Everybody put your hands in the air....

Gringos and locals alike raise their hands in the air to catch the first rays of the new year: Aymara New Year´s celebrations, Tiahuanaco

In case you missed it: Happy New Years everybody! What´s that you say? Happy New Years, in June? Well, it depends who´s calendar we´re talking about, really. In this case, I´m referring to the Aymara calendar, which starts and ends with the winter solstice. And of course, being in the heart of Aymara culture here in Bolivia, we made a point of attending the New Years festivities.

The Aymara are the local indigenous population in northern Bolivia, and make up around about 35% or so of the total population of the country. Whereas the Quechua are more commonly associated with the Incan empire, the Aymara are more closely associated with the Tiahuanacan empire. Which empire? Tiahuanacan - while everyone has heard of the Incan empire, the reality is that it only lasted less than a 100 years before the Spanish wiped it off the map. The Tiahuanacan empire, however, spanned a thousand years, and covered an area from Lake Titicaca through most of Bolivia and south, well into Chile and Argentina. Its capital was the ceremonal centre of Tiahuanaco, near the south shore of Lake Titicaca - today the ruins are still being excavated.

Revellers gather around impromptu fires started by setting brush on fire to keep warm in the pre-dawn, sub-zero temperatures

It is in these ruins that the new years celebrations for the Aymara people take place. In the absence of any easy and reliable way to do it, Dorthe and I joined a tour, and headed out to the ruins at 4am in the morning. As you can imagine, at 4000m, at 4am in the morning, on the longest night of the year, in the middle of winter, it is somewhat cold. Ok, frikkin´ freezing is perhaps a more appropriate phrase! The locals though found the way to keep warm - they put a match to the dry altiplano scrub while waiting in line to get in, and then gathered around the resulting fire. It worked pretty well for a few minutes, until the fire burned out - but of course, there´s always another bush!

The celebrations were very simple but rather elegant. Thousands of people, both gringos in goretex and locals in their beautiful traditional dress, packed into the ruins and stood facing the hill on the other side of the valley. As the sky lightened slowly to the northeast, everyone took their gloves off (not that much fun in the sub-zero temperatures) and raised their hands in their air - the idea being to catch the first rays of the new year. And then everyone just stood there in silence, hands above their heads, watching the dawn. When the sun finally poked its head over the hills, it was greated by a few large horns, and the odd cry of "Viva Bolivia!". And that was about it - rather different to home, and really quite pleasant.

The locals dancing up a storm in Tiahuanaco

Of course, no Bolivian festival is complete without music, dancing, drinking and a little something for Pachamama, and that was what followed - lots of traditional dance, and lots of traditional music. And lots of puro, coca leaves, and llama fetuses headed onto bonfires for Pachamama. It was quite a sight to see many of the local villages parading and dancing their way around these ancient ruins in the same way that things have been done (more or less) for the last two thousand years. We watched them and joined them for a bit (but no more drinking with Bolivians for me!), and then once the crowds had moved on to the town, we toured the ruins. Tiahuanaco is a beautiful ceremonial centre, and we were both especially impressed by the intricate detail and embellishments on their stonework. In addition, the technological achievements of this civilisation clearly parallels that of the incas.

Like New Years in our countries, it was light when we eventually returned home to La Paz - although for a slightly different reason. In all, it was a rather interesting, and somewhat different, New Years to what we are normally used - but we enjoyed ourselves immensely. Everyone was very happy and friendly, and we received more than our share of hugs and "feliz nuevo año" from Bolivian strangers. And we even managed to run into the Bolivian minister of culture (our tour guide knew him personally). But best of all, I have to say, it was quite pleasant starting the first day of the new year without a hangover!