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This article is based on experiences and interviews in connection with fieldwork undertaken for my thesis about the guided tours of the mosque at Södermalm in Stockholm. I have looked at how different actors talk about the sauna in the mosque — situated in the basement next to a gym — and how they contextualize it. I describe how it can either represent a Swedish sauna or a hammâm, which is a tradition with its roots in Muslim societies. I use the concept of context in much the same sense as Arjun Appadurai, to capture the allusions through which the local is connected to the translocal. Furthermore, I briefly discuss the implications of private and public space raised by the presence of the sauna, and endorse the idea that in the use of the concept of public/private we should consider that a place or a situation is not seen the same way in this respect, by different actors. Finally, the suggestions is made, that one possible way to look at the mosque as place is to investigate the history of how it was built, and the considerations involved at that particular time.