The past few days we have been sweating ! We were in Soesoeman, a small village in Magadanskaya and here it is merely minus 15°C !

Not only the temperature made us sweat. We stayed in a camp with gold-diggers and it was anything but fun. We got locked up in a hut camp together with 50 dirty, drunken men. We were within an ace of being attacked. These men, so it seemed, hadn't seen a woman in years. Thanks to Ingrid (she had a great idea !), we got out. She promptly showed the men a poster of a famous politician and shouted that we are befriended with him. The men suddenly got quiet, respectful and they finally let us go.

A few days earlier, we met Andréj : a multi-miljonair who owns twenty gold-mines. He's campaigning of becoming the lord mayor of Ust-Nera (the little town we visited). We were having a break, past the road, drinking some hot soup. And suddenly this fancy jeep stopped and the driver who was wearing white gloves, got out and opened the carriage-door. We immediately saw that the man who stepped out was a wealthy, rich man. His name was mister Andréj. He asked us what we were doing. Well, we're having some soup....

When we told him our story - in Russian language ! (after 4 months in Russia we do speak some Russian !) and told him that we are Belgian tourists making a worldtrip. Out came the typical Siberian hospitality ! He made one simple phonecall and ten minutes later we saw a mobilhome coming our way. It contained a complete restaurant with a cook .
Our host ordered him to prepare us a meal. Andréj seemed to be the man on the thousands of posters we saw hanging on walls, doors, windows. It was one of these posters that Ingrid showed to the men in the hut-camp. Thank you Ingrid and thank you Andréj too !