The Unbearable Lightness of Spa-ing, Part II

No, I didn’t complain, and I got into a “thing” about it with a Dutch journalist, MC, who also attended the Summit and who I was spending a few days with. The day before we’d gone to a drop-dead fabulous spa called Tirta, which I’ll talk more about another time. She told me after the massage, having been given forms on which to grade our therapists, she had given hers the lowest rating. She said the therapist was awful because she pulled her hair. (This hair connection is totally coincidental.) Worse than just giving her a lousy rating, the other therapist—mine—noticed it and pointed it out to her while we were still in the treatment room. (Note: In Asia, all massages are couples massages. If you come with another person, they will use one treatment room. But that too is another story.) MC saw her therapist grow completely deflated after seeing her rating. She was annoyed that the other therapist pointed it out while she was still there, but I think more than that she was looking for reassurance because she felt a little bad. I couldn’t give it to her.

I agree the therapist shouldn’t have looked at the ratings until we were gone. But we were there as journalists and were given, I’m sure, what the spa manager thought were the finest therapists. So I think the rating shocked them. But I was more shocked that MC was so cavalier about giving a bad rating. We had a big debate about it. MC is a tough cookie. I always thought I was a tough cookie but it turns out that on these matters compared to her my personality is like, say, Ellen DeGeneres eating cotton candy while holding a hot water bottle, sitting on Buddha's lap .

For customers, it's always hard to know when is the right time to complain. If the treatment isn't great many people feel it's easier just to get through it. Some people just get bored and start making a mental grocery list. But what about journalists who are given free treatments? What is our obligation? MC, who was sharing a treatment room with me and was situated less than three feet away, said she didn't want to talk loudly and disturb my peace. (She does have a heart, after all, just not when she's in review mode.) Do I as a journalist receiving free massages have a right to complain? An obligation? Should the journalist complain right then or there or save it for the mass printing? When is the right time for any of us to complain?

The Unbearable Lightness of Spa-ing

Now that I’ve described my least favorite spa experience while I was in the Philippines, here comes the more difficult task—attempting to pick a favorite, which I already know I cannot do. So maybe let’s go for the second least favorite. Maybe process of elimination is the only way to do this.

At the risk of sounding incorrigibly spoiled by too much of a good thing, I have to tell you that I was not at all impressed with Chi Spa, in the Edsa Shangra-La Hotel. I know, five-star hotel, award-winning spa brand, what’s the problem, Spadette? It’s probably more a function of the fact that Chi is located in a hotel. I don’t care much for hotel spas because they have to appeal to such a wide variety of people. The hotel is going to have visitors from countries all over the world who come from all walks of life. That’s quite a segment of the population to please. How do you tease out levels of spa expertise, the tastes, the cultural disparities of such an enormous group? You don’t. So you go middle of the road.

That’s what I disliked about Chi Spa. But what really bothered me is that it didn’t deliver what it promised. The Shangri-La hotel has a distinctive Asian flavor and the spa menu reflects that. It offers several exotic treatments unique to Asia. When I was booking my treatment, however, things became a little muddled—or clearer, if you buy into my theory of hotel spa gentrification. When I asked the receptionist about the treatments under the heading “traditional massage,” as explained they didn’t sound so traditional to me. For example, they offer Tui Na, which is a Chinese treatment, except that when she described it the treatment suddenly included Swedish massage. Wha? The Philippine Hilot, I think, also had Swedish, and some Shiatsu, which is Japanese.

No matter, I was signing up for the Himalayan Head and Scalp Massage. By this time, I’d had several full-body treatments for several days in a row—I know! I’m so sorry to brag! I craved a break. Also, I’d heard of this head and scalp treatment, which sounded so luxurious, but never had one. Who doesn’t like to have their head and scalp massaged, I ask? Let them mix it up with a little Japanese this or Chinese that, I’m going to have an hour and fifteen minute head and neck massage orgy! I felt I covered my bases—or at least the most important base, my head.

