Sauna
The Finnish heated room for bathing, a place of rest, cleansing and sometimes ritual.
Also: banya, banja
The sauna is a small room heated to between 70 and 100 degrees Celsius, in which bathers sit on benches and throw water on hot stones to make steam, called loyly. Finland has about three million saunas for a population of five million, and every home, apartment block and workplace has one. People bathe weekly, often on Saturday evening, and families cleanse themselves before Christmas, and in the past mothers gave birth in the sauna. Birch whisks, vihta, are used on the skin. It is a place for quiet talk and the Finnish saying is that one should behave in a sauna as in a church.
Region: Europe