Salon.com > Mayans

Parenting through the apocalypse

Fri, 21 Dec 2012 00:00:00 +0000

When my daughter was 4, she was afraid of the Humble Bumble from the Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer movie. She didn't like his sharp teeth. It was a cute fear. To this day, we joke about things having sharp teeth, like sharks. She body-boards 3-footers in shorties breaking over a sandbar off the southern Massachusetts coast. She's not afraid of sharks. But now that she is 11, she is afraid of the end of the world. My healthy child is afraid of dying.

"Andrew Kirby said that he doesn't have to do homework tonight," she tells me on Dec. 11.

"Why?" I ask. Kirby's a middle-school classmate, a chunky wild man.

"Because he said to the teacher: 'Why bother? The world is going to end on 12-12-12 at midnight.'" She rifles through a Samsung Galaxy tab before she even gets her little ballerina arms through her NorthFace sleeves.

"The world doesn't end on December 12, 2012," I tell her, opening the front door to let her sister out into the cold. “The world ends on December 21, 2012. We have approximately 10 days left."

She lets out an exacerbated argh and climbs into the backseat of her mother's Prius with her younger sister in dance leotards. Ah, yes, the world may be coming to an end soon, but we are still trying to save her while sticking it to Exxon one mile at a time.

Colombia’s “end of the world” bunker

Thu, 20 Dec 2012 22:16:00 +0000

BOGOTA, Colombia — Whether or not the winding down of the ancient Mayan long-count calendar brings the end of the world on Friday, one Colombian man is taking no chances.

A reporter for the Bogota daily El Tiempo recently toured an elaborate underground bunker built by a businessman in the South American country's central Antioquia department.

The structure features iron and concrete walls 20 inches thick that are coated with copper (to protect those inside from radiation). Inside are bunk-beds, a kitchen and a pantry filled with gas masks, tanks of oxygen and water, and a two-year stock of instant and canned food. Other supplies include winter clothes and seeds to reforest a barren, post-apocalypse planet.

How to survive the end of the world

Tue, 18 Dec 2012 17:24:00 +0000

SIRINCE, Turkey — For most of us, if you believe the doomsday theory, the world will end on Dec. 21.

The whole world, that is, except two small, seemingly random villages. Since some believe they possess high levels of “positive energy,” Sirince in Turkey and Bugarach in France will be spared the Armageddon.

For Sirince, a town of just 650 people, such beliefs are good for business.

“It’s a big event for Sirince. We could make it a tradition,” said a cheerful Ahmet Kocak, the owner of a boutique hotel here, as he sat on the hotel terrace overlooking the village’s historic Greek cottages.

For the first time ever in the history of his hotel, all of his rooms were booked eight months ahead of time — all by Americans.

The apocalypse is Obama’s fault

Tue, 11 Dec 2012 18:23:00 +0000

December 21 is approaching--and with that, speculation over what will happen to the world is going into overdrive. That date is when the Mayan calendar ends, according to some, though others have begun to question that interpretation.

In any case, December 21 has become shorthand for “apocalyptic end of the world scenarios.”

People around the world have reacted to the impending date of doom with seriousness. So here are 5 hysterical reactions to the Mayan calendar ending--”hysterical” in both senses of the word.

1. Luxurious Bunkers