Monte Alban

7/3/04 Today was amazing. I'm not sure I have enough distance from our visit to Monte Alban yet to say much other than I am in awe of how advanced that society was. Also, we were incredibly lucky to find a Zapotec guide who spoke English. He is the grandson of a famous healer named Dona Cande who died at 113 years old. He grew up on the tallest mountain encircling Monte Alban and was very excited to share the knowledge of his ancestors with us. James understood his name as Rolando, but I believe it was Orlando. If you go to Monte Alban, ask for him. He was the closest to an old Austin hippie we've met so far. He wasn't formally educated but was the most knowledgeable and intelligent man we've met. He took the time to stop and explain the uses of all of the vegetation as well as all of the spiritual and mathematical reasons for the locations and uses of the buildings. My favorite building was the astronomical observatory. It had stelae that represented each astronomer (every astronomer had different tattoos around their eyes) with the constellation they founded. Another truly fascinating item was the stelae that are referred to as Las Danzantes. Once thought to be dancers in a psychedelic mushroom trance scientists have finally discovered these to be documentations of different medical conditions. The room in which they were discovered is thought to possibly be a medical library or healer's office. They document hunchbacks, breach births and other physical deformities. Finally, our guide explained the big draw at the Solstice which is a chamber that receives the direct light of the sun twice a year and sends the beam glowing down to a platform where a priest dressed in reflective gold dress would address the indigenous people. Another interesting tidbit were stelae that depicted races other than Mesoamerican. They have documented proof that Africans, Asians and other races were at Monte Alban before those cultures were believed to have transportation sophisticated enough to cross the oceans. I have a ton of other small facts that I probably will not post, but may get around to working into a story. Like I said before, it was an amazing day. We had been told it was maybe 2 hours of entertainment, but we were there for 5 hours and felt we needed another day.