Egypt summer 2011, ASWAN part 2

On Tuesday 7th of June we left to the Elephantine Island in the morning. We took a boat to the island and it didn't take that long. We entered the Island and saw nobody anywhere when suddenly this old man came to talk with us and told us he's going to show us around the island for a little money in return. We told him that we can get around by ourselves and we didn't like the man at all. Well, that wasn't okey for him so we had to let him show us the Island. The man was the chief of the village and one of the elderly of their people. The people who lived in there were Nubians. Not Egyptians, Nubians. They had their own spoken, not written, language. The Nubians have their own culture that is different from the egyptians. Nubians have their own dresses, dances, traditions and music for example.

We walked through the village and got to see a lot of their traditions and the way they lived. The chief showed us the school of the village etc. He took us to a house were this young Nubian woman made Henna tattoos for us (for a high price..!). But we were too embarrassed to start to haggle the price. I took a henna tattoo to my ankle with stars and my name written in arabic and Saija took some flower thingy in her arm. After the tour around the village the man started wanting money from us and he wasn't pleased at all to the money amount we gave him. We took a local ferry boat back and the payment was that you just left some money on the table whatever your conscience told you to leave.

Here's a video that I found from youtube. On the video you can see the chief that introduced us his village:
Nubian village

Like every other day it was really hot so we wanted to walked to the Isis-hotel to swim. Going to the same direction this Nubian boy called Mostafa started talking with us and I was really rude to him at first. (you'll never know what they'll want..) He was really patient with me and my angry answers to his questions. He walked with us more than 5 minutes and I started to like him when I noticed that he was just curious about us and he was being friendly. He offered to take us to this area mostly used by locals only and we could swim and relax there. It was his day off from work (he had his own boat and business) but he offered to get us there for a two hour trip and we would pay him something. We told him that we'll give him a call if we decide to accept his offer. 

At the pool we had so much fun when Saija noticed (while I was trying hard to sunbathe and get some colour since I was still white!) that there were three local men trying to paint the numbers how deep the pool is to the egdes of the swimming pool. Saija noticed that some of the numbers were incorret. It was supposed to say: 1,2 m but the number two was upside down, like a mirror image. I didn't beliave Saija so I got up to see. She was right and of course she wanted to correct it to the men that didn't speak english. Once we started to correct them, we did it throughly.. All the numbers were incorrectly marked down next to the pool and had already been painted. The deepest place in the swimming pool where I could barely stand with my head above the surface was marked as only 1,4 metres.. So they also had all the numbers wrong how deep it was at what place of the pool. Also when they meant to put 0.9m they put cm instead and didn't believe us when we told them that it is supposed to be metres. When they finally got their job done, after they had had to do it again several times after we had checked the numbers. We thought that since we were so nice and helped them out that they're gonna offer us something to drink, at least water. But no. Nothing. They just waved us bye and left. :D

We only had two hours of patience to stay put at the pool so we decided to call to Mostafa. The boat ride took around 20-30 minutes and the view was amazing! On the other side of the River Nile was the city and on the other side all you could see was sand. At some points the river was really rocky and Mostafa had to be careful not to drive too fast and he really had to know where all the rocks in the river were for not to hit them.

The place was called a Nubian Beach and it was really amazing! We were almost the only ones there and the sand was so soft and warm (hot). We had a great time hanging and sitting on the warm sun for couple of minutes at the time since after that we had to go to the water because it was too hot. Mostafa told us a story about this indian man called Ajakan who had visited Aswan many times. The man had some kind of rheumatism and in India he had been running from doctor to a doctor to get some help for his symptoms. Nothing helped. Not the medicine or anything. He had tried everything that he had heard of, even some herbal stuff and legends they knew in his town in India. Ajakan came to Aswan with his family for the first time and he heard from the local people about their old ways to treat people with his kind of symptoms. It was the magical sand on the Nubian beach. The sand was so soft and different from what I've ever come across anywhere. The sand was said to have this magical power because the sun kept it warm almost all the time. For example if you had knee problems you were supposed to sit on the sand and cover your legs to the warm sand. Ajakan thought that hey, why not to try it. The doctors in India had promised him less than 5 years to live. The sand did miracles for him. He could move and do everything better than before. Eventually he and his family moved to live in Aswan and the man lived much much longer than expected. Before his death the man dig a grave to him and his wife on the hills of the sand dunes. The graves they wanted to be buried into. The story felt like a was hearing this old urban myth or legend that were usually told around the bonfire from father to son.. :D

