And another reason not to drink the water:

Everybody's favorite Civil War Union cavalry general, John Buford, was
killed by typhoid. You can check out his wikipedia page here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Buford

Weird Al sez: if you've never tried real Mexican cooking, well you oughta...

Another brief thought to add to the ones below:

The fact that two students at the language school where I'm studying got
sick with typhoid this week helps to validate my point that, although
Mike Touchton is right about most things most of the time, I think his
"get sick on the local water" policy is a little questionable.

Along those lines, I've been using a steri-pen water purifier to clean
the water out of the tap, and the thing rules. Totally amazing. Uses
ultraviolet light to scramble the DNA of any wigglies hiding out in your
H2O. If you haven't had your "the future is here, today" moment this
week, I'd try one out.

Some General Observations...

1. Zip-off travel pants and photography vests are not cool. However,
they do serve the purpose of telling the locals who deserves to be robbed.
2. Andean music beats the pants off of Guatemalan marimba music.
3. Religious artistic achievement and church exploitation appear to be
positively correlated.
4. Wearing a double-breasted suits with no tail vent makes you look
like a goombah no matter what continent you're on.
5. Halloween costumes on little kids are cute anywhere, although the
costumes here are admittedly a little weak.
6. My quechua teacher doesn't get my stupid quechua puns. Come on!
p'acha mama should be the name of a local tailor!
7. Killa is quechua for moon. That means that the killa house isn't a
hotel run by rap aficionados. Sadly. Not that I ever actually thought
that or anything.

Social Sanctions, Municipal Bureaucrats, and my Moustache

Had a fascinating day today.

The family that I'm staying with is doing aid work on their
own--literally out of their own pockets--funding a school in one of the
rural municipalities right outside of Cusco. It's a place where there
has been a kindergarten and a primary school for 15 years, but until
they began paying teachers to go there, there was only part-time
instruction by a volunteer about 2 or 3 days a week. Now, the kids get
full-time instruction, and although there are occasional problems, the
kids probably will have much better opportunities than they have ever
had before.

These kids, by the way, have got to be the cutest things out there.
Until this morning, I was pretty convinced that our landlord's kids were
the cutest possible little people, but that is manifestly not the case.
Peruvian campesino kids are cuter than any gringo kids I've ever seen,
and even cuter, I think, than Guatemalan kids.

Among other things, we played games like "pull the white guy's funny
moustache" and "garbage train," which means the first person grabs on to
the back of the gringo's shirt and we make train noises while performing
a congo line-like dance and picking up garbage off the ground. In
reality, lots of train noises and not much garbage picking-up, but we
made a couple passes, which the kids liked anyways.

Fed them breakfast (bread) and lunch (bananas), because a lot of their
families are too poor to provide them with three meals.

I would be lying, by the way, if I took credit for any of this, except
for having excellent facial hair. My homestay family here is doing all
this stuff.

Between playing with the kids, I had a chance to talk to the community
secretary about local forest politics. According to her, they do a
little bit of reforestation, though they don't get any help from the
municipality or the province, and they only receive subsidized saplings
(not free) for planting from the central government. Even though, they
don't have any trouble with deforestation, she says, because they have a
good system for taking care of people who violate rules regarding
cutting trees. They ostracize them from the community socially and
exclude them from any community decision-making.

So nobody breaks the rules.

Fabulous. This is just the sort of thing I was looking for (but didn't
find) in Guatemala.

Got to go back there and find out more.

I also met with the provincial environmental bureaucrat. He didn't give
me a lot of information (like most municipal bureaucrats), but there is
one interesting thing going on in the province. They seem to be
starting a replanting program as part of a carbon-sequestration project
for which they will receive income. This is an incentive that I don't
think anyone has connected with our research before! Want to find out
more about that as well. Is it real, or is it just some bureaucrat's
pipe dream?

Subjective Rationality

I had an interesting conversation with Valerio, my Quechua instructor
today, in which he described this ritual which takes place North of
here, high in the Andes in the springtime.

As he described it, these two villages on either side of a pass in the
mountains meet in the pass and have a battle-literally-with traditional
weapons like slings.

He said that, as the tradition goes, the side that wins will have better
harvests that year.

He also described how this tradition seems to have been handed down from
the pre-incan Moche culture (if I remember correctly). The battle can
quite literally be deadly. He said that the year he went, he saw at
least one person killed and several others seriously injured, including
badly broken limbs.

