Easter Island

The last leg of our trip was spent at Easter Island, otherwise knows as Rapa Nui. It is very remote, in the middle of the Pacific, so it took a lot of time to get there. Just the flight from the mainland of Santiago to the island was over 5 hours, to give you an idea of how remote it is. Because of this its culture was uninfluenced by western civilization for a long time, and even now, being that it is owned by Chile and after the work the missionaries did, it still has a very strong sense of Pacific island culture among the natives. English wasn't common on the island, the natives all spoke Spanish and Rapa Nui. Greg and I were able to get by fine with our limited Spanish, and we knew two words in Rapa Nui - Iorana and Maururu. Iorana means hello, good morning, good afternoon, and good bye, and Maururu means thank you. When we arrived, the owner of the hotel we were staying at greeted us at the airport with flower necklaces.

We don't know too much about the history of Easter Island, as very little of it was documented and we don't know how to read their written language. Their history was passed down through word of mouth. We do know that the giant statues standing around the island, the Maoi, were created to protect the graves of their elite and the island. They stood atop ahus, which is where the bones of their leaders were buried. The Moais were created from an extinct volcano on the island called Ranu Raraku, and the big headpieces on their heads, Pukaos, were created from another crater, Puna Pao. The headpieces represented a common hairstyle from their day. Before the fall of the statues, there were 17 tribes on the island, and each tribe had two classes - long ears and short ears. The long ears stretched their ears out, and most of the Moai represent people from this class. The short ears did not stretch their ears and were the slaves. There is one Moai representing a short-eared person. There was a big war in the 17th century between the two classes which caused the destruction of many of the statues around the island. After the war, the class system started to disappear and a new system was put in place to determine the leader of the island, which was called the Birdman competition. They also stopped created Moais around then. The Birdman competition was a contest where one man was selected from each tribe to swim to a local island, collect an egg from a bird that nested there, and the first to return with the egg ruled the island for that year. They stopped this competition after the first missionaries appeared on the island in the 1800's, however it still plays a big part in their culture. Their church has symbols from the Birdman competition on top of the statues of all of its saints.

Since then missionaries came, and their Moais were destroyed, their history took a darker turn. They were exploited many times and taken into the slave trade. The biggest devastation the island faced, however, came from disease. At one point a large group from the island were taken to be sold as slaves, but it was done illegally, so when the government of that ship found out, they demanded that the islanders be returned. When the islanders were returned, they brought back with them a foreign disease that wiped out almost the entire island. Only about 100 remained, and all of the natives who live on Easter Island now are descendants from that small group. The population has since recovered, and now the island has about 4000 people living on it. Slavery wasn't the only way they were exploited, some people came there to use the land as well. There was a sheep company that occupied the island for awhile. They told all of the natives to live in what is now the main town, Hanga Roa, and took the stones from their houses to build fences around the island for their sheep. The sheep company isn't there anymore and now the islanders can live where they want, but it wasn't until recently that the exploitation stopped. The island was recognized as an important historical site, and many efforts have been made to restore the Moais and learn about their history. Despite all of the hardships the islanders have faced over the past few centuries, or maybe because of them, the Rapa Nui people are a very strong race. They have a lot of pride in their land, their culture, and heritage. And like the Cuzconians, they don't like leaving their island. They see something special in it that they don't see anywhere else.

It wasn't until recently that the island became as accessible as it is today, and thus open to tourism. It used to be the case that to get to the island you had to take a ship, and it was a few weeks journey from the mainland to get there. Then there were some planes, but they didn't run very frequently. Now there are planes that go to and from the island a few times a week, making the trip very doable. There is still a lot of mystery in the island, and I think that is what attracts most people to it.

During the time of the creation of the Moais, we don't know how they were transported from the volcano to their final place or how their Pukaos were placed on their heads. Some of the statues weigh as much as 80 tons, so it was not an easy feat. The locals will say they walked to their final place, using a magic called Mana. And it is said that when they reached their final location, the eyes on the statues would be hollowed out so that coral eyes could be fitted in place. Once it had its eyes it could protect the island, and had Mana. All of the statues fell down at one point, so every standing statue on the island today was reconstructed at one point. There are no coral eyes left, save for one that exists at the museum on the island.

