Pre-Christmas Sauna

Ispoisten uimarannan sauna.
http://www.turunavantouimarit.fi/ 

Finally the time had come.... I would go to sauna in Finland. Maybe your wondering why that's something memorable. Well Finland is the country of the saunas, and in my whole four months here, I've never been to one. Stupid me.

So as I mentioned above, Finland is the country of the sauna. Sauna is a big part of the Finnish culture. For them it's a place to relax, meet friends and family and it's also an important place for physical and mental relaxation. I like their thinking about saunas: Finns think of saunas not as a luxury but as a necessity. Maybe we can bring this thinking to the Netherlands? No problem for me to go to sauna once a week.

So why is Finland the country of the sauna? Well, Finland might be a big country when you look at the surface, but it has only five million inhabitants. When you look at how many saunas there are, you can count to almost three million! So basically every household has one sauna, and that's a really common thing, to own a sauna. There are also a lot of little public saunas, for example by the lakes.

For our sauna experience we went to a bigger public one, a place called Ispoisten uimarannan sauna. 
Before our sauna turn we got to taste this delicious Finnish Christmas snacks, like gingerbread cookies and some pastries, and chat with the other exchange students. After that it was finally time to hop in the sauna. It was a similar one to the ones that I'm used to from in the Netherlands, but I had to adjust a little to the heat.

When you get out of the sauna, it's a Finnish thing to jump into the lake, sea or snow. Unfortunately the snow melted away this day, so we were forced to jump into the sea... Not something I looked forward to with a water temperature of five degrees, but hey, exchange is all about getting out of your comfort zone right? So Emma and I grabbed each other and jumped right into the water. And well... it was damn cold. But also refreshing and better than expected. Felt a little reborn after the swim.

After the first sauna turn, it was time for Secret Santa. Everyone who bought a little present, got one in return. It was really fun to see the ESN staff all dressed up like Santa and reindeers.

Luckily for us there was another sauna turn after the secret Santa and we could relax some more.

I really enjoyed going to sauna here and I really regret that I didn't go before. Hopefully Emma and I will go again

Nähdään!

Aniek