Sauna culture

Here the sauna is the wholly natural, fixed point of existence, the place where life begins, where life is lived and where it ends. "I take a sauna almost every day, it is my elixir of life. In the sauna I get a moment to myself, a chance to sort out my thoughts and recharge my body with energy," says Svante Spolander. One of Svante's earliest childhood memories is connected to the sauna. He remembers looking for his father and finding him and the men of the village in the village sauna. "For a little boy it was at first a frightening experience, with all these men and the heat and the steam. The fear quickly turned into a hard-to-explain sense of fellowship. There in the heat, without a stitch on, everyone is equal: young and old, high and low, Finnish and Swedish. In the sauna, wrongs and quarrels are left outside. Yes, the sauna is a place of reconciliation, and from that moment the sauna has been here, in my heart," says Svante, placing his hand on his chest.

He continues: "I remember the football clashes between the villages here in the Torne Valley when I was a boy. The matches were played to the death, but when the final whistle blew, people were reconciled in the sauna. It is a legacy from the medieval provincial laws which decreed that the sauna is a place of peace." The Swedish Sauna Academy was founded in 1988 and is based right here in Kukkolaforsen. The Academy's head office, overlooking the river and the rapids, lies right next to the impressive sauna museum with its 13 different saunas. "In the sauna the four elements meet and the connection to health and wellbeing is obvious. In Finland sauna bathing is an everyday thing, strongly connected to nature, lakes and quality of life. I want to explore the health connection even more deeply and I am in contact with a professor at the Karolinska Institute who has compiled a range of research reports on the subject. After surgery, for example, taking a sauna is good for the healing process. Of course you should consult your doctor first," Svante explains.

The material includes studies on how sauna bathing affects metabolism and hormone production. At the Sauna Academy they eagerly await new findings on sauna and health. "In the Torne Valley the sauna has always held a special position. It was the home's cleanest, most sacred place. Here women gave birth, here people washed for the holy day, here they wrapped their dead relatives for their final rest," says Svante. On the second Saturday of June every year the National Sauna Day is celebrated, a great and important festival here in Kukkola. "It is bigger than both Christmas and Easter. Members of the Sauna Academy usually gather here in Kukkolaforsen for a range of activities and conversations, with the sauna at the centre of course. Now we are working to expand the sauna museum, with even more history and knowledge about sauna culture both in Sweden and around the world," concludes Svante Spolander. Text by Ella Jonsson.