Cacaxtla & la ciudad de México

26 de diciembre a 2 de Enero

I spent my second week in Mexico staying with an amazing family in the neighborhood where Diegro Rivera and Frida Kahlo lived. The mother, Yvonne, graduated high school with my mom and was kind enough to host me for the week. I had such an amazing time.

The two older boys, 14 and 8, were very sweet, and we went to see Star Wars: The Force Awakens in theaters together (viewing #3). We discussed nerd culture, language, the city, everything. Unfortunately, it was most;y in English so my Spanish really didn't improve much that week. 

There were also two younger children, a 5 1/2 year old boy and a 2 year old girl (both spoke better Spanish than me). 

My second day there they took me to see Cacaxtla, one of the largest archaeological sites in México. It's believed to be a city built by the Olmecas-Xicallanca people (I will abbreviate to Olmecs).

It was absolutely amazing. The site is outside the ring of mountains surrounding la Ciudad de México, but the volcano in this picture (which constantly experiences minor eruptions that mostly consist of puffs of smoke/vapor/ash) is visible from both the city and Cacaxtla.

I was absolutely blown away by the pristine colors, and the visibility. You can see the pollution that's everywhere here and sinks down between buildings to settle close to the ground. It was so warm though. I don't think I've been cold since I got here. #blessed

The view here is from atop the largest uncovered pyramid at the site, the pyramid you can see is a minor temple that's still in pretty good shape. If you look carefully, just across the visible path from that pyramid is a triangular-ish shaped hill with some small trees on it. Specialists suspect that it's another pyramid, but they haven't received enough money to finish excavating the whole site yet.

The view all around the main central pyramid is littered with these small suspected-pyramids (you can see 3 more in the picture above), leading scientists to believe that Cacaxtla is one of the biggest sites they've found.

This is a panorama of the large pyramid as you approach from the path. All of the different step-like layers were built during a different "era." At the end of each era, a child was selected as a sacrifice, and then their body was entombed in the walls being built for the next era. The child was selected based off of number of birthmarks or patches of differently colored hair. If you had two or more, you were a prime candidate for ringing in the new era. 

The priests who did the sacrificing lived at the top, and were the only men who didn't have to fight in the wars with other tribes.

All of the paint here is original. Nothing has been restored. Nothing. I still can't get over that. This mural is almost 100% in tact, and depicts the Olmecs conquering the Maya, which represented the earth "conquering" the rain, i.e. absorbing it. It's a mural of the necessary sacrifice of celestial water to the earth for the sake of live. The Maya are the ones in feathers (sky--> rain --> water) and the Olmecs are in the leopard skin (leopard --> land animal --> earth). 

Fun fact, the first archaeologist  was a dude who analyzed this mirror thought it was just depicting the olmecs beating the mayans in a bloody battle. It was a female archaeologist who came back and said "wait, hold up, that doesn't make sense, try this instead." Of course.

We also went to el Museo Dolores Olmedo, who was really close friends with Diego Rivera y Frida Kahlo. She had a personal collection of their artwork that, when she died, she donated to the city to be kept as a museum to honor their work.

As you entered the museum you were greeted by these giant agave plants. These guys were massive, to the point where you can really tell that they're straight out of the prehistoric era. Agave is everywhere, and they're right at the tale end of what I can only assume is their pollination  (do they even pollinate? I have no idea how these massive plants reproduce) season, because some of them have these giant stalks that tower over even some of the trees.

See? What even are these things. I love them. They're fascinating.

Also, just for reference, that hedge next to it? Yeah, that came up to my hip. 

The museum was also absolutely swarming with peacocks. I mean, they were everywhere. 

Look at this beautiful sleepy peacock.

They also keep a pack of a breed of dogs unique to Mexico, se llaman Xoloitzcuintle (zoh-loh-eets-kweent-lee). try saying that 5 times fast. They're simultaneously the ugliest and the cutest dogs I've ever seen. They're hairless, except some of them have a little tuft of white/grey hair on the top of their head. 

This is one laying down next to a statue in their enclosure.

I want 20 of them. They're endangered, so I'll call it a reserve and I will help to keep this hideously adorable breed of pups in existence #lifegoals