You can see the rocks to where we swam

Anyway, at the beach we had fun! At the shore we jumped of from the roof of Mostafas boat! We swam in the River Nile and we even swam to the nearest rocks even though to currents were really strong. And you needed to be a good swimmer the get there. Me and Mostafa jumped to the water from the rocks and it was about 3 metres to the water. First I couldn't even walk on the poiling rocks, when my feet got dry. Mostafa didn't even notice that the rocks were that hot and I couldn't walk there at all. After a while my feet got used to it at least a bit.  I was too scared to jump because I was afraid of the rocks benieth the surface. Mostafa knew the water like his own pockets and to places were the rocks were. He showed me exactly were I could jump and it was so cool! :D Swimming back to the shore was much much easier and we didn't even have to do anything because to current got us almost to the shore. :D

When we got back Saija and Mostafa's friend had disappeared from the boat and my bag was gone (I knew she had taken it). Then I saw one snow white hand moving behind the sand dune and we ran to see what happened. Saija and the other guy were riding on a camel!! :D Me and Mostafa also got a short and also a free camel ride. It was fun but also a bit scary because the camel was a bit stubborn and when he felt like it he just went down all of the sudden to rest.. After riding the camels we swam and hang in Mostafa's boat to get some cover from the sun and wait for the sun to go down. Our agreement for the two hour trip didn't go as planned 'cause we really fast became friends and had such a good time so it was like friends spending a day rather than that we had bought a business from him.

We waited the sun to start setting and then started to climb our way to the top of sand dunes! We had to wait because the sand would have been burning hot otherwise. The way up was sweaty, hard and long! It felt like walking without moving anywhere. The guys walked without shoes but me and Saija had flipflops on and they told us when we needed to use them when it was rocky. The rocks were sharp as knives! So we didn't want to get cut.

On our way up

Half way up and the view was quite something!

Finally we were at the top and we could see the whole Aswan! Our boat seemed so small when we saw it. We were at the top for almost an hour just admiring the view and enjoying the cool breeze from the wind.

Our boat

You can see the strong currents

Me and Saija holding the Sun :D

Then we decided to walk even higher to the other side of the sand dune to see where the sun was setting. We ran the hill up and it was a great excersise!! We were at the top. Couldn't get any higher.

Running up the hill

Coming down from the sand dunes was fast!! :D it only took a minute or so! :D The sand was so soft and still warm for the sun. While we headed back to the boat Mostafa's friend took of running to what seemed like a desert for us. Mostafa told us that they know the places and the sand like their own pockets. Their villages was just around some of the sand dunes so the friend left there to get us some sodas to drink.

Coming down

Back at the boat we finally left back to our hotel. First we picked up the guy from around the corner of the island. We were starving so Mostafa drove his boat in front of this restaurant where we ate. He kept us company. After eating we wanted to go to take showers with Saija and agreed to see him in a bit. After taking a shower we went to this bigger boat with a restaurant in it to drink beers. We were joined by Mostafas friends and we had a good time with them. :) Mostafa invited us to a Nubian wedding the next evening so we decided to stay one more night in Aswan. We would miss the first day of our hotel reservation in Hurghada but we didn't care and Mostafa kindly offered to call to the hotel to tell them that we're going to arrive one day later than expected. We were only a street across from our hotel so Saija left to sleep earlier and I stayed with the boys. We talked over two hours about everything like coverments, religions and the situation in Egypt. It was an interesting night with the boys. :) Mostafa walked me to my hotel at 3 am. And Saija, the magical girl with electronics, couldn't get our door open for a while, but finally I got in..

Shokran Mostafa for making our day so great and unforgettable!

Egypt summer 2011, ASWAN part 1

After sleeping less than three hours we woke up around 4 am to get ready for the hot air balloon ride! We had a really busy schedule after the hot air balloon so we backed our backpacks to be ready to just pick them up from the camp. Again, we waited outside our camp for the company to pick us up. We paid 300 pounds / head (40€) for the trip and it was totally worth it! The minibus driver had gotten my egyptian number from Ahmed and called me to make sure that we had woken up and came to pick us up. Along with some other tourists we were taken to this big open area on the West side where there were four huge air balloons being put up. We could already see the sunrising behind the scenery.

