Chichen Itza: Mexico's Mayan Wonder 

Honestly, all of the cultures of the Americas could use a bit more attention, if only the Spanish conquistadors weren’t such genocidal maniacs, they deliberately tried to exterminate the native cultures, destroying countless manuscripts and priceless books containing god knows how much information on these cultures, then they tried to write over the native history with Catholicism. Same goes for the US government with the native Americans, who knows how many priceless relics and stories were lost from these cultures when they were almost wiped off the map, forcefully removed from their homeland and treated as second class citizens at the best of times and treated with outright distain in the worst.

We learned about a lot of the known history in of the peoples native to this land and the States. Including those of the Lower North American continent like Mexico, and the Upper North American continent First Nations. And down into South America too. And they didn’t sugar coat the rape and slaughter as much as they used too. So here’s hoping for a little less stupid bigotry in the future.

@@chickenmonger123 we can hope, I still weep for the history and knowledge of these cultures we will never learn about because of their near-complete destruction

I want to visit teotihuacàn so badly 😩

You should come. It’s a short trip from Mexico City. The site is massive though, you’ll need lots of sunblock and comfortable shoes, but it’s worth it

I've been there and done that. Amazing experience.

Not that you can do it anymore, but walking up the steps you can hear rainfall. Each sound put into the pyramid is echoed differently. Drums, claps, footsteps, chanting. All make unique sounds

I did that! It’s cool!

Exactly. I experienced this myself while visiting there and the feeling is somewhat spooky

@@nuucha Spooky? You really found it spooky? You must be petrified of graveyards then.

Are they equivalent to the non contacted tribes, or the US Indian Reservations?

@@Locutus Neither of those, they have contact with the western world all the time, and they don't have land in the form of reservations. The mexican constitution has a law called "usos y costumbres" that permits individuals groups of people like indigenous communities to self govern, it's kind of a gray area where the federal and state governement allows them to do as they please as long as they don't explicitly violate the most common and important laws, the government won't intervene in for example how they decide to organice their local administration within their municipality, taxation, land rigths, etc. But would investigate murders, kidnapings, drug trafiking and so one and so forth. Basically as long as it isn't criminal activity and it doesn't bother the adyacent communities, towns/cities or infrastructure, they can rule their communities as they see fit. That doesn't mean they're independent however, the federal governemnt can suspend the use of the usos y costumbres law to any particular community if they become increasingly problematic.

In the 1800's the Yucatan applied to become a state in the United States. Their geography and isolation from the rest of Mexico has always made them somewhat separate from the rest of Mexico. The US congress perhaps mistakenly turned down their request.

When i visited our native guide told us maya men do not grow beards unless they have western blood mixed in

Well, not exactly. The last maya, real independent state ceased to exist in 1697 with the pillage of Tayasal, in Guatemala. From there, the Spanish ruled all of the maya area and there were several rebellions, but none of those achieved independence from Spain until Chan Santa Cruz rebelled and was recognized by the UK government as a sovereign nation. The last reduct of this independent nation ended in 1901 when Mexican president Porfirio Diaz took the land and turned it into part of Mexico. You can find small, rebel communities of Zapatista Maya in Chiapas today, but those rebelled in the 1990's.

i don't say i'm gonna watch youtube i say i'm gonna watch simon

My wife and I climbed it back in 2004. Can’t confirm that is dangerous. Steps are very narrow and had to come down on our butts

My mother climbed it when she went in the late 80s. At the time she was told that they thought to climb they used the steps like switchbacks.

You can still climb the temple at Coba. The thing is ... is that the Coba site is actually larger, with more excavated buildings in the first than Chichen Itza, but it takes a bit longer to get there (as far south as Telum, then turn right and head inland for an hour) than the easy bus ride to Chichen. The nice part is that crowds are smaller, its mostly under the forest canopy so its cooler as well. Done both, Coba is far, far better.

I was there in the early 90's and no one mentioned any warnings about people passing out climbing the big pyramid. In fact, ran up the pyramid, twice...that was in my marathon days. It was a lot harder than I had imagined, the stairs are very narrow and very tall, you have to watch EVERY step.

US tourists...

#Al R. It has been 35 years since I was there, and I still am in awe of it. Amazing place.

I recall that as well, but I remembered it backwards. But now that u mentioned, I’m pretty sure you’re correct...unless the guides are in cahoots at passin us tourists a fast one. Or, same guide? Guess it could happen :)

The captain winner was the one sacrifice. The guide was right!

Should be renamed to Chicken pizza, to help promote American tourism.

Wife and I visited it and got a tour early last year (a week before US started shutting down air travel). It was a truly amazing place, and I'm really happy we got to visit it. I had recently read some books about the Brothers/Twins, Xiabalba, etc, and it was super cool to get a visual/physical representation of those stories.

Well you might want to start addressing it properly. It is the MAYA culture with something like 26 different tribes and many kingdoms. The people spoke the MAYAN languages. They are not the Mayan people. They are Maya.