This tradition is quite bizarre when viewed from the Gringo
perspective--I mean... come on! Getting killed for some anachronistic
religious belief?

And the really strange thing is that this thing is permitted by the
Peruvian government and even regulated. Apparently, the police look on,
and even regulate things, making sure nobody's smuggling in rifles or
dynamite--only traditional weapons are permitted.

But I got to thinking about how rational this may be, given the belief
system of the people in that part of the countryside. If they win, they
believe they will have a better harvest, and that might be a matter of
life and death for many people in the community. To corrupt Dr. Hans
Zarkov of Flash Gordon fame--"A rational transaction. One life for
many." There is a small probability that you get killed or hurt, but the
result may be, if you believe the myth, that your kids and folks and
uncles and aunts and cousins and friends all get fed and survive this
year, they all get to stay in town, nobody has to go to Lima and work in
a dirty, dangerous factory, and maybe you even make enough to buy some
Chicha during Semana Santa or a new radio or a healthy horse.

Maybe not such a bad deal, right?

The key is the belief system. If you buy in, it makes sense. If you
don't believe, it's ridiculous.

There are two points that occurred to me about this. The first one is a
philosophy of social science idea:

One could argue (I think successfully) that any form of rationality,
including economic rationality, is utterly subjective. Don't worry--I
won't be going all Postmodern/Kuhnian any time soon.

The primary difference between Exchequer Paulson and Karl Marx and those
campesinos up in the mountains is facial hair and goofy hats (for
examples, see my most recent photo posting, in the sidebar). But after
that, the primary difference is the fact that Paulson's theory about the
way the world works has a lot more systematically constructed evidence
than either of the other two theoretical approaches to explaining local
economic trends. Let's face it: neither "winning rock-throwing contest
= good harvest" or "communist revolution = workers' paradise" has a lot
of systematically constructed evidence going for it, while
"recapitalizing banks = much less recession" has some pretty strong
evidence.

Perhaps more importantly to the scientific endeavor, however, is my
second point.

Most people aren't rational economic actors. We know that. When you
pull the lever to drop the 100 $1 bills and offer your partner one of
them, he (or she) says no. We get a lot more utility out of sticking it
to some jerk than we do from $1. What can you buy with $1, anyways? If
we were economically rational, we would never celebrate Halloween, right?

Broadly, we're neither very good at incorporating alternative types of
rationality into our models of human political behavior nor do we make
any attempt to address alternative types of rationality. We have a
pretty good idea what people will do when they're primarily motivated by
money and they have a broadly market-compatible set of beliefs about the
way the world works, but what if there is another type of utility that
moves people--maybe religious faith determines what utility people get
from particular types of action--or maybe people's understanding of how
the world works is totally different from that of the economists.

If you believe (like the Quechua speakers of some Andean villages) that
winning rock fights will make the harvest better, or that blood
fertilizes the earth, or (like the ancient Mayans) that giving your
crops to the priestly class will make the rains come next year, you're
going to do a lot of things that don't make sense to economists. And
fundamentally, that's a flaw.

In order to have a truly comprehensive theory of human behavior, we need
to have generalizable theories (take that, Kuhn!) which are capable of
incorporating alternative rationalities and alternative forms of utility.

IMF

I'll be interested to read more about these IMF loans to Iceland and
(maybe) Pakistan. The time has come to see if the Washington Consensus
(at least the dogmatic version) has reached its end.

As yet another birthday gift...

...McDonald's is opening in the main plaza in Cusco. Frankly, I would
rather a Taco Bell or a Pollo Campero (if I might be so bold), but I'll
take what I can get. They'll get plenty of competition from the local
francise of Bembo's, a Peruvian burger chain that's right across the
plaza and looks pretty slick (although I haven't actually checked to see
if the burgers are more than 5mm thick.) The only downside to Bembo's
may be that they lack the free WiFi that may make McDonald's my second
home.

For those of you who would complain about the opening of a symbol of
neo-imperialism in the heart of the old Incan Empire, I would suggest
that globalization works both ways--these same forces may bring us
really good papa a huancaina in Boulder.