Our balloon

Sunrise, taken from the ground

We were told instruction on the ground: listen to your captain on board and when he tells you to take the landing position we were supposed to do it immediately. We watched the balloons getting bigger and bigger and finally they were up. Then we were told to run fast to the balloon and get inside the basket quickly. I started climbing inside it when this man took me to his lap and threw me in. :D Everything happened really quickly. Before we noticed we were up in the air. Our captain Mohammed introduced himself to us passengers. The basket was much bigger than you see in movies. The basket was divided into five different sections one of which was Mohammeds (in the middle). There were maybe 10-12 people with us in the basket.

The ride was amazing! The view to Luxor was something so indescribable! The sunrise was beautiful! And we could see the sights we had visited like: Colossi of Memnon and the Temple of Hatsepsutin. We also spotted our camp and our hut! :D We flew above the River Nile and admired the view! We had thought that the balloons would land to the same place where they took of but they just flew farter and farter away from the West side and we ended up landing on the East side on some field. The ride took 45 minutes and was totally worth the price and the early wake up!

Our camp, the biggest island (the white one on the right) was the island were we swam

Our camp, our hut was the blue hut on the left side

Buildings on the East side

When we landed to the East side and we really were in a minute schedule to catch our train. The company workers were the best! Ahmed had told them our timetable and they really took care of us! They told us to get into the minibus which was leaving first and we got a ride straight to the river and there they had a boat waiting for us to cross the river. The boat took us in front of our camp (the harbour were to boats were supposed to go would have meant 15 minute walk for us). All this time one of the company workers came with us to make sure we made it on time! We crapped our backs and Ahmed was waiting for us to get us back over to the East side were he took a taxi with us to the train station. We quickly bought some breakfast to go which was so bad we couldn't eat it.. We told thank you to Ahmed and we were the first ones on the platform just 10 minutes before the train was supposed to arrive..

Supposed to.. Well it never arrived. We sat there like idiots when we saw Ahmed coming back and told us that there is no train coming and we needed to take a minibus to Aswan. Great. Then we tried to figure out how to get our money back from the tickets because at that point we had around 5€ left.. Ahmed told us that we could get the money back from the tickets at 5 pm so he agreed that he gave us the money now and he would get the money back from the tickets in the afternoon. We went to sit inside this minibus outside the train station. There was maybe 12 seats + the driver. Before us there were already three men waiting for the bus to leave but it wouldn't leave before it was full. Also there we sat like idiots before we figured the thing out and got off the bus to the outside to wait. We waited an hour before we got the bus almost full and then the men started getting mad at the driver and he finally agreed on leaving.

The bus ride was terrible. It was so hot and we were really hungry! We sat on the back seat and I had one backpack right next to me on the right side and the other one under my legs. Saija sat on the left side and this old egyptian man sat on the right side. I couldn't move at all or move my legs. No one on the bus spoke english and we had a fun time laughing with the old man when we for example tried to ask how long does the ride take. He also watched fascinated while I wrote our journay or when I watched our pictures that we had taken on the trip. The bus ride took 3,5 hours and again we had no idea where to get off! The busride felt to take forever! When most of the other passengers took off so did we. Oh, and before the bus left from Luxor we paid to this younger man who shouted people to get into the bus trying to get it full, we thought that he was the driver. Well he wasn't. And when the bus made it closer to Aswan the driver started to collect the money from the passengers. The men looked at us a bit when we didn't pay.. We tried embarrassed to explain that we had already paid for the ride.. We didn't have enough money to pay it twice! (we would have paid it twice if we had had the money because it was so cheap).

We got off from the bus and put our backpacks on and tried to figure out what direction to go to. At the camp we borrowed this local mans computer to check some places to stay at in Aswan. We were standing at some bus station and we were surrounded by taxi drivers offering us a ride. We really couldn't accept their offers 'cause they were too high for us and our current money situation. Finally this one taxi driver understood what we were willing to pay and we hopped on. He took us to the hotel Memnon of which downstairs happened to be a bank! 