We can skip over the look of Chi Spa. It’s totally beautiful eye candy, so enough said. We can even skip over my lovely therapist, D. Or maybe we shouldn’t. D, in fact, sort of muddled my spa experience beyond my menu issues. When we were walking to the massage room Dang asked me why I didn’t consider having a whole body massage in addition to the scalp and head. This question was a little like being offered a plate of delightful food—take your pick of whatever would be most scrumptious to you—and as you select your one or two pieces, thank the server and are about to take a bite, the server says, “That’s it? Really? Why don’t you take a few more pieces? Come on, there’s plenty. You know you want it.”

It throws you off your game. First I didn’t question my decision. “No, that’s okay." I said. "I’m fine with just the head massage. In fact, I’ve been looking forward to it.”

“Alright,” she says, sounding deflated.

Now, an hour and fifteen minutes is a long time, so as she’s working on my back, which surprises me since it’s a HEAD and SCALP massage, D points out that I have knots back there. Knots that, if they have not been removed after the amount of massages I’ve had thus far, it should be assumed I will have forever and ever. I own them. Or they own me. But instead of telling her not to worry about it, I cave. I tell her it’s okay to work on my back a bit. It seems to make her happy. More time passes and though she should well be on the head by now, she asks if it’s okay to work on my legs. Oy.

I like D, she told me her story—teenage daughter she’s raising alone, loves the States, hopes to be transferred to one of the Chi Spas that will be opening here in the States within the next couple of years so that she can fulfill her dream and have her daughter attend a good university. As I’ve talked about so many times, it’s hard to complain to a massage therapist about your treatment when you’re in the throes of it. You’re naked, she’s not, and she’s being so nice. And if I were paying full price ($90-ish—cheap by US standards) things may have been different. I may have stood up for myself. Instead, I just got bored. I totally give up on the idea that this was going to balls-out fun for my head and now it’s not.

You get pretty good at calculating time when you’ve had a lot of massages and so I sort of mentally check out until about, oh, ten minutes before the treatment is to end. I start coming back to life when she begins to zero in on my head. “Here it comes,” I think. “So what if it’s short, it’s going to be sweet sweet.”

But it wasn’t. I’ve had better scalp massages at Sine Qua Non, my hair salon in Chicago. Sometimes my stylist asks the adorable Mexican lady—whose job is usually to sweep up shorn hair and such—if she’s got a sec to shampoo me. Now, that lady knows her way around a scalp. Dang did a sort of gentle tugging at little chunks of hair, using a rhythmic beat. Is that what they do in the Himalayas? I have no idea. But it was weak. And I think I can safely say that I’ve still never had a Himalayan Head and Scalp Massage.

Look for Part II on this story tomorrow.

By the way, I don't know what The Unbearable Lightness of Spa-ing is supposed to mean, either. I just needed to title for the blog.

By the way again, if you click on the Himalayan Head and Scalp Massage link in this post it will get you to an Indian Head Massage. I couldn't even find anything with the words head and Himalayan.

Happy Birthday to Me, Korean Style

My own birthday was on October 10. I spent it at the base of Mt. Pinatubo, a not-much-thought-about volcano until it erupted in the Philippines in 1991, after hundreds of years of slumber. I’d heard about hot springs occurring naturally after the eruption near the crater, and that a spa—called Spa Town—had opened, somewhat making the best of Pinatubo’s ghastly emission, which made the area a ghost town and displaced a local tribe called the Aita. (Though I’m not sure you can displace nomadic people. Actually what happened is that they ended up taking root in the area and, with some help, they’ve been taught to make touristy objets d’art from the ash that almost destroyed them. Progress? You decide.)

I should preface my day at Spa Town by saying that in the 10 or so days I spent in the Philippines I visited more spots that I can only describe as paradise and experienced more insanely divine Asian spa treatments than any mere human like myself should be allowed. (Not really; I deserved it, but so does everyone else. I wish I could have taken you all with me.) So if my birthday wasn’t spent in total bliss, hey, it’s an interesting story to tell and like I always pray, May I live an interesting life, I got my wish.

