-10 degrees and Saunas

Today it finally hit -10 degrees! Haha… but when the sun rose it went up to a "hotter" -8 degrees. Anyway, I decided to take a walk out to experience something that I’ve never experienced before! Haha, it was very cold, but it got quite nice after a while… cos I think I’m in love with the weather here and there was nice fluffy snow everywhere (and of course, because the sky was clear and there were no torturing cold winds). But I think if i stayed out longer I would become frozen.

Anyway, here is a picture of a sauna house near my place. Sauna is a great tradition here in Finland, and normally the people will be naked while they do the sauna.


And then after they feel warm and toasty, another tradition is to jump into the freezing sea. Yup! You read it correctly! Haha… they will do that!!! And if the sea is frozen, they will dig a hole to jump into the sea. I have no idea how it feels like… but I’ll try it when it gets warmer in Spring! Haha… but I’ll wear my swimming suit lah. I’m not so bold. Hahaha.

They will run down this "lane" and jump inside the sea! But normally there will be these wooden planks placed there so that people can run towards the deeper part of the sea.

Other than that, I also visited church which is very near where I stay… too bad it’s services are in Finnish. Anyway, this is what it looks like. Quite pretty! Haha.

the exterior

the interior

the book of Genesis in Finnish

And to end off totally irrelevantly, I bought more food stuff today… one item that deserves to be mentioned is the broccoli. I walked up and down the same place for a long time… haha deciding whether or not to buy a bunch of fresh broccoli worth €1 (i.e. S$2). I think the sales people thought I was mad. But finally, haha, I bought it! Later when I got back to my place and put the groceries into the fridge, I felt as if the fridge was not cold at all... haha.