The view from our hotel window to the River Nile

We draw out money while around 20 army guys in this big trunk watched us. We made our way to the hotels reception and they also had plenty of room for us. We got our own room with a big window to the River Nile and we paid 7,5€/head/night. We chose the hotel because there was supposed to be a swimming pool but there wasn't so we left out to find this four star Isis-hotel with a swimming pool. The staff there were great to help us out. They even agreed on changing our big 200 pound (27€) money to smaller. 'Cause in Egypt you need to have small money like 5 pound notes! They had no changes to give back at you anywhere when you paid with "big" money. We swam at the pool for around two hours and it was sooo relaxing after the bus ride. We were basically the only tourists at the pool. There weren't many in Aswan altogether. After swimming we were starving and ended up at some local restaurant to eat good food with a low price. We walked through some Aswan bazaar but we didn't buy anything. Then we made our way to the train station to figure out what our next move would be in a few days and how to get to Hurghada. We learnt that we had to take a bus to there instead of a train. We also found an internet cafe just outside our hotel and we stayed there for a while then we went to bed early.

Sunset, taken from our hotel window

Egypt summer 2011, LUXOR part 3

On the 5th of June we woke up pretty early and ate breakfast at the roof of the hostel enjoying the sunshine. Then we left to the train station to buy tickets for the next days train to Aswan. We were pretty lost at the train station but figured it out where to buy the tickets. It cost us 40 pounds together. We had decided that why not to go and see the city of Aswan too because we had almost already seen Luxor and we had spare days before our hotel reservation started in Hurghada! No idea about the city or where we were going to stay at but that's what we decided to do. After buying the train tickets we were supposed to find a bank to get money from because we didn't have much left. We ended up walking across Luxor from bank to bank. We went to three different banks and each one of them sent us to the next bank. None accepted our Visa Electron cards.. The last bank sent us to here..

Saija who hates machines wouldn't even think about putting her card there, neither did I. So we had to manage with the money we had left and try to find a bank in Aswan. Back at the hostel we packed our backs and headed towards the River Nile to cross it over to the West side where we were going to spend one night. Marc followed us all the way to the boat and said bye to us. Finally we got rid of him. The boat owner was a nice young man (first my opinion of him wasn't that good.. I thought he only wanted us to pay to him) who proved to be quite a gentleman. He took us straight in front of our camp where we were hoping to stay at. We wandered a while before we had the courage to walk in. We were basically in the middle of a countryside with donkeys and camels walking on the small sand roads. We could see the near by fields being covered with floodwater. 

We walked into the Al Salam Camp which was run by this egyptian family. We shyly asked the man if they got free beds and he seemed really shocked and surprised that we hadn't booked it in advance and asked us how we found the place. (The place is not easily found if you haven't looked for it from the internet). They had plenty of room for us. The camp was surrounded by fence and there were maybe six huts which each were for two people. There were common showers and toilets in the camp. Between the huts there was this almost like a living room outdoors with tables, chairs and couches to sit and hang around.

While we waited for the man the fix our room, the boat owner Ahmed came to sit with us and we agreed going to a felucca ride with him and his boat in the evening to the Banana island at sunset time. We also agreed on going to A HOT AIR BALLOON ride at the next day at SUNRISE! He organized it for us by calling to the Sindbad hot air balloon company. We were so excited. In the camp it almost felt like being in a paradise, the place seemed to be so far away from everything and it was only across the River Nile from the city. If you really want to enjoy a real experience in Luxor, definitely stay there! 

Our hut

After he made ourselves home at our small hut we decided to go walking around the neighbourhood and to buy some water. We noticed that we really were at the countryside. Donkeys, palm trees underwater, chickens and ducks running around on the streets, small kiosks where we could by water and something to snack. 

Saija: Go closer.. closer! Ira: I can't it'll kick me..

When we were walking back to our camp these two local boys came past us with motorbikes and asked us if we needed a ride to some place. We kept on walking even though they tried to offer us a ride. Finally Saija looked at me in the way I immediately recognized, Saija wanted to have a little adventure. So, we agreed on to go with them to have a ride around and to see an area with local people and where they lived in. The boy I rode with was really really shy small town boy studying hieroglyphs at the University. He was so shy I almost felt sorry for him, but he was the most friendly boy! I knew we were fine with him and he would never try anything with us. The motorbike ride took a bit more than we expected, almost 15-20 minutes until we were in this small village with cute houses. On the way we really got to see stuff we hadn't seen in the cities. I spotted that the houses were often been built next to these small canals and over them were handmade bridges so you could cross the canal.  The house we got in was really new and modern nothing like the hut we stayed at. At first I was a bit nervous when we got inside the house and the boys offered us some local juices to drink. The boy I rode with taught me how to draw hieroglyphs and how to write my name with them. That was really interesting and I could really see that the boy loved what he studied. His eyes shimmered when he explained and draw them to me. They played us some egyptian music and wanted to dance with us.. :D But we really weren't that into it.. The boys took us back to our hostel and Saija got the adventure she had wanted. Nice but a little scary experience at beginning anyway. Now I have to say that we really thought it through before leaving with the guys! We are quite good with reading people and to know who to trust and who not to. 

