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| Finding the best massage was not an easy task (Courtesy: Pixabay) |
Last week I
detailed the first half of my epic adventure to discover the world's most
perfect massage. This week I continue the
search which had thus far been an exercise in futility.
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| A Swedish massage is one of the most traditional treatments -- Stockholm Harbor (Courtesy: VisitSweden.se) |
Nevertheless, since I was in Sweden
Once again, I rang the front desk of my hotel to schedule
an appointment. I was on the last leg of
an assignment for the Swedish Tourist Board, and there was a bit of extra time
built into the end of the itinerary so it seemed like a good time to take
advantage of some added relaxation.
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| Traditional Swedish massage (Courtesy: Pixabay) |
“Just get undressed and lay down on your stomach,” she
said. “I’ll get ready and be back in a
moment.”
Being that Sweden
Halfway through the procedure it was time to turn
over. Annika picked up the wash cloth
and told me to roll over onto my back. As
I stared up at the ceiling, she strategically put the cloth back over me and
continued her routine.
“Why bother now?” I thought, “There’s nothing she hasn’t
seen or exposed already.”
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| Wellness travel is popular (Courtesy: Pixabay) |
Annika went about her business quietly and with great expertise.
Perhaps I was overthinking the procedure, but though it was soothing enough to make
the prospects of a great night’s sleep considerably more viable, there was
nothing particularly sensational about the process.
Then again, conditions were not exactly ideal, and that
may have minimized my level of relaxation to some degree.
When Annika finished, she returned to the bathroom to put
her lotions away and wash her hands while I got dressed. When she came out, I smiled and shook her
hand. Then I thanked her and told her
how much I enjoyed visiting her beautiful country. Annika nodded politely and
departed.
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| The quaint narrow streets of Gamla Stan, Stockholm's Old Town (Courtesy: VisitSweden.se) |
“Well, I’m supposed to meet a video crew here today. I’m
going to guide them around the city.”
My jaw dropped. Not only was Annika a massage therapist
in the evening, but she also worked for the local tourist office during the
day! She was equally surprised to discover that I would be her client for the
remainder of the day and that she would be our escort.
The shoot proceeded without a hitch. Not only did Annika
turn out to be a truly lovely person, she was also an excellent source of
information about the city of Gothenburg
While Thailand
is an Asian country, baseball is not big there, so I felt reasonably certain I
could avoid the trauma of being turned into mashed potatoes like I was in Japan
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| Sukothai was the ancient capital of Thailand (Courtesy: Tourist Authority of Thailand) |
All the female writers I had read in my research had said
that Thai massage is among the best in the world. Truthfully, my faith in their
opinions was starting to wane, but I remained optimistic that I would
eventually complete my quest for perfection.
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| Floating market (Courtesy: Tourist Authority of Thailand) |
The Thais are totally service oriented. There is nothing
they will not do for you. There is a serenity within them that is hard to
describe. Perhaps it’s the Buddhist philosophy that permeates their lives which
gives them such a purity of spirit. Or maybe it's nothing more than a gentle
simplicity within their ethnic identity that makes them seem so content. Whatever it is, the two degrees of separation
within the culture seem to be in direct opposition with each other.
An old friend who was now retired from the writing aspect
of the business, but still very active in Public Relations was heading up a
group of writers I was traveling with, and it was she who instigated the
excursion to the spa.
Using keen insightful intellect, I weighed my options and
came to the conclusion that if a bunch of women were going to get a massage
then it had to be good. After all, it
was articles that had been written by women that began my quest in the first
place.
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| Thai Yoga Massage is like the waterboarding of wellness therapy (Courtesy: Pixabay) |
Since I was the only male in the party, it was obvious
that my treatment would be a one-on-one affair.
The women, on the other hand, did the typical female thing and decided
to have a group massage. Sort of the
same phenomenon as going to the restroom together at a restaurant.
The preparation for this massage was, again, completely
different than the others. At the spa in
Chiang Mai, they handed me some clothing that resembled silk pajamas and told me
to put them on.