They have, after all, already brought us the Pupusa place on North
Broadway--an El Salvadorian restaurant that's run by a bunch of Mexican
guys which was originally recommended to be by the American son of
Guatemalan immigrants while at a hostel in Guatemala, and which I have
since recommended to other Boulderites in Honduras, Guatemala, and the US.

They also serve Mexican coke.

There are probably more ways to get other countries into this story, but
I think my globalization schtick may be a little worn.

¡Feliz Cumpleaños a Mi!

Thanks to all of you who wished me a happy birthday... Maureen
commented on my facebook page that she hoped I would get a cake from my
family. I did, in fact, get two cakes. One last night at the house,
and one at the language school where I'm getting my Quechua lessons.
They were both pretty good, but the kicker was the Peruvian dish that
went along with the cake. I believe it was "Pollo al Aji" or something
like that. Mildly spicy casserole-like dish with potatoes (of course),
onion, cheese, and chicken over a bed of lettuce, served over rice. The
Peruvians really do know how to cook!

In other news, I've been taking some pictures of graffiti around town
(all ostensibly political, though some more than others) which I'm going
to upload to my picasa page. Since Emily has been asking for pictures
of my hat, I'm also going to put a picture of that up as well. I'll
also put a link in the sidebar.

Colin Powell

If he's endorsing Obama, apparently I voted for the right candidate...

Me, hats, and Harrison Ford

As Zane knows, one of the things that I admire about Sam Fitch is the
fact that he is one of the few people I know who can really pull off
wearing a hat with a brim in this day and age. I (like most admirers of
Indiana Jones) love the fedora etc., but (although I own like four
fedoras and the like) I feel a little silly wearing one.

Nevertheless, I find myself the owner of another Peruvian fedora
today--my second--after losing several layers of skin in a particularly
painful way at the hands of the thin Andean air and needing a hat that
will do a better job of allowing me to ward off a case of skin cancer
for a while.

I feel a little less silly, though, after having two conversations about
the hat.

The first was with Lucy, the mom in the house, who told me a story about
how a former student of the school that stayed in their house was robbed
in Venezuela but didn't lose any credit cards because he had them stored
in his hat.

The second was a conversation with the Canadian gal who is also staying
here. She was impressed with the purchase.

So I think I'll keep it. And I'll be putting a credit card or two inside.

Noqaq sutiyki gringo

Learning a new language from scratch is hard work! I am now able to
carry on a very basic conversation in quechua, and on a couple of
occasions, I have been able to understand a word or two here and there
spoken on the street by the locals. Wears me out, but it's kind of fun
to be picking it up, however slowly.

Between the dry air and the terrible sunburn I got the second day I was
here, I look like I'm developing some terrible skin condition. I've
lost about three layers of skin on the back of my neck. Emily tells me
that my grandfather would tell me to put suntan lotion on. She's right,
but I'm hoping it won't come to that (I hate the stuff). I'm hoping
I'll be able to track down a nice fedora with a brim, having stupidly
left my awesome crushable fedora at home in Colorado. The fact of the
matter is, there isn't much time when I'm not wearing a long-sleeved
shirt anyways, and wearing shorts would be like walking around with a
flashing sign that says "Tourist: Mug Me." I didn't even bring a pair.
Not that I exactly blend in here... So the only thing that needs
shading is my head. And a hat will do that.

I just want to avoid the floppy tourist-hat look. If you know what I mean.

Emily and I are definitely adopting dark-skinned children so my kids
don't have to deal with this curse of the pasty.

A day in Cusco by the numbers...

11,000 feet of altitude
12 panhandlers
14 pushy street vendors
10 miles walking
14 miles by taxi
5 shoeshine boys
7 gringos in photography vests
3 completely separate parades
20 bottle rockets
2 coffees
4 hours of Quechua
2 llamas

And in response to Aubrey...

...Peruvians poop in the street, too.

http://aubreywestfall.blogspot.com/2008/10/do-you-have-three-euro-or-toilet.html

Lima Architecture

First off, I realize that this is getting ridiculous. I must have
posted three blog entries today. And it looks even worse because all of
my posts from the past week went up yesterday. I have work to do, but
I'm evidently finding an effective way of putting it off. But I've been
thinking this for three days and I wanted to put it up before I forgot.

Moving on...

Lima is a mecca for mid-century architecture and on back to the colonial
period. Including at least three styles of early 19th century
architecture (Moorish, French, and Spanish-style construction), early
20th-century Victorians, Art Deco style... the works.