Back at the camp the owner asked us if we wanted to go swimming in the River Nile and of course we wanted to! He sent some of his friend or someone to come with us. We rode this small rowboat to a tiny island only maybe 100-200 metres from the camp and the man with us took us there. On the next island there were children playing and one boy rode a donkey which walked in the water to the island. A bit different games than we have in Finland. Anyway at this island there was this small hut were we left our things and went to swim. The man who was with us was a bit irritating and also funny. He said ALL THE TIME: you know and it sounded like he was saying ju no. The view and experience was really something and it was really cooling to get into the water because it must havee been easily over 40 degrees. On our way back we had to row the boat back to the shore.

At 5pm Ahmed picked us up in front of our camp with his boat. We got to admire the River Nile and just enjoy the weather and everything. We even got to steer the boat. At the banana island we had to pay something to get into the island which was so stupid!! But anyway we did. The island was cool! It almost felt like being in a rainforest. There were so many different fruits growing like bananas, mangos, grapes, papayas, figs and fruits I didn't even recognize.. We got the taste bananas and they tasted so fresh and sweet, nothing like the bananas we normally eat.

Back at the boat Ahmed suddenly asked us if we wanted to swim in the middle of the river. There was this very low place (ford) in the river were he could leave his boat and the water was only to our ankles and knees. It was so cool to swim there or just to stand there.. I even started walking towards were the water got deeper but the currents were too strong that I couldn't get anywhere. At the same time the sun was setting and I thought that it would be cold after swimming but in a matter of minutes we were already dry. The sunset was amazing! We took around almost 50 pictures of it. Ahmed took us back to our camp and we paid him. Earlier on the same afternoon he had invited us to go to some party at their village near by. We asked from the camp owner if he knew Ahmed and if it was safe for us to go there and he told us that he's a good man and we can go with him. Ahmed was around our age and we agreed that he would pick us up around 9 pm.  :)

Back at the hostel the mother of the family made us dinner which was the first time in Egypt we actually didn't like it that much. We had a dinner company from german boys who had their holiday from Israeli where they were working as a peacekeepers or someting like that. I was a bit weird since they were younger than us and already doing that kind of stuff in Israeli.

"PARTY"

At 9 pm we waited outside our camp and it was pitch dark and we couldn't see anything. While we waited we tried not to get eaten by hundreds of mosquitos.. Then this car came to pick us up but Ahmed wasn't there so we waited until he came before we got in. We drove about 15 minutes and stopped at some local village with no taxis, no tourists or anything at all that would give us a peace of mind that we were safe and could get back to our camp somehow. There were children playing on the streets, older people smoking shisha and sitting on their chairs. There were only couple of lamps that gave some light to the street. We changed to a "normal" car and me, Saija and Ahmed shared the backseat and Ahmed's cousin was on the front seat. He looked so weird, scary and looked like he was from some action movie and he was the bad guy.

Pretty soon it turned out the it wasn't just some party we were going, it was a wedding! We were a bit stunned and asked if we were dressed correctly and asking what about if we should have had a present or something to bring. Well, it wasn't anything like that! The whole village was happy to meet the new couple and it's about their happiness, not about gifts or what you're wearing. The WHOLE village was there, it was a celebration of the whole community. First our driver took us some place near the beauty salon where the bride was getting her makeup and hair done. People sat there and drank tea and had a good time. We also tried to do that but we were a bit nervous, Saija was totally freaking out and tried her best not to show it but I could tell she was freaking out. Ahmed's cousin didn't make us feel any better with his behaviour and the way he was, just gross. We were told that the beuty salon was owned by this english girl named Sara. Suddenly the couple came out from the salon and people went absolutely crazy! It was like something had happened and people were running around like maniacs. Before we hopped into our car and left to drive behind the wedding couple we changed a few words with Sara and she seemed really nice and for a moment we were happy that we knew someone who we could automatically trust.