Once attired in my Hugh Hefner outfit, I was taken to a
room that was roughly 8 feet by 8 feet with a soft thick soft on the floor that
ran wall to wall. The room was enclosed by a ceiling that was roughly 8 or 9
feet above the floor. The cubicle was dimly lit for serenity but there was no
music or soothing sounds to be heard. Instead it was completely quiet. My first
impression was that the room appeared very much like an enclosed ring the World
Wrestling Federation might use for one of its cage matches.
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| The Thai that binds (Courtesy: Pixabay) |
For this treatment, my attendant was extremely short, almost
frail looking. Thais are generally small
in stature anyway, but this lady was even smaller than most. She took one look
at me, rolled her eyes and shook her head back and forth as if to ask,
"Why me?"
Immediately I knew that I was in trouble again.
There was no oil.
No back or leg rubbing. No light
manipulation of the scalp and face. This
technique was something else again. It was destined to be an experiment in
contortion that would turn me into the Thai version of the Gordian Knot.
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| Thai version of hear, see and speak no evil (Courtesy: Pixabay) |
I was motioned to sit against the wall and stretch my
legs forward. The little Thai woman began with a flurry. She had a lot of
energy and was accustomed to working quickly. She was not accustomed to dealing
with Jabba the Hut. It would have been far better for her to pace herself. I
could have told her that in advance had I been able to communicate with her or
if I had known what she was going to do.
Being unable to either, I just let her commence at her own rate.
The massage was like an audition for Cirque du Soleil. The
therapist began at my feet. She grabbed
my right foot first and jerked it violently to the left. Before the surprise,
and pain, subsided, she yanked it just as severely to the right. The second movement bent my knee in a
direction I am quite certain it was not designed to go. As I screamed out in
pain, the little Thai woman smiled with satisfaction.
Next, I was told to sit in the middle of the cubicle with
my legs bent across each other Indian style. The therapist stood behind me,
reached over my right shoulder, grabbed my right ankle and tried to pull my leg
back over my head.
“Lady,” I thought, “There’s just no way my leg can go that
far.”
I could feel her pulling harder and harder. Then she
began to rock my leg back and forth in much the same manner you use to rock a
car when you’re trying to get it out of the snow or mud.
Once she determined she had reached my maximum dexterity
point, she put my right leg down and moved to the left. Thank goodness she
didn’t actually get my leg behind my head. If she had, I know she would have
left it there.
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| She loves me "knot" (Courtesy: Pixabay) |
When it was time to work my arms, the therapist sat with
her back against the wall for leverage, put her bare feet against the left side
of my body and pulled my right arm across my chest with as much force as she
could muster. For a tiny person, this little lady was really strong. I probably
could have twisted my body in her direction except that her feet were
positioned in such a way that the only thing I was going to move was my arm. I
was convinced that I now had a dislocated shoulder, and still, the treatment
continued.
For the next exercise, I was told to lie on my back with
the bottoms of both feet pressed against the wall. Then she moved to the top of
my head, grabbed both arms and pulled as hard as she could with her feet jammed
against my shoulders.
By now I was beginning to wonder if she was a
"therapist" or some other facsimile known as "the rapist."
I sat up while she got down on her knees behind me and
jerked my right arm down over my back.
You guessed it, the left arm was next.
For a full 30 minutes, the little Thai dynamo mangled my
body parts into positions they had never known before and never will know again.
My fingers and toes touched places they had never touched, or ever were meant
to touch, for that matter.
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| Traditional Thai festival known as Loi Krathong meaning "to float a basket" (Courtesy: Pixabay) |
Mercifully however, the process was, at long last, taking
its toll. Powerful and expert as she was at her craft, the attendant was not
accustomed to working on someone quite so robust. She was exhausted, and yet, she
was only halfway finished.
Out of breath and gasping for air, the attendant motioned
me to sit against the wall and rest. Then she looked at me with chagrin, rolled
her eyes and said, “You big. Res' now.
Back soon.”
