Nicole is a big fan of spa treatments and massage specifically, so I knew we'd have to sample.
On the first day there, our tour guide said that we could get a full hour massage treatment in our rooms for $30 (I think. Boy, my memory of October is getting blurry; I'm glad I'm almost finished with my China series). I jumped at the chance.
Nicole and I have done side-by-side massage a number of times. It's fun, although being together doesn't usually matter much since massage is such an individual, internal, sensation/sensual thing. For me, I'm always half or wholly asleep anyway.
Two ladies that spoke not a lick of English showed up at our hotel room that night. They had us lie on the bed and got to work. It was nice to do this in the hotel room. I was so tired that I fell asleep, and don't remember a whole lot about that part of the experience experience.
After the horizontal massage, they had us each sit up at the edge of the bed. They took what seemed to be like Walmart bags and filled them with hot water and herbs. The water looked to be a brackish brown by the time they brought the full, steaming bag to us, and they had us put our feet in. It was just herbed water, but in my very tired state it kinda looked like diarrhea and I was kinda grossed out.
That said, they tied the bags around our feet and let our feet soak, and it felt great, this making of the feet soup After the soak, they massaged our feet, another very nice experience. And that was about it. A very nice, very cheap massage that we could just fall asleep after.
But that wasn't the only massage we got while in China. When we got to Hangzhou, I asked the hotel about massage places. They gave me directions to a place called Sha-na-na (yes, like the 70's tv show with Bowser, and no, you cannot make this stuff up). It was only a couple blocks away, so after Nicole freshened up from the day, we walked over.
When we walked in, it was kinda like a restaurant. They asked us, "Body or foot massage?" and followed that with "For two?" in a similar tone to what a hostess at a restaurant would use. Yes for two. Yes full body. I think this massage was also $30, but for 90 minutes.
They escorted us to a private room. It had three loungers in it separated by little end tables. Nicole took the middle one, and I took the one to the right. Someone came in and brought us tea. Then they brought a little plate of of fruit for us to enjoy, including pieces of dragon fruit, which we really got to enjoy over the course of the trip.
The TV was on, tuned to a Chinese variety show that looked a cross between The Voice, America's Got Talent, and The Gong Show. Lots of goofy silliness that we didn't understand, but at the same time kinda did. Goofy humor is somewhat universal.
Then our massage artists came in, and they were very good looking. A well-built hunky chunky monkey for Nicole, and a petite, cute tiny thing for me. No kidding, this girl wasn't more than 90 pounds soaking wet.
And neither of them seemed to speak any English whatsoever. Communication was limited to grunts and pantomime. This was just fine with us.
Communication was bad enough that it took an embarrassingly long time to understand that my girl was telling me to get out of my chair and come sit on a stool so that she could work on my shoulders and back. I've got a long torso, so it's no surprise that once I was on the stool, this petite little thing had to get her own stool to stand on just to reach my shoulders.
No kidding, I felt like a hulking giant.
And once she was up there, she sure did a number on me. This was deep tissue massage. I'm pretty sure she massaged my lungs through my shoulders, given how hard she was pressing. I pictured her behind me, lifting her entire body up after placing her elbows between my shoulders and neck, just to put the entire weight of her body on these two points. Cirque style.
After the back rubs, he two massage artists brought in wooden buckets full of herbs and hot water. That's right, we got to make the feet soup again! And after the feet soup tenderized our feet meat, they started working on our feet.
My girl worked rather vigorously, rubbing the top of my foot pretty hard. It hurt. And after a while it hurt a lot. I cringed and squirmed, but didn't say anything because I figured this was just me being a massage wuss. I mean, it's not like this little lady could cause any damage, right?
So we finished up our massage and headed out into the night, relaxed and feeling wonderful. Feeling really happy to have experienced some of this massage culture.
Skip ahead to the next morning. My foot kinda hurt when I woke up. And then I had a look at it in the light of the bathroom. This is how it looked:
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| That is not my natural feet color. That is a colossal bruise. |
That was and will remain, however, the last foot massage I get in China.
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