Mexico's amazing ethnic diversity is visible wherever you travel. In one state, Oaxaca, there are 15 distinct groups each speaking its own language.
Of the 63 languages still spoken in Mexico, 16 of them have more than 100,000 speakers. The biggest of these groups is Nahuatl, the language spoken by the Aztecs at the time of the Spanish conquest. More than 1.3 million Mexicans speak Nahuatl.
Other major language groups are Maya, Mixtec, Purépecha and Zapoteco. A website run by a friend of mine includes articles about indigenous groups, their politics, their languages and their cultures http://corresponsalesindigenas.blogspot.com/
The pyramids at Palenque, in Chiapas, were built by Mayan speakers. In other words, these languages and cultures have survived five centuries after the arrival of the Spanish. Native languages also survive in many parts of Latin America.
Race can be a touchy subject in Mexico. Some are proud of their indigenous blood, others not so much.
About 80% of the population of Mexico is mestizo, of mixed race. The mainly male Spanish conquistadores intermarried with indigenous women and enslaved the native population to work in mines and on vast estates known as haciendas.
By contrast, the immmigrants who colonized Canada and the U.S. brought their wives and families, and they killed or displaced the Indian population to reservations. There was far less intermarriage.
These children were in a procession at Christmas in Oaxaca. Pyramids and tombs
We visited several archaeological sites in the Oaxaca area.
Monte Albán sits on a mountain high above the Oaxaca Valley and the city of Oaxaca. The top of the mountain was leveled off to allow for the creation of this Zapotec ceremonial site.
Here I´m in one of the tombs discovered at Monte Albán.
This funerary statue was found in one of the tombs in the area.
This shot of Yagul was taken from a fort on the hill. You can see the ball court in the lower left. 
This mask of the Zapotec god of rain and thunder, Cocijo, decorated an altar at the nearby Lambyteco ruins and was still on site. 
The buildings at Mitla are famous for the superb stone friezes that decorate their facades.
Here is a close up of some of the geometric designs. Imagine these brightly painted - awesome.Streets, courtyards and crafts
We didn't spend the whole trip walking around ruins. In fact most of our ramblings were around the streets and parks of Oaxaca.
Bright sunshine, vivid colors, warm weather - who needs snow to celebrate Christmas? 
We saw an unusual type of local handicraft at Noche de los Rábanos (Night of the Radishes), an annual fiesta held two nights before Christmas. Local people compete to carve radishes into people, animals, and occasionally, churches.
A third of the displays were flowers and people made from corn husks - like these. Maybe they should change the name of the fiesta.And Spanish influence in the churches
After the Spanish arrived, they imposed their religion and language where they could on the native population. Thousands of churches were built in the colonial era.
This is the pulpit in the Templo de Santa María de la Asuncion in El Tule.
Templo de Santa María de la Asunción in El Tule
This is one of the bell towers of the Virgen de la Asunción in the village of Tlacolula.
The church of San Jerónimo in the village of Tlacochahuaya ...
... is decorated in vivid floral murals by local artists. Very unusual.
San Matías Jalatlaco in the city of Oaxaca is notable for its simple altar accented in bright red and gold. Notice all the fresh flowers - we saw lots of flowers in every church we visited.
The bigger churches often display bronze or richly gilded plaster. This gilt-covered altar ...
... and pulpit are in the Church of Santo Domingo de Guzmán.
Wow. I never knew that Mexico had that many dialects.
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