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| Thai women are striking, but typically small in stature (Courtesy: Pixabay) |
I knew I was large, but I didn’t consider myself a
candidate for toting teak logs at the elephant training school either. Nevertheless,
I had worn her out. She needed a break before completing the second part of the
program. I had to admit that I did feel better after all of the stretching,
pulling, yanking and jerking, but I couldn’t honestly opine that it had been
anything close to relaxing.
When the therapist returned, we went through more of the
same. Finally toward the end of the treatment, she sat down against one wall of
the room and spread her legs. Then she motioned to me to put my head between
her legs so she could work my shoulders, face and scalp.
I was on my knees looking at her and trying to follow the
instructions. When she motioned for me to come forward I leaned down on fours
and moved my face toward her crotch. How was I supposed to know that she wanted
the back of my head in her lap instead of my face?
The tiny woman screamed in a moment of frenzy and
panic. She held up both hands as quickly
as she could while yelling at the top of her lungs, “No, no, no, no. Ova’ roll ova’. No face, no face.”
In mere seconds she had become fluent in English!
I immediately realized my mistake and quickly changed
directions. After an hour of merciless pulverization, I wasn’t in any to dive face
first into her nether regions either.
Apparently my
error scared her into reality. She completed her assignment very quickly after
that and hastily informed me that the treatment was over.
As for me, I was still in pursuit of the perfect massage.
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| The ancient ruins of the Baths of Caracalla in Rome (Photo: Taylor) |
Next stop, Italy
It was sort of like synchronized swimming for massage
therapy. They would work in tandem so that both sides of the body received the
same manipulations at the same time. It
sounded interesting and worth a try. The biggest drawback about the treatment
was that since two people were working, the session took half as long.
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On this occasion, there was a cover sheet, with no
pajamas or claustrophobic closed areas and everything seemed routine. Routine, that is, until one attendant handed
me an article of clothing, sort of, that I was supposed to wear during the
treatment.
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| In theory, fours hands are better than two (Courtesy: DiscoveryLoyalty.com) |
The added garment was nothing more than a thin paper jock
strap that barely covered my masculine gender, provided I didn’t tear the
elastic loose as I was putting it on.
Other than that everything else was normal.
There was nothing unusual about the treatment, except
that it went twice as fast because four hands were working at once. In the end,
I saw no real benefit to the double whammy and convinced myself that it was
little more than a gimmick.
Once on my back, the women worked my arms, shoulders and
scalp. When it came time to rub the
front of my legs, they removed the cover sheet leaving everything exposed
except for the little sack they had given me to enclose my package.
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| Laying on of the hands, four hands that is (Courtesy: Pixabay) |
The grand finale came when they finished working on my
legs. That’s when each woman grabbed one
of the flimsy pieces of elastic that was wrapped around my hips and pulled the
jock strap away in one grand gesture.
It was rather like being at an elegant dinner party where
all the waiters simultaneously lift silver domes to reveal the food. The
difference this time, of course, was that the paper jock was the dome and my
goodies were, well, not food, but you get the picture.
As soon as they tore away the covering, the attendants
hastily left the room. In fact they got
out so quickly I was thinking, “What just happened?” before I even realized the
treatment was over.
As far as massage was concerned, I was pretty much over
it. I had tried. I had put my best foot
forward, so to speak, and done my best to find the best massage in the world,
yet each time the experiment ended badly off-center and out of kilter.
In the process, I did however, establish a short list of
guidelines for all future massages to which I religiously adhere today:
Basic Massage Rules For Men
1 – Always request a female
attendant
2 – Don’t stay in your hotel
room for a massage
3 – Never trust a hairball
therapist wearing a diaper
4 – Be sure to be kneaded
rather than stretched
5 --At all costs avoid an attendant
who is a baseball fan during the Japanese World Series
It’s a basic list, but it has served me well. Though I
have since enjoyed the occasional luxury of a fine massage, I no longer scour
the planet in search of the elusive ultimate massage.
Though I will never stop traveling, when it comes to my
Massage Research International project, affectionately known as my personal
MRI, I have vowed never be "rubbed the wrong way" again.
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