I grew up in Finland.

Birch water

In spring, when the snow is still on the ground but the sun is already bright, my mother taught me how to collect birch water.

You take a branch of a young birch, cut the end clean, hang a glass bottle from it with a rubber band, and wait. A few days later the bottle is full.

It tastes like faintly sweet water — clear, cold, and alive.

Thirty years later in London I saw the same thing sold for thirty pounds a bottle.

The work that makes it better

I learned that hard work makes the reward better.

At twelve my grandfather Torsten showed me how to prepare a sauna properly: chop the wood, collect rainwater from the barrels, fill the tank that wraps around the stove, light the fire.

Only then do you sit.

You take a handful of soft birch twigs and gently beat your skin. The leaves leave it feeling clean and new. Afterwards you rinse with water mixed from the hot tank and a cold bucket.

Something you can hold

I also learned to carve.

I used a knife from Lapland to make flutes from birch. Years later I bought the same kind of knives for my own children so they could learn the same thing.