Of all the sauna stories I’ve read, this one perhaps resonates the most. Not because I’m blind, I’m not. But there’s something about Ryan’s experience and perspective that gets to the heart of the matter.
I too discovered sauna in Finland, where I spent the coldest, warmest, loneliness and most connected season of my life.
I was picked up from the airport from a program member and brought directly to the sauna. What happened next, the author puts it best:
“And he ushered my naked body away, through a door, and into a super Christ-almighty hot room that was oh-my-god-wow, now that’s a sauna.”!
I surly had an easier time finding my way around Helsinki than the author, but his paragraph about waiting in vein at the ferry station captures, what I’m sure is, a very common experience/feeling for anyone who has spent time in Helsinki during the winter months.
There is something very magical about the contrast between the isolation and frigidness of that city during the winter and the ubiquity and specialness of the antidote, the sauna…
I hope you enjoy Ryan’s story as much as I did.