Spa Town is a decidedly different kind of spa experience. First, it’s Korean and though I can’t make judgments, the only other Korean spa experience I’ve had is in my hometown of Chicago and is called Paradise, which has become a sort of post-modern cult-y spa-esque experience for a small group of hipsters and lots of Korean-Americans. I’d post their website, if they had one. But I don't think they're in on the joke. In fact, I think they wish those hip, young Americans would just go away. Like Spa Town, the style and vibe in Paradise is not relaxation-, or luxury-, or pampering-focused. In fact, it’s sort of the antithesis. It’s a little gruff and, I found out, it can be a lot scary.

At Spa Town the facilities are totally outdoors and look beautiful, peaceful and serene. There is piped-in music that’s not quite ethereal spa music we’re accustomed to hearing. It is more like classical with a contemporary Asian flavor. I liked it. An enormous covered pavilion sat in the center of the grounds. Ladies in beautiful gold tunics were giving Thai massages while other workers industriously polished the pavillion's wood floor and the like, and generally emanated gentility. Off to one end, there was bricked-in area, this one filled with grey sulfur that had been raked smooth. On its edges were two ovens with attendants feeding the mouths kindling to heat the sulfur (check out the photo on the left). Another one exactly like it but filled with salt sat next to it. Circling further, there was a great mud bath, some showers and then a locker area.

I’m going to somewhat spare you the comical/grim trip to the hot springs, which are higher up alongside the volcano and require a 45-minute drive on what looked like the moon but was actually just a rocky, craggy and sometimes-covered-in-water expanse. I'll just give you the thumbnail sketch of that portion of my birthday. Yes, the drive up was surreal, sometimes spooky. But what was spookier is that Spa Town is located just next to Crow Valley. For the unacquainted, the U.S. essentially colonized the Philippines at the turn of the century for about 40 years, until the 1940s. They used Crow Valley to test bombs and munitions, and it continues to serve that purpose for the Filipino Air Force. We were stopped twice while trying to get to the hot springs by soldiers wearing military uniforms and carrying big guns, which was admittedly freaky except when you looked at their feet and saw that they were wearing flip flops when it became sort of sad.) Apparently, even though we were given the OK to proceed by the major on duty, target practice was in full swing and so we had to keep stopping to avoid, um, death.

It was idyllic Spa Town that really put me on the edge, however, and tested my will. Once it was decided my spa treatment was to begin, three staffers, one of them carrying a shovel, took me by the arms and walked me to the sulfur pen. It’s highly unusual for the Philippines, but none of these people spoke much English—and I was beginning to need some reassurance. All I heard was great discussion in Tagalog on how big a pit to dig—for me. It was dug quickly and they motioned for me to step in. What I remember most is the inner battle I was having with myself: Should I bail now, just say No Way, and regret forever that I will never know what could have happened, could never write about it like I am here? Or should I foolishly, cavalierly and because I don’t like to offend, get in that pit, get buried and risk a full-out panic attack?

I got in. They started shoveling. I didn’t like it. It felt creepy, grainly, itchy. And very hot. Shake your body! Shake your body! They kept saying. It wasn’t until my left leg felt like it was on fire that I understood what they meant. By shaking, your body settles into the sulfur, the better to feel the hot spots. As I lifted my legs as much as I could, the guy with the shovel put more sulfur under them. Better. But not much. Someone took a cloth and put it over my eyes. I don’t like that I can’t see. Not. One. Little. Bit. For the ash! For the ash, they say, when I struggle to get it off. I am now buried up to my neck, though they’ve taken the cloth off my eyes.

Half hour is my sentence, I’m told. I’m already sweating hotly and two of the attendants are gone. One young boy remains, but I don’t know that yet. I think I’m alone and so I gather my senses and begin to breathe as deeply and as evenly as I can. I think of the Sanskrit mantra Elizabeth Gilbert recites in “Eat, