The Diplomatic Finnish Sauna Society of Abuja

We attended a reunion today for all those who took part in our recent expedition to Lokoja. The afternoon was kindly hosted by the Finnish Ambassador and her husband, who had sent out an email inviting us to bring along not only our photos of the trip, but 'your swimming pools and towels if you wish to enter the Sauna room and dip yourself in the swimming pool'.

This seemed too good an opportunity to miss. When we lived in Washington DC, the hottest ticket in town was not lunch at the White House or dinner with the Clintons, but a night at the Finnish Embassy's 'Diplomatic Finnish Sauna Society of D.C', held in the basement of the Finnish Embassy. Entry to the secret sauna club was highly prestigious, and Washington power players, staffers, think-tankers and journalists reputedly mingled and debated naked in a steamy sauna session, before treating themselves to Finlandia vodka and gravlax.

For some unknown reason Simon and I never received our invitiations to join the Friday night Finnish fests in Washington, so we were delighted to finally make it to a Finnish Ambassador's sauna party, albeit in the height of the African summer heatwave. When the temperature outside is 35'C, the last place you really want to be is a Finnish sauna (where temperatures range from between 80'C and 110'C), but it was a fantastic afternoon - and we did indeed 'dip ourselves' in the pool afterwards.  The Ambassador gave us a little overview of the importance of the sauna (which I now know is pronounced 'sow-na') to Finnish culture - every family has one and it is regarded almost as a sacred place. She told us that her grandfather was born in a sauna, which was common in the days before public healthcare, when a journey to a hospital could take many hours and the sauna was the cleanest and most sterile place in the house. Saunas were also sometimes used to prepare a body for a funeral - so their importance to the entire life cycle is deeply ingrained.

Every Finnish embassy worldwide has a sauna and it seems the Finns really do use saunas as a form of diplomacy. (This makes sense - a sauna is an egalitarian places where controversial topics are avoided, and no form of hierarchy or title is used. Plus it is pretty hard to to argue with someone when you are both naked and can hardly talk for the stifling heat). Except, it seems, in the UK where the Finnish Embassy's press officer confessed that 'Britons' prudishness and penchant for coffee dates makes London ill-suited for socializing in the nude'.