Most of the buildings are grimy and decaying. But they're still
beautiful. I wish I could have gotten some pictures, but I didn't feel
like walking down a busy street in the run-down central part of Lima was
a good time to advertise my status as a wealthy gringo. "Hey! Mug me!"

It's like a slightly seedier, dirtier version of Manhattan.

Which gets me to my next point. I am totally convinced that the
Peruvians are going to be one of the shining stars of Latin America's
21st century. In thirty years, this country will be like another
world. If only they could get their wacky electoral laws squared away.

Tipping

In his blog, Chris Blattman argues that we should end the process of
tipping:

http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/chrisblattman/~3/418456361/end-tip.html

I agree with the argument that it's a shame that the tip has become an
obligation. However, I like tipping. I try to tip everyone, including
my barista, because it helps to ensure good service the next time I use
the services provided at a particular establishment.

I try to tip with coins at the coffee shop when I can, incidentally,
because they clink when they go into the tip jar, and they can hear me
tipping, even if their back is turned.

In Cusco

And by the way, I'm in Cusco. And folks, for those of you who've never
been here, you really should come.

Some of you all had heard that I was going to take a 30-hour bus ride to
Cusco. As it turns out, the road has gotten a lot better since the
Lonely Planet book was put together, so the ride is scheduled to take
only about 20 hours now. From 5:30 in the afternoon until about 1PM the
following day. But it was closer to 24 hours for me, since it was about
4:30 when we pulled into the Cruz del Sur station in town.

For any of you who haven't ridden these South American luxury buses,
it's a hoot. They show movies pretty much constantly, serve meals, and
play bingo. And the seats recline to almost horizontal so you can
almost sleep well.

They also run a metal detector over you and video you as you're getting
on to prevent (or deter) you from hijacking the bus and stealing
everybody's baggage and passports, etc. That has been known to happen,
though I definitely felt secure on this one.

Oh. And they offer wireless internet. Seriously. But I didn't want to
haul the old computer and make myself a target for entrepreneurial
Peruvians in search of some cash. And as any Bolivian will tell you,
all Peruvians are thieves and crooks. Just kidding, of course, although
the Bolivians actually do say that. And they refer to them as "rats."
Pretty hilarious. For the record, my experiences with Peruvians have
been almost universally aboveboard. Only gotten ripped off by the
occasional taxista.

All in all, it's a pretty good deal. About $50 for that trip, which is
a hell of a lot less than flying. Especially at the moment, as several
local carriers have gone out of business and the level of competition is
low.

And it's totally worth the literal pain-in-the-ass to see the incredible
views. Peruvian mountain scenery is, if anything, more beautiful than
Guatemalan mountain scenery.

Plus, I saw the following movies in Spanish: Superbad, What Happens in
Las Vegas, that movie about Sept. 11 with Nicholas Cage, and some action
flick about snipers. I'm probably forgetting one, as well. Not that I
would have ever paid to see any of those movies, but still. And not to
mention that it's one less night that I have to find a place to stay!

New Pictures

I have a (very) few pictures from Lima up on my picasa site now. You
can click on the link below, or I'll also put a link up in the sidebar.

http://picasaweb.google.com/gdanielwright

Emily Passed the Bar!

Now, you can all refer to her as Emily L. Wright, Esquire (but avoid
using your Keanu Reeves accents, por favor.)

Religion

I visited two places today that tend to give you really disparate
impressions of the Catholic Church in Peru (and Latin America in general).

After getting some breakfast and a bus ticket, I stopped into the Lima
Cathedral to take a look at Pizarro's tomb. I had been into the
cathedral before, when I came here with my high school kids, but I
didn't really have a chance to look around.

Pizarro's tomb itself is (remarkably) beautiful, and ironic.
Breathtakingly decorated in colorful mosaics, there are religious scenes
and a mosaic of one of Pizarro's earlier encounters with Peruvians,
during which he spirited away two indigenous Peruvians to be displayed
in Spain as curiosities, and to demonstrate the potential of the new
land to the crown (hoping to get a loan). If my history is right, the
event took place during Pizarro's second trip to South America, before
he defeated the Inca Atahualpa.

