We are going to prove that Mexico is the mix of modern and traditional country…
Megadiverse country
Mexico is home of 10-12% of the world’s biodiversity. Mexico ranks first in biodiversity in reptiles with 707 known species, second in mammals with 438 species, fourth in amphibians with 290 species, and fourth in flora, with 26,000 different species!
Mountain ranges and volcanoes
The Mexican territory is crossed from north to south by two mountain ranges known as Sierra Madre Oriental and Sierra Madre Occidental, which are the extension of the Rocky Mountainsfrom northern North America. From east to west at the center, the country is crossed by the Trans-Mexican Volcanic Belt also known as the Sierra Nevada.
Aglomerations
Greater Mexico City officially called Mexico City Metropolitan Zone (Zona Metropolitana de la Ciudad de México), constituted by the Federal District and 41 adjacent municipalities of the states of Mexico and Hidalgo. In 2005, Greater Mexico City had a population of 19.23 million.
Xochimilco is better known for its extended series of canals – all that remains of the ancient Lake Xochimilco where all inhabitants travel in colourful trajineras (Xochimilco boats) between chinampas covered with flowers.
Teotihuacán (”place of those who have the road of the gods”) was, at its height in the first half of the 1st millennium CE the largest pre-Columbian city in the Americas. The name Teotihuacán is also used to refer to the civilization or culture that this city was the center of, which at its greatest extent included much of Central Mexico.
The Maya – “sons of the days, are made up of time”
And, as the daughters and sons of the days, the Maya developed an elaborate and sophisticated system of timekeeping that is still very much in place. The ancient Maya used 17 different calendars based on the cosmos. These calendars were, and still are, calculated by the traditional Mayan priests, and are used to time the planting of crops, and to schedule sacred celebrations and ceremonies.
Mexico’s Palenque Mayan Ruins
Today, most Mayan people live in three areas: the Yucatan Peninsula and Chiapas state in Mexico, and the Guatemalan highlands. Today’s Maya number between four and six million, divided into many different ethnic groups who speak around 30 different languages. The indigenous thatched roof housing is pretty much the same. The old crops (corn, beans, chile, tomatoes and squash) are still being grown using many of the agricultural techniques, including the slash and burn cultivation. The forms of village social organization seem to have survived intact. Mayan medicine is age old, and western medical science is studying many of its techniques, especially the herbal remedies, and finding many useful things.
After 1521, the Spanish tried to systematically destroy Mayan civilization. They burned the codices, which were ancient bark paper books. This is one of the great crimes of world cultural history. One surviving codex, housed in Dresden, Germany and called, not surprisingly, the Dresden Codex, is a wonder of brilliant drawings and decoration and cryptic hieroglyphics.
Famous sites
The two most famous sites in Mexico are Palenque and Chichen Itza with their own unique fascinations to explore.
Beloved by many who declare it to be the most beautiful Mayan ruin, Palenque. The region around Palenque has the highest average rainfall in Mexico, watering a schokingly dense rainforest. So far, only 34 out of 500 ruins have been excavated.
Temple of Inscriptions is perhaps the most interesting pyramid at Palenque. Besides being the tallest, it also housed the crypt of Pa Kal, a powerful Mayan priest, discovered in 1952. The most famous piece, Pa Kal’s jade mosaic death mask, has been stolen from the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City.
Chichen Itza translates to mean ”mouth of the well of Itza.” Chichen is the best known, best restored, and arguably most impressive Mayan ruin. Chichen had two principal wells, or cenote: one sacred and the other profane. The profane well was used for everyday needs. The sacred well, a largish 195 feet across by 120 feet deep. Divers have retrieved skeletons and many ritual objects from its depths.
Improve your vocabulary!
extension – przedłużenie
adjacent – sąsiadujący
municipality – okręg miejskiindigenous – rdzenny
cultivation – uprawa roli
codex (pl. codices) – kodeks
dense rainforest – gęsty las
excavate – wykopywać
depth – głębokość