Notice in this statue the eye socket isn't completely hollowed out - it's just an angle. That means that it fell over in transit and never reached its destination. The statues that reached their destinations had much bigger sockets so that the coral eyes were able to fit in place.

This is the coral eye in the museum.

The Moai statues were made at a crater called Ranu Raraku. Here, there are statues in all stages of completion. When the people stopped making them, they were all abandoned. On the side of the crater they became buried due to the sediment the rain brought over the years.

There were a bunch inside of the crater too, also buried.

Here Greg is standing in front of one that wasn't finished yet - it was lying on its back, still attached to the crater. They were carved in all different positions depending on what the shape of the rock was at the place they were being carved. One of the people in our tour group asked why the people didn't just break off the rock, transport that to the final location and carve there, which would have been simpler. And the answer was that since this was the only source of that material on the island, they didn't want to waste any of it - so they made the statues right there using the least amount of rock for each one. It's quite an impressive feat if you think about it, to create something so large and heavy on its side that will be able to balance when standing up. It took multiple people to create each one, and the process took about a year. They used small, sharpened rocks to do the carving.

This is the only Maoi made with short ears. It is also the only Maoi with feet.

The Pukaos were made here, at Puna Pao - a similar crater, but with a redder stone.

This is the largest group of standing Moai - there are 15 total. The original 15 were destroyed by a tsunami, and were recently restored by a Japanese company. They were in many pieces along the field, so it was a big effort to find all of the pieces and put them together seamlessly. Because they had to be put back together, they weren't strong enough to hold the Pukaos anymore. Only one of them was, the second to the camera. To get the Pukao on its head, the Japanese company used a giant crane to put it in place. Part of the effort was an advertisement for that crane they used.

The company also placed a mound at the end of it that you could stand on to look like you're a part of the line up. Greg fits in perfectly here.

There are petroglyphs around the island too, carved into the rocks. The Moais and their Pukaos also had petroglyphs carved into them when they were created, but over time the weather and elements have erased most of them.

This is an interesting rock that was used in their religious rituals for awhile - it is called Te pito o te henua, or the naval of the world. That name was also given to the island. The first king of the island, Hotu Matua, brought it with him when he arrived many centuries ago. The material that this rock is made of isn't found anywhere else on earth, so scientists believe it was a meteor. Notice how it is perfectly round. The rock is magnetic also, and if you hold your hands close to it, some people feel them start to tingle. I didn't feel the tingling, but I did feel warmth coming from it. 

The people used to live in both long houses and caves. Long houses looked like overturned canoes, and were made with the reeds found along the island. This is the frame for one of them. The rocks in the front of it making the semi-circle made up a porch area which helped stabilize the ground in the rainy season.

And the caves were formed by pockets of lava. They provided good protection from the elements, however, they were only used for sleeping because they were so dark. Here is one without its entryway. Traditionally the entryway was very small to protect from the wind. The Rapa Nui people were fairly large so they had to crouch to get in.

This is what the entryway looked like.

This is what one of their chicken coops looked like. There aren't many of these left.

Today the island has many free chickens and hens running around. When the sheep company came and took the stones from the villagers to build their fence, they took the stones from their chicken coops too. So all of the chickens were set free, and now the chickens running around the island are because of that. People don't eat them however. Apparently their meat is tough, and their eggs are small and not very tasty. The chicken meat and eggs they eat are imported from the mainland.

Here was a mother with her little chicks following her around.

Every morning (when it wasn't raining) at the crack of dawn, every single chicken and hen on the island would start cock-a-doodle-doing for a good hour to wake everyone up. It was kind of comical to hear them all in chorus like that. So Greg and I didn't sleep in much on the island, which was fine because there was more to see during the day than at night.

 The island had a lot of stray animals on it. There were tons of dogs and cats, and then there were also the chickens, horses, and cows. We made many furry friends along the way, most of the dogs were friendly. Here were some of the wild horses we saw.

My favorite stray was a tiny baby kitten we saw on the sidewalk. It couldn't have been more than a few weeks old, and it was super friendly.

There was a man looking after it and its mom, and he came out and greeted us when he saw we were petting the kitten. When the man picked up the kitten, it fit entirely in his hand it was so tiny.

