A week after...

So, we're still going down the coast of the Gulf of Mexico. Annika says that the more she gets to see of Mexico, the more she wants to show me of Sweden.
A lot of movies are made in this area (great jungle locations) and we were told some of the places we visited were used as locations for big budget movies, but the amazing part of it is that the Olmec culture that lived here long ago were capable of tame the wilderness so they could live in it (it's really thick jungle somtimes!).

We spent some time in the coastal city of Veracruz, which is one of the busiest ports in the entire country and it has a lot of things going on all of the time; people were very nice there!

Let's see what else we encounter... God's good!

So, it's more interesting than just "happily everafter..."

First, we went to Mexico City to take the family to the airport in the hopes that they would make it to Sweden without much delay (which thank God, they did).

But before that we had to take Annika's parents around Mexico City in the public transportation system to my grandmother's house.

After this, Annika and I decided to take a well deserved honemoon and we thought we would start it right in Mexico City so we headed to the Zocalo, smack dab in the middle of the heart of the city.

Later, we got on a bus and made our way to the Gulf coast of Mexico, to an aunt's home in a town by the sea called Barra de Cazones in the state of Veracruz.










After we finished all the shrimp in the town, we had to move on to this really cool archeological zone called "El Tajin" which is really a very big place. Now I'm trying to make this pictures fit in this really slooooooooow computer in this really hoooooooot internet cafe in this really smaaaaaaaall town, so if the pictures look like a mess, well, just consider I'm using a 56K modem connection! :)

And the Mexican wedding was...

So, finally, after so much paperwork and a few unintended detours, we got hitched! The day started early with all the last minute preparations. We had a very hard working crew headed by my father and all the Drottja kids. Then, Johan, Emil, and I got started on the garland that Annika was gonna wear. We had purchased an Arabian Jasmin bush from which we cut a few twigs with flowers so we could make it.

After this, all of us walked to the justice of the peace offices where we turned in all the paperwork which cost us so much in time and sweat to obtain. We waited in the building for a while while they processed the information and the judge got ready to officiate the ceremony so the kids got a chance to explore the building inside and out (we're lucky they didn't ask us to leave!). After about an hour we were called inside the judges chambers and we had a very straight forward, simple ceremony. We signed all the legal papers, got our parents and our witnesses to tell the judge we were free and clear to be married to one another and the judge finally got us married before the Mexican government.


After the ceremony we didn't have much time to gloat on the fact that we were ALREADY husband and wife because we went rushing to the hairdresser who did a very Mexican (read: overdone) hairdo on Annika -- which she had to tone down a bit when we got home.



Back home, we got through the last few adjustments and got ready to marry again! Except this time was gonna be more symbolic and meaningful for us and our families. Rune, Annika's dad, got us married before God with a very simple, yet nice ceremony which was both in Swedish and Spanish (my brother, Sal, did a good job at repeating in Spanish what Rune was saying).

Last night as singles!

So, here we are, ready to go to sleep knowing this will be the last night we will say good night to each other as single people...

Annika and I went to this nice stylist place where she got a nice pedicure/manicure and I got a long-deserved haircut.



And now we have all the paperwork ready and all the preparations done and out of the way, we were able to sit down and enjoy a meal at ease with the rest of the family.

Still alive!

So, between the ridiculously long list of papers we've had to put together to be able to get married in Mexico and the arrival of the family, we've had a full schedule... But we've managed to survive it so far! And not only that: Annika's brother, Anders, and I went to Mexico city by ourselves where we went to the city's park, watched some daring Mexican dudes who go up a really tall post and then just spiral down dangling secured solely by a rope!

We went to a hot spring place called Tolantongo. We spent a few days there enjoying the water, the sun, and the quiet. All of us got into the pools but Annika ventured into the cave where the springs come from the roof five meters above and she took a hike down the hill where our cabanas were.











Everybody had a good time: the Mexican-Swedish relations got stronger and in general the trip was a success. On the way back we decided to stop by another interesting place called Tula, where Annika's parents got to see a bit of the cultures of Mexico before the conquest... and then they did some tourist shopping (check out Rune's cool hat, which Ulla-Britt didn't approve of)!