had passed away.  A total of three of our workers have died since last year. This hit us all very hard as we became very close to all of these men.

One death of my dear friend Chabello we had heard about earlier in the year. His son and I are Facebook friends and this past fall he reported to me that his father had suffered a heart attack. I am still grieving his loss and it is hard to come back to Joya de Ceren knowing he won't be here to welcome us back. We are planning to go spend time with his widow and son this week, which will be tough be good.

My birthday last year with my friend Chabello

The other two workers' deaths were a total shock to us. One had killed himself by drinking poison and the other was murdered in the course of a robbery.  These are all tough to take and each of these three men are missed as project members and friends.  This worker had been only 22 years old. Last year I had driven him home after our end-of-the-year party. I had known he took a bus to come work with us each day but had no idea that he lived two hours away by bus and spent almost half of his daily salary getting back and forth from work and home (we compensated him for this once we knew!). He was 21 years old and supporting his mom, sister, and grandmother but living in a gang-ridden area. It was an experience I will never forget and so humbling to see what so many individuals live through and do for their families. Tragic and sad.

I thought it worth sharing this news with all of you. It is easy to feel like my fieldwork area will be the same each time I return, but I'm stuck every time by the dynamic changes that occur in all our lives so quickly. A year has passed and I've returned to see the babies now toddlers, the children growing quickly, and that not all of the friends I left behind a year ago are here to welcome me back.  This is life and reminds me to be ever so grateful for my days and cherish the time we have here.

The anthropologist cannot be kept separate from those they study or study along side-of and this is ever so apparent at the loss of my friends.