The tomb is ironic because of the religious imagery (I don't associate
Pizarro with many of the values of any church), and because of the huge
"PAX" written on the floor. Pizarro was no peacemaker. He lived a life
of violence (from his early life fighting in Italy elsewhere to his
assassination at the hands of his rivals).

Even with Pizarro's unholy bones hanging around, there is no question
that the cathedral gives you (or at least gives me) a peaceful feeling
of awe, as much at the beauty of the religious artifacts on display
there as at the religious significance of the place. So many beautiful
paintings and incredibly intricate woodcarvings, among other things,
really speak to the inspiration that religious beliefs have brought to
many people here, religious functionaries and lay-people alike.

Although I suspect my family will be surprised, I have to say that, were
I to adopt some other religious creed (I consider myself an
episcopalian, though not a dogmatic one in any respect), I wouldn't feel
uncomfortable adopting the Catholic faith. Although the official
beliefs of the church are much more conservative than my own, the
religion, as it's practiced in everyday life, is often pretty loose, and
there is also a strong political tradition (Liberation Theology) that
comes out of the Catholic Church that I can associate with.

I tend to be a little more skeptical of the evangelical churches that
are in evidence here and, especially, in Guatemala. Those guys are a
lot more conservative than me. But at the same time, evangelical
churches are also known for being popular with women (especially poor
women), because the women believe that church membership makes their
partners more reliable. It is feasible. Those churches discourage
gambling and drinking (among other things) and create a dense social
network which probably places social sanctions on individuals that break
those norms.

Of course, the evangelical churches also energetically oppose birth
control, which can't be helpful, economically. It always scares me to
see so many small children running around. Latin American kids are
super-cute, but they eat as much as American kids and cost a lot of
money to clothe and educate as well.

On the other hand, I spent a good portion of the afternoon in the
"Museum of the Holy Inquisition," which is a really creepy place.
Torture equipment on display, an excavated dungeon where prisoners were
kept... Really scary.

The inquisition was, to put it mildly, a completely unjust and truly
frightening episode in American history (that is, the history of the
Americas). The lonely planet book refers to it as a "Kafka-esque
nightmare" and "utterly surreal." Which is about right. Although at
the risk of polemicizing, (is that a word?), some of the things they did
weren't all that different from some of the creepy things the CIA has
been involved in (waterboarding and whatnot). The inquisition developed
a range of methods that would cause great pain and fear while not
permanently damaging the body of the defendant (victim?). That sounds
pretty similar to the current administration's efforts to justify
interrogation techniques which have the information-extracting power (or
lack thereof) of torture, but technically, can be defined as "not
torture."

Kind of makes you wonder about the church all over again. On average,
good or bad?

For those of you who slogged through all of that, I'll shortly have some
pictures of some of my recent attempts at touristing up on my picasa
site--when I upload them, I'll put a link up, although you can also get
to my pictures from my CU web site (http://sobek.colorado.edu/~wrightgd).

Guys with Guns

One thing I don't get: Why do security guards in Guatemala use pump
shotguns, while all of the security guards I've seen here carry AK
rifles? Given the economic situation of each country, one might think
that these were economic decisions, but why would Peru have an abundance
of AKs and not Guatemala?

At least the guards are older than 14.

I also want to note that I saw possibly the coolest police vehicle I've
ever seen. Better than the mustang interceptors some police departments
are now using. I saw a Kaiser Jeep pickup truck with a riot setup that
consisted of a metal box-shaped frame welded to the chassis, with wire
grating (a little thicker than chicken wire) welded on. Presumably,
this is so that the truck can be used to bash back crowds of angry
protesters while being protected from flying rocks, airborne guinea
pigs, and the occasional high-velocity freeze-dried potato.

Really, though, the cool part is the fact that it was an old Kaiser
pickup. Those things rule.

Lima

I arrived in Lima last night with no real problems, and aside from
paying an inordinate amount of money for a (safe) registered taxi at the
airport to take me to my hotel, everything went just fine.

At first, I was a little worried about the hotel I'm in. It's in a
classic (read: old and dark) building, and is a little run down. But I
slept quite well last night, and the room is quite clean and
comfortable, even though it is a little worn around the edges.

