WORLD
Mexico`s Mayan region launches 2012 apocalypse countdown
Baku, December 23 (AZERTAC). Only a year is left until Dec. 21, 2012, when some believe the Maya predicted the end of the world. But unlike enthusiasts of doomsday theories who suggest putting together survival kits, southeastern Mexico, the heart of Maya territory, plans a yearlong celebration.
Mexico`s tourism agency expects 52 million visitors by next year to the regions of Chiapas, Yucatan, Quintana Roo, Tabasco and Campeche. All of Mexico usually gets about 22 million foreigners a year.
Most archeologists agree that the 2012 reference on a 1,300-year-old stone tablet only marks the end of a cycle in the Mayan calendar. "The world will not end. It is an era," said Yeanet Zaldo, a tourism spokeswoman for the Caribbean state of Quintana Roo. "For us, it is a message of hope." Yucatan State has announced plans to complete the Maya Museum of Merida by next summer. The Mayan civilization, which reached its height from 300 A.D. to 900 A.D., used a Long Count calendar that begins in 3114 B.C., then marking time in roughly 394-year periods known as Baktuns. Thirteen was a sacred number for the Mayas, and they wrote that the 13th Baktun ends on Dec. 21, 2012.
Believers have taken the end-of-the world fears to the Internet with hundreds of thousands of websites and blogs. "The Maya are viewed by many westerners as exotic folks that were supposed to have had some special, secret knowledge," said Mayan scholar Sven Gronemeyer. "Human beings seem to be attracted by apocalyptic ideas and always assume the worst," Gronemeyer said. "This new historical and archaeological knowledge is so much more interesting and mind-blowing than the fantastical claims about Maya prophecies one sees on TV, books or on the Internet," said David Stuart, a specialist in Mayan epigraphy at the University of Texas. Jonnie Channell of Albuquerque, N.M., says that 2012 "is going to be one of those things where people are definitely going to have to plan," not because of impending apocalypse, but because hotel rooms in the Maya region are probably going to be full. Channell, who owns Maya Sites Travel Services, is surprised that she already has 24 reservations for three tour packages she is offering to major Mayan sites in the week leading up to the solstice. "We put together these tours, and we`ve got lots of sign ups," she said. "If anybody think it`s going to be the end of the world, then they better stay home."