The wedding couples car was this black car and it was decorated with bright different coloured lights all over the car. There were over ten cars driving behind the bride and the groom. These cars were full of people! And I really mean full! There could be over eight people in a normal car. The minibuses or the local cars were also full of people! We drove to the waterside were the first wedding pictures were taken. The bride looked beuatiful and also really young, I think they told us that she was 18 or so. The pictures must have been good 'cause the moonlight and the wedding couple looked amazing. There were also pictures taken of them when they were holding someones baby. Maybe that was also some kind of ritual or tradition. After the pictures were taken along the River Nile all the cars drove to the sightseeing place called Colossi of Memnon were they took more pictures. All the locals stayed near their cars about 50 metres away from the couple but Ahmed took us near the couple so we could take pictures of them. We ended up on their wedding video.. At the same time we saw another sight which we hadn't seen yet. Before we got to the actual wedding party it took us over two hours waiting for the couple and when the pictures were taken.

On our way to the wedding place all the cars were driving on this narrow road, speeding and driving like crazy. At that point we were driving behing this minibus so we couldn't see what happened in front of it. Suddenly I saw how the bus in front of us braked and I saw how our driver started to brake but immediately my first thought was that we are going to crash! Thank god the driver got the speed down even a bit before we crashed to the other car's back. I was sitting in the middle of the backseat without a seatbelt! I saw before we crashed so I could hold myself almost still but I still hit my legs to the seats in front of me. Saija hit her cheek and head to the drivers seat. Nothing worse happened and the people were immediatelly asking us if we were fine. We were fine, just shocked. The car got the worst damages. The driver almost couldn't get out because the door didn't open up that much.

The wedding place was located in the village outdoors along some small canal. It was on some alley with open space and the wedding couple went to sit down on this small stage in front of the space. There were only couple of benches and the rest of the people stand. We first waited something to happen but nothing did. There was egyptian or arabic music and first the children started to dance and then some adults also. The couple just sat on the stage and watched everyone. We were sitting on the bench (I was sure it was going to break down and we were going to roll down the small hill to the canal). In front of us there were about 15 children staring at us. Ahmed told us that we were the first white and blond females some of them had ever seen and that there weren't any tourists visiting their village so they were curious to stare at us. The children were really cute and they could dance! It was amazing to follow them move and dance. They really had the rhytm in their blood. Other people also shyly stared at us. We had been there about an hour when Sara appeared from some where. Sara was a 29-year old english woman who had just moved to the village with her egyptian fience. The had been engaged for four years and now she had opened her own beauty salon. She told us that the children would stare at us all night if we stayed there and she suggested that we leave to an other wedding to the next village near by.

Egyptian weddings usually take several days. There are the actual wedding day, ceremonies, prewedding things, after wedding things. Usually they take three to even four days (that's what we were told). The bride wore an ordinary white bridal dress and the groom wore a black suit. Wikipedia says this: "The ceremony starts with a car parade. The wedding car (as prestigious as possible) will be decorated with flowers and ribbons. Cars of both families move together in a noisy parade of continuous sounding of car horns to a wedding hall most often in a hotel (not in the wedding we were). The honking is to announce that there is a wedding taking place.When the bride and groom finally reach to their destination in the hall (outdoors) they sit in the “Kosha”. The Kosha usually consists of two comfortable seats in front of the guests where the bride and groom reign as though king and queen." That's the part of the wedding we got to see! :)

We left to the next wedding with two motorbikes with three persons on each. The next wedding was much different. The wedding couple wasn't there (at first) it was just a party or celebration for them. It was held on this big open area outdoors and it reminded me of like a carnival or something like a funfair with all the bright colorful lights. There was this old fashioned horse carriage in front of everyone with four men on it playing music and one of them sang. Men were sitting on the ground on carpets and all the women and children sat on the other side on chairs. There was three men from different age groups dancing some same ritual dance at the open area in front of everyone. Some of the men there were drinking beer and some smoke pot (Ahmed's cousin for example.). Sara's fiance paid to some small boy to go and buy us cokes from somewhere. After a while the boy kindly came back with our drinks. We really wanted to leave with Saija 'cause it was already at 1 am and we had to wake up before 4 am. Before we left we saw a glimpse of the wedding couple when they got there to enjoy the night. We got a motorbike rides back to our camp after 1 am.

Unfortunately I don't have any pictures or videos from the weddings, 'cause Saija accidentally deleted them. :/ Afterwards we thought that maybe it was a sign that only we were supposed to see and experience the local weddings and their traditions.

It was quite a day to remember!