I've only been in Lima one other time, and it was on a guided tour which
Emily and I went on with some high school students of ours when we were
teaching in Maine. The endshot is that, although we spent a day or so
here, I didn't get a very good feel for the place, because we spent most
of the time touring historic sites and museums. It was, certainly a
good trip, but we hardly went anywhere where we were amongst Peruvians,
rather than gringos.

So here I am. I wanted to get a little bit of a chance to walk around
the city and check it out. So today, I went to the Plaza de Armas to
get my bearings, then went off to the la Parque de la Muralla, which is
a park laid out around the ruins of a section of the city walls. Along
the way, I checked out some colonial churches, including the Convento de
San Francisco, where the crypts below the church are open, and you can
peer into chambers where femurs and skulls are laid out in symmetric
geographic patterns. But I only looked at the facade and dodged the
pigeons today, because I've been down there before.

Also walked through one of the city markets--a lot less crowded and
chaotic than I thought it would be, though it still has its share of
stiff, dead geese hanging upside down in butcher shops, pigs' heads on
hooks, and what appear to be cattle hooves...

Lima is also blessed with a large number of very skilled tailors. Lots
of sharp looking suits hanging in the windows.

I got a chip for my cell phone, so I should be able to use it to call
home now, though I'm not sure how expensive it will be (probably too
much). We'll see how it goes. I already had two of the three major
brands available in Guatemala, and now I have the third. I may, at some
point, also get a Telefonika chip here. I've got one, but I don't think
I'll be able to receive calls on it, since it's a Guatemala number.

And in case anyone wants to call me, my number here is: 98 046 8931. To
get me from the states, you probably have to dial 01 (the international
access code) and 51, the country code. So that makes it:

01 51 980 46 8931

I think.

I also walked through Chinatown. That's a bizarre feeling. Why do I
have the strange belief that Chinese individuals only emigrate to the
United States?

In general, I would say a couple things about Lima:
1. Although it has been held up as an example of poor air-quality
regulation, especially among automobiles, Lima seems a heck of a lot
cleaner to me than Guatemala city, though it was (admittedly) a holiday
today, and the city isn't getting a lot of the traffic it might get
otherwise.
2. Parts of the center here are a little dirty, but a hell of a lot
nicer than Guatemala city, and even La Paz. Although La Paz also has a
pretty good feel to it.
3. It's pretty clear that Peru hasn't had an election in a long time.
Not many painted election signs around. Although there is one huge APRA
up on a hillside North of the center.
4. They do seem to be doing a good job at developing the city, as
well. A lot of work seems to have gone on in the last ten years or so,
and the city is fairly well maintained. I'm hopeful for them.

Also, I'm so far very happy with my mountainsmith lumbar pack/shoulder
bag. Not as slash proof as the leather bag I got in Guatemala, and not
as crushable as the montbell bag that got slashed before I got the
leather bag, but very comfortable, even when I'm wearing it in front
with a backpack.

All right, I think it's time to head off and get some dinner and a
recharge for my phone.

Heading Out Again

I'm currently sitting in terminal C of Denver International Airport,
watching the beginning of what looks like a beautiful sunrise. I'm
heading out of Denver for Atlanta, Miami, and ultimately, Lima, Peru
this evening.

Although I've felt in limbo the last couple of weeks here, and didn't
get the one thing completed that I had planned for this month, I did
have a fantastic break with Emily, I got rested up, and I got a lot
closer to defending my dissertation prospectus (my one solid goal). I
also had a nice visit with my mom and dad, who came out earlier in
September, and some nice get-togethers with people in the department and
other friends.

If all goes well, I will spend a couple days in Lima, then I'll take a
bus to Cusco towards the end of the week and be there on Saturday (the
11th of October). I'll be in a guesthouse from the 11th until the 18th
or so, then I move in with a family (hopefully, a Quechua-speaking
family, so I can practice my language skills).

My lessons begin on the 13th (Monday), and continue on up until December.

The only other things I have scheduled for the time being are a meeting
with Miguel Jaramillo, a colleague of Krister's and the guy who
orchestrated the Peru surveys, during the first week of November, and my
flight back to Denver for Christmas, which is on Christmas Eve Day.

I started missing Emily before I even left, and I'm already looking
forward to getting back. Only 78 days to go until I see her again...

But, as she said, my job is to have a good time and get some good work
done in the process.

Even so, I'm looking forward to getting this language training and
fieldwork over with, so that we don't have to be apart again for a long
time.