Noted. Good suggestions.

@@megaprojects9649 honestly, just go down the list of wonders in Civ V, easy content

“Porcelain tower” is what my family call urinals that run all the way to the floor

Heh, the Red Court ritual to kill Dresden.

@@N_0968 And others.

@@chickenmonger123 His whole bloodline. But thankfully they died themselves.

@@N_0968 Indeed. And others died too.

Who's here to save the child?

@@alexander-mauricemillamlae4567 I believe she is "resting" quietly in a health camp.

True, and he's itching to escape the basement and put Simon in it!

@@imouse3246 The itching is simply because he is not used to his flour sack -prisoner- err I mean guest clothing.

My god! I can't believe I actually get to speak to the all mighty Supreme Leader directly 😱! I feel so humbled and honored. Please tell me "little rocket man", what is it you do these days now that you've completed your rocket collection? What comes next?

I WILL FIND A WAY. THERE IS ALWAYS A WAY.

@@megaprojects9649 with cocaïne everything is possible!

That's for business blaze

@@edmundthespiffing2920 cocaine probably is the way, link Chichen Itza to cocaine, cocaine to the CIA, CIA = cold war, Done!

@@edmundthespiffing2920 because it's always respectful to make stupid jokes like this

*losers

@@etonbachs4226 Thanks very much! Corrected!

Yeah, I've heard it both ways, too. Maybe everyone was sacrificed? It may be the first time I am happy to be un-athletic.

The tour guide we had said that it had been theorized that the winner was not chosen by a single winnable set of rules, the priests (who were chosen at birth by the Chetmal, I believe is how it's spelled, Grand Priest) would instead interpret it based on "the movements and related to the stars". Also, at the grand ball court there were two teams the eagles and jaguars that were composed of the royalty and the common respectively... I have a feeling the eagles won most of the time...

They never wrote that. Jesus Christ. The cycle ended on Dec 21, 2012. The priests were supposed to start the next cycle but the Spaniards came and I don't know about you, but if I'm to busy dying of a sickness or been hunted like a prey animal, I'm not going to be like "this is all good and what not, but I gotta finish the next cycle..." Mayan priest were killed almost at the beginning of the conquest for been pagan. The Spaniards weren't interested in saving the Maya religion. They went to impose Catholicism and they did just that. You idiots assumed and created conspiracy theories around it. And because of that some dick in CT went "sInCe cAleNdAR eNdS iN 12.21.2012 iT mUsT mEaNs tHe wOrLd iS gOiNg tO eNd tHaT dAY uNlEsS i dO sOMetHing bEfoRe tHEn." The rest is sad and unnecessary history. 20 kids + the incel killer plus any adult that got on his way dead on 12.14.2012. He was a homeschooled loner that spent his days on a computer researching about the 12.21.2012 conspiracy. He killed 21 "pure" including himself. He had enough ammo to kill many more, but he turned the gun on himself after the 20th child. THAT is no coincidence. The only reason it wasn't mentioned again is because he also had Asperger's and the media didn't want the attack associated with Autism for fear of stigma.

That was an misinterputation

We got free tickets to go. Well, not exactly free bc we had to suffer thru a 4hr sales pitch for timeshares along the coast. Worth it in the end

So do I.

It's already been done

Not by simon

Nothing compares to chichen itza nothing the architecture and astronomy aknowledge is by far the most magnificent and stunning archeological site on this planet

@@gabobeltran9132 I’m not sure about that, can we really say that we already know everything about the cultures and civilizations that came before us? I believe there’s still entire civilizations of people yet undiscovered and countless mysteries in the cultures we do know about to be revealed. Certainly the Mayans were exceptionally good at things like astronomy and architecture, but even among the other people of central and South America there are some absolutely stunning works of architecture that I’d argue rival the best of the Mayan. There’s still so much we’ve yet to learn about so many cultures all across the world, a day may yet come where we discover a long forgotten site full of priceless artifacts that completely shatter all we thought we knew of our past

I feel ya

I think this mica was only in Teotihuacan pyramids

I was there in 1984 before the first hotel was built on the beach in Cancun. El Castillo was complete but the rest of the site was still being uncovered. The same with Coba. Walked around Tulum, just me my wife and a local guide... Went back in 89, then again in 96, after Hurricane Gilbert pushed the sea 4 miles inland and nearly cut Isla Mujeres in half. By 99 the place was overbuilt, we backpacked down to Belize but the tourist trade was in full and haven't been back since.

@@tommypetraglia4688 I went in 2001 to Playa del Carmen. Cancun was a bit overbuild by then even. But going to are all the amazing Mayan and historical sites was definitely worth it I do wish I had been able to go as early as you did I get that was soon much better. Unfortunately I was like a couple of months old in '84! Hah

I also remember reading it from somewhere. The theory goes that getting into after life by ritualistic sacrifice was considered a great honor so people actually wanted it or something like that

lucky dawg