A crevasse in the ground, a passage between underground water and a stream, a keyhole, a threshold. A spring is not – as it is often defined – the beginning, but rather a secret place, a link. It allows one to draw from the link between two worlds.

“The flowing water is ‘alive’, restless. It is a source of inspiration, it heals and prophesises. Streams and rivers reveal power, life and eternity: they exist and are alive. In this way, they gain autonomy, and humans continue to worship them despite other epiphanies and religious revolutions,” Mircea Eliade wrote in History of Religious Ideas. The worship of water can be found in every culture, just like tales of the springs and the water of life.

Zargan Nasordinova, a Muslim refugee from Chechnya who has lived in Warsaw for over a decade, says of her homeland: “It’s like your soul is there, and you are constantly fighting for her to come back to you. Here it is beautiful; there is freedom here. But where you were born, you grew up; there is a big part of your life left there. I really like my country, especially the mountains. Do you know what