On the whole, the island is a very safe place to be. The people are trustworthy, and theft is very rare. Assault is unheard of. However, there was one time during this trip when I feared for my safety. I was walking by myself to pick up a drink (Greg ran back to the room to get something), and out of nowhere a German Shephard runs out of someone's driveway and starts barking and growling at me. I don't think he was going to bite, but for whatever reason he felt threatened by me and felt the need to threaten me back. I was pretty freightened, as I had no defense against a dog like that should he decide to attack. Soon after, a man came running out of the driveway and told the dog to be quiet and go back inside, and Greg also came running over to help. The dog eventually went away when he saw he was outnumbered, but that experience shook me up a bit. I guess that kind of thing happens when you have stray dogs running around. 

However, most of the dogs we met were very friendly and liked to be pet. Usually we would pet one and it would follow us around for a bit - just like that we were friends. There were a lot of German Shephards, some Labs, I saw one Husky, and there were some of those dogs with the curly white hair also. And of course there were a lot of mutts. There weren't as many cats, but there were two at the hotel we got friendly with.

The food on the island was delicious. I had a lot of fish while I was there, and it was all locally caught and fresh. Usually it came with a fruit in the sauce also, like pineapple. 

At the hotel we stayed at, we had fresh papaya and papaya juice every morning, made with fruit that grew right in the backyard.

And they had a small farmer's market every morning. I bought these bananas that were very small and plump, and they tasted much sweeter than our bananas. I heard once that bananas are actually a type of berry, I could taste that in these ones. They had a bit of that tangy taste you find in strawberries or blackberries.

This is their church. Inside it has statues of all of the saints, but if you look on their heads you'll see a bird symbol. That's the symbol from the Birdman competition they used to hold.

While we were on the island we saw some dance shows, where they played traditional music and showed us their traditional dance. My pictures from it didn't come out very good, but Greg took some nice videos.

Our last night there, we saw a dance that included dinner, cooked in their old way - in the ground. They covered the food with palm leaves, and then with dirt, and had it cook underground for a few hours. They cooked vegetables and meat like this, and it was all delicious. Here they were uncovering it for us to eat.

They painted our faces for the event too. It was at night so the lighting isn't too good in these shots, but the paint started out the same color as our skin, and as it dried it turned white.

Lastly, this is the spot where Greg proposed. It was on top of the crater where the Birdman festival took place. The small island where the men would swim to get the egg is close to it, and people would watch from up here. There's a lake inside the crater.

This is the view from the top.

Here are some more pictures of the Moais.

Machu Picchu

The first thing to know about Machu Picchu is how to pronounce it. It's Ma-chu Pee-h-chu, according to the locals. Machu Picchu was an Incan city built in the 15th century in the mountains used as a university and some believe as a retreat. It was abandoned about a century later during the Spanish Conquest, and remained a secret for centuries to the outside world until 1911, when an American explorer discovered it. Until 1911, its existence was just a rumor, a myth. Since it is hidden in the jungle, when the Incas abandoned it, it only took a few months for the natural elements to take over it again. It camouflaged into the jungle in the 3 months the Spanish took to get to it, so the Spanish missed it and thus it is the only remaining Incan city that was not destroyed.

The story goes that the American explorer, Hiram Bingham, was convinced of its existence and was on his third attempt at finding it in Peru. He did not have much luck searching around the jungle, so he took a break in Cuzco. He went to the market and saw one of the venders was selling some interesting looking vegetables. He asked where they were from and the vender said they were from Machu Picchu. The locals all knew about the abandoned city's existence, it was just the outside world that found out about it in 1911. Nobody knows Machu Picchu's original name, it was called Machu Picchu because that is the name of a large mountain next to it. Bingham became very interested and asked more about it, and the vendor said that if he wanted to know more, he would have to buy all of his produce. So Bingham spent the last of his money on the vegetables from this stand, and the man told him where he could find the city. So Bingham set out with his crew to find the city, and after much hiking came about the old city, which at this point was buried in jungle. There were two families living there at the time. When he approached the entrance of the city, a little boy came up to him and said "you're in the middle of the jungle, let me show you around our home" and so he found Macchu Picchu. Here is Bingham with the boy.

Bingham at the time was working for Yale University. He came back to Machu Picchu later with a much bigger crew, and they took many of the artifacts from the site, promising to return them the next year. He never returned them, so they became the stolen property of Yale University. Recently, the Peruvian government spoke out against Yale University, demanding its priceless artifacts back, and Yale agreed to return them over the course of 10 years. The first installment was returned a few months ago, and we were able to see them at the Machu Picchu museum in Cuzco.

