We celebrated our new year in Lapland with 25 other friends, mostly from IESE. For me, to have experienced a place north of Arctic Circle like lapland where I can see light ony for 4 hours during a day was something priceless, like they say in a "mastercard" ad. I had only read about such things in my geography books.

I also got to meet for the first time the real "Santa Clause" in Rovaniemi. Rovaniemi is also the town in Lapland which crosses the "arctic circle".

There were many "first time" events for me that took place during this trip. I drove a snowmobile, experienced reindeer sledding, did sauna of about 100 degree C and then went out and slept on the snow naked for few seconds (Finnish style), all for the first time.

Thank you Juha for organizing the trip and hosting us in your grand winter house.

Some photos from the trip:

driving a snow mobile


Pulling Siru on a frozen lake


Santa Clause Village. The line above us is the line to mark the arctic circle
although it doesn't always fall exactly on the line.


Feeding reindeers in a reindeer farm