2012 AND THE MAYANS

I figure this is the part everyone wants to hear about, so I’m starting with the good stuff. 2012 came up a least a dozen times of the course of our trip, and every time was met with the complete bewilderment of the Belizean people. My husband and I bought a handcarved stone Mayan calendar from a vendor on the beach. I don’t remember how 2012 came up, but it did, and he assured us that we had nothing to worry about, and asked me what I thought was the source of the phenomenon, and all I could think of was “people want to sell books”?

Now don’t get me wrong. You can believe whatever you want to believe is going to happen this year, and I won’t judge you. The problem here lies with conflating the end of a long cycle in a cyclical calendar with the destruction of the human race. I could go on about it, but as usual the wise elder Wiki has far better things to say than I: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_phenomenon

As another wise person put it: “if you had to carve all of your calendars in stone, the end of a cycle seems like a pretty good place to stop”.

If you don’t feel like reading all that (though I found it fascinating!), I’ll sum it up for you: yes, it’s true that the Mesoamerican long count calendar cycle ends on December 21, 2012. The fact that the date will be 13.0.0.0.0 by Mayan rendering would have been of great significance to them, as 13 is a sacred number. They would have, however, seen it as at great reason to celebrate, and neither past Mayans nor contemporary Mayans have made any “prophecies” most especially NONE about human destruction. One of tour guides mentioned the galactic alignment, which some fear may cause earthquakes, but that fear is unbased, according to astronomers. Other galactic alignments have come and gone without catastrophe. That same tour guide also asked us group if anyone thought something crazy was going to happen. No one raised their hands, and he replied, “GOOD. We have a really good group today”. Later on, a starry-eyed dingbat of a lady was talking about a cycle of “no-time” and that humanity would have this time period to prove itself, and if we worked for peace, we would begin a new era of peace. But that sounds like the song “Age of Aquarius” to me, and not like a culture of people who held the sacrifice of life as very sacred.

THE PEOPLE
The people of Belize were truly incredible. Totally vibrant and culturally diverse, Belize is populated mostly by Mestizos (Euro-Spanish descent), Creoles (African/Caribbean), Garifuna (West African/Caribbean/Native), and Maya (Native, more commonly referred to as Mayans, but I think that’s incorrect). They are happy, unabashedly friendly, helpful, and made us feel welcome at nearly every point in our trip. Belize as a nation doesn’t have too many natural resources, and became a sovereign nation in 1981, and as a result I think they have evolved into a very non-aggressive, mostly unpolitical, peaceful nation. Everyone on San Pedro seemed to encourage a philosophy of “Slow down. Relax. Drink your rum.” And boy, did we.

Also in Belize are a huge community of Mennonites who produce most of the country’s chickens, eggs, butter, and cheese. Their reputation was somewhat tarnished when some Mennonites were caught growing pot. Our tour guide also relished in telling us that the roads in rural Belize are crooked and winding to keep airplanes from landing and smuggling pot out.

RUM, RUM, RUM…. AND PLANTAINS.
The drinks on the island were weak but tasty. Probably all for the better since it’s hard to drink enough water when you have to keep buying it by the bottle. We refilled them as often as we could, but still ended up buying so many! Luckily, the hotel office recycled them for us. Every tour we took offered all the free booze you could drink, and our tour guides would gladly make your drink as strong as you wanted.

Cashew trees grow widely and the fruits are used to make a delicious port-like sweet wine. Each pear-sized fruit only produces one cashew, which must then goes through several processes before it’s edible, hence why cashews are so expensive.

The default meal in Belize is stewed chicken, beans and rice, fried plantains, and potato salad, and tour guides gave you as much of that as you wanted as well. Most of the food was some combination of classic American barbeque, Caribbean, and Mexican. Burgers, side salads, tacos, beans and rice, plantains, fried conch, seafood. All very delicious. I also found my new favorite drink, the caipirinha. Hard to pronounce (KAI-pee-REEN-ya), but a simple drink: white sugarcane rum, muddled limes, and cane sugar.

THE COUNTRY
We were warned that Belize is a “third-world” country, but it has clean running water, sanitation, and such. I got into the habit of flushing the toilet with my shoe because there was often no soap. Not that doing that probably made any difference, I’m sure it was a mental thing. We also had to get into the habit of throwing toilet paper in the trash instead of flushing it. I guess most of the plumbing was sensitive. But apart from that, there was no big culture shock. Everyone spoke English, took US money or credit cards, even the wall outlets are the same.

We tried as often as possible to hear the history of Belize from the people from Belize. It was a familiar story- San Pedro was an idyllic island that Belizeans flocked to for opportunities, and foreigners with lots of money invested into hotels, restaurants, bars, and tour companies. You can see the older, well-established tourist joints closely packed together, and on the outskirts are dilapidated and abandoned buildings sitting right next to high-end condos built sky high to block out the sun from the slums. Like Oregon, the beach is public property, so you can walk everywhere. Vendors hock their handmade wares, and from what I hear are far less aggressive than say Mexico or Egypt. All of them seemed to be selling a small variation of the same necklaces, earrings, animal wood carvings, stone Mayan calendars, and handwoven textiles.

During the superbowl, while all the burger-eating Americans were watching the game, we stumbled upon all the locals gathered around a huge, grassy field for a soccer game. Don’t know who was playing, but they looked to be local men in their 20′s. They were selling food for 1/10 of what it cost in any tourist joint, and playing loud dancehall music. The locals really seemed to enjoy such simple things like good music, friends, and good food. It really moved me.

THE REST
There’s stuff that is very hard write about, like how beautiful it is to swim in a pristine coral reef exploding with colorful fish, or to pass through a dark cave that centuries ago was a door to the underworld and a place for human sacrifice and ritual. Or to see the ruins of impossibly old temples, and impossibly intricate stone carvings. To think and feel how different another world is from mine. To see enough birds, mammals, reptiles, and fish to fill a book. The pictures are better, but still don’t even come close. It was every bit as mind-blowing as I expected and more. I’m so grateful I was able to go!