2012: What's it All About?

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2012: What's it All About?
Mexico's Culture and History is filled with romance and drama and it has many historical attractions. There are the standard ruins of the Olmecs, Maya and Aztec. Also there are the train routes used by the legendary Pancho Villa. These are the main reasons, second only to the beaches of Cancun and Acapulco that people come to Mexico. You may ask "why," and the reason is because of the tale of Mexico's past, through an overwhelming amount of physical remains, is as romantic, dramatic, blood-curling and complicated as it gets.

Mexico has the 13th largest GDP and slowly the level of the population in poverty is decreasing and the middle is growing. Goldman Sachs have stated that according to their calculated predictions, Mexico will have the 5th largest economy by 2050, so although they have had their fair share of teething problems and still have issues to contend with as a country, it is widely accepted that Mexico is a good bet for future investments. Mexico has several major economic pillars including oil production and car production, but tourism is also a factor due to its quiet rise from a nation in poverty and the standing of being the USA's sick cousin, to an emerging global player.

Rubber was created by the Olmecs, an ancient civilization from Mexico. They boiled the latex they had collected from the rubber tree to create a ball which they used to play sport. Asian countries like Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia are the main source of rubber today. In 1879 a method for producing synthetic rubber was developed. Today, synthetic rubber, which is derived from petroleum, makes up more than 50% of the rubber available on the market today. Both synthetic and natural rubber have some of important uses in various industries. The use of rubber is widespread and is found in both domestic and industrial products.

The fine detail carved on these sculptures is fascinating. Many sophisticated geometric patterns match some of the most distinctive Art Deco designs popular in the early Twentieth Century. They also show how the Olmec people valued grooming and fashiion in a way we rarely think about ancient civilizations. You can see elaborate headdresses, jewelry, loincloths, turbans, tunics and sandals. Several figures present forerunner's of today's hip “Melrose Avenue” look with beards and shaved heads.

The appearance of ceramics in Mexico coincided with either the arrival of a new people or sudden fluorescence of an existing people around 1600 BC in the tepid lowlands of what is now the states of Vera Cruz and Tabasco, alongside the Gulf of Mexico. They called themselves the Zoque. According to their own legends, they crossed the Gulf of Mexico in three great flotillas of giant canoes, to come in their new homeland. Three thousand years later the Aztecs called the inhabitants of this region, the Olmecs, which means 'rubber people.' These Nahuatl-speaking Olmecs had recently arrived in the region and could not have built the original mounds. However. the process of making rubber by mixing the saps of an indigenous rubber tree and an indigenous vine seems to coincide with the arrival of the Zoque.