To get to the site we had to take a bus, a train, and another bus, which ended up taking a few hours both ways. However, the trip over was very pretty. It is right on the edge of the Amazon jungle, so the closer we got the greener the landscape became. This was the train we took.

And here are some shots from the trip.

Here we are at the entrance of the park.

And here we're standing in front of the city, excited to be where we were.

Notice the profile of the head in the background made by the mountain? I found this picture online where it is photoshopped to look more pronounced.

The Incas worshipped the elements - sun, water, earth, and wind. They said there was a fifth element as well, which was love, because without love you cannot worship anything. Each element had its own place of worship. This was the temple of the sun.

A few years ago some tourists drew graffiti on the walls of it so we couldn't go inside, only view it from the outside. Notice the two windows in it, one is in the front and the other one is off to the side. They were carefully and thoughtfully placed. During the winter solstice, the sun shines through one of the windows at such an angle that the light splits in two, so there is a shadow in the center. And during the summer solstice the same thing happens with the other window. We were there just a few days short of seeing this.

These steps leading up to the city functioned as their growing areas for the crops. They grew enough here to feed the entire city.

Notice the way these stones fit together, they fit almost perfectly. These stones didn't originate from the mountain they were on either, they were transported from a nearby mountain to be cut and put into place. I could barely manage a flight of stairs without getting out of breath, I can't even imagine what went into transporting enough stones from one mountain to another to build a city.

They cut the rocks in such a way that their breaks went along with the grooves already in place. Here is a rock that was almost cut. After the cut was made, it would have to be polished some more to to perfectly flat, and that process could take years.

The Incas also had a strong eye for art when they were building the city. A theme that comes up repeatedly in its design is the shape of the condor. This is a drawing from the original design of the city:

See how it resembles a bird? This is a sculpture inside the city, also representing a condor. The two big rocks at the back are the wings, and the white half ring at the base represents the white collar that condors have.

This is a sculpture in the style of cubism (apparently Picasso wasn't the first to invent the style), representing the mountain we are standing in front of. All of the faces on the sculpture are designed to catch the light in the same way the mountain does.

And this sculpture represents a constellation the Incas used for navigation. It's also a common shape in Incan designs, called the Inca cross. In the constellation, the stars point out north, south, east, and west. This sculpture shows only half of the shape, but when the sun shines on it its shadow creates the other half. I put the original design of the shape next to it.

 

This sculpture was used as a compass - each point represents a different direction. An interesting thing about this is that normally true north is not the same as compass north. This statue points to true north, as directed by the stars. However, here compass north and true north are the same. The reason for that is that Machu Picchu is partially magnetic, making them align.

The Incas also had very advanced medicine for their time. For example, they knew about blood transfusions. And they knew that to match blood types, you needed to take blood from pregnant women, because their blood will match 90% of the blood types in existence. They were able to perform brain surgeries as well. If you look at ancient Incan skulls in museums, some of them have multiple bumps of them from holes that were healed over all (meaning they survived), from surgeries performed. When surgery was performed, they used the white flower from this plant to help the patient with the pain. When you turn it into a tea, it makes the body entirely numb and acts as a hallucinogen, so the patient felt nothing and probably enjoyed the experience.

The tea from that plant was also used to help with meditation. The people would drink it and then go to the temple to meditate and relax the mind. Here was the temple they would use.

The acoustics in here were really good. We (the tour group) all chanted Om together in here, and it felt very loud and resonating.

The coca plant was also a big part of their lifestyle, for the reasons I mentioned in the previous post - it helps the body absorb oxygen, helping with the altitude, and is an antibiotic. If you look at ancient Incan skulls another curious thing is that most of them have a many teeth left. That's due to the coca leaf keeping the mouth clean. This is a baby coca plant growing inside the site.

Maintaining the site is a big job, since it is in the jungle and plants are always trying to claim it again. They have people working all day cleaning out growth from between the cracks of the stones and such. And to keep the lawn nice and short, they have llamas all over.

In my opinion, llamas are a much better solution than lawn mowers. They're energy efficient, cheap, and they will fertilize the lawn as well. And tourists like the llamas also, some will walk right up to you.

After the tour was over we were allowed to roam around the old city and explore a bit, so Greg and I took some more pictures.