Machaq mara (new year in aymara)

When the first ray of sunlight pierced the door Tiawanaku, today, 21 June, began the New Year Aymara
This ceremony has taken place for the Bolivian Altiplano lands belonged to one of the longest living cultures of South America, which was developed over 2700 years and came to 1200 AD.
Tiawanaku was the capital of a great state pre-Inca Andean.
The Aymara New Year is a family celebration during which people gather to celebrate the rebirth of life sprouting from the Earth. Huddled with each other around the fire, spend the night outside the Tiawanaku´s door waiting that first ray of sunshine for the shortest day of the year.
In this ceremony, song, dance, eat, drink and symbolically burn all the negatives of the previous year
Tiawanaku door is a calendar that marks the two solstices and two equinoxes of the year and was built in place with a thorough orientation to the first ray of sun the first day of winter pass through it.

Source: Julian Varsavsky – Página 12 (supplement Turismo 12)

---