The unending rains seem to parallel the biblical flood, washing away the sins of the world. In Macando, the flood washes away the last remnants of the banana factory and the massacre. It signals the beginning of the return to a primitive society. Even the characters become more natural and less materialistic, like Aureliano Segundo. He is home (instead of at the home of his mistress), so he simply stays there, waiting for the rain to end. He begins to work around the house and lose weight. By the end of the book, following the ruins of the flooding and draught, the town and its final inhabitants are destroyed by a hurricane. To me this means that the author is trying to tell us that there is no salvation in modernity.
At the beginning of the novel, I felt that Ursula's character was the strongest. She was in control of her family and her home. She was the thread that continued through generations. Even as she became blind, others were unaware because she was so in tune with each person's daily routines. Because Ursula lives to be between 115 and 122 years old (p. 342), she is a witness to the early Utopia that was Macando in the early years. She was also witness to the advancement of modern times in Macando, war, the banana massacre, and the eventual capitalistic destruction. I think her slowly shrinking, even becoming like a doll or plaything for the children in the house (during the flood the children carry her around and decorated her like a doll), is a symbol for the disintegration of Macando.
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