FUNKSTATION (Tampere, Finland)

After class we went to the sauna with Petri. He is teaching sound stuff (e.g. Sound Design) at the TTVO. We walked through the wonderful Kauppinojan forests until we reached the nicest public sauna in Tampere, Kauppi sauna.
In the winter people like it a lot, because it has an avanto (ice-hole). "[...] you can get there easily by cross-country skiing through Kauppi or by ice-skating on Nasijärvi. If you want to be less sporty take Bus number 3 starting from Keskustori westwards. (http://www.itampere.info/info/tampere/best.html).
Oh yeah, I forgot. On the third picture you can see Petri who is about to enter the sauna -- and he's wearing a woolen cap! To understand what he is doing, you have to know that we are not talking about saunas -- we are talking about saunas with a real wood stove in it and a whole bunch of Finnish sauna junkies who keep on throwing water on the stones, smiling contentedly. The result is a temperature of 122°C. The caps are necessary to protect your hair and your ears.
Petri always sat on the highest level next to all those other guys with caps on. Most of us tried to sit up there, but nobody managed to do it longer than about 5 minutes, smiling wasn't an option. After that, the lake with its 14°C was a great relief.
Pertri said, that it takes about two years to be able to sit in the top row smiling.