Happy New Year from Chaa Creek

And why we’re looking forward to 2012

As with the arrival of every New Year, all of us here at Chaa Creek once again invite our many friends around the world to join us in looking forward to the future with fresh perspectives, aspirations and hope as new opportunities and challenges present themselves.

[pullquote]But what we do know is that 2012 will see some profound – and many would say necessary -changes to the way the world works and how we see our place in it.[/pullquote]Each New Year is, of course, new, but as almost everyone is now aware, 2012 has been earmarked for millennia as holding something special.

Here in the Heartland of the Maya, where thousands of years ago ancient Maya sages painstakingly calculated and predicted a series of unique celestial events that will occur on December 21 2012, this sense of history combined with anticipation of what lies ahead is keen indeed. What exactly did those ancient stargazers and seers predict, and what does it mean for us today?

We’ll never know for sure. History and the Spanish conquerors conspired to delete the intricacies and nuances necessary to understanding why this year was deemed to be of such importance, and why the Maya went to such pains to record a date so far in the future for us to take note of.

But what we do know is that 2012 will see some profound – and many would say necessary -changes to the way the world works and how we see our place in it. Even in tiny Belize, tucked away between the peaceful Caribbean Sea and the primordial rainforests, we feel the winds of change almost daily with news of such events as the Arab Spring, the Year of the Protester (as the influential Time magazine had it) the embattled Euro, collapsing world markets, a hotly contested US presidential election, accelerating environmental changes and a plethora of new events that, in an ever shrinking world, impact on us all.

On the face of it all, it can be quite daunting.

However, for us, the ancient Maya’s meticulous recording, calculations and predictions signify one very important quality – hope. To look towards a date so far into the future, and to then leave inscriptions in stone in anticipation that someone would be there to notice and act on them, well, that shows a very high degree of faith in humanity and hope for its future.

We feel that this is the central message of the Maya and 2012. Far from the unfounded (and frankly, often idiotic) doom and gloom scenarios propagated by people far removed from the Maya , we see the Maya attention to 2012 as one of hope, courage and an ability to embrace change while holding onto what is dear to oneself and society.

So in that spirit, we wish everyone a restful and relaxing holiday with friends and family, and a joyous start to what promises to be an eventful 2012. Here at Chaa Creek we’ll continue to act on the assumption that what we do now will be noticed by our progeny thousands of years into the future, and this affects how we conduct ourselves today. And we think that’s a pretty cool way to begin 2012.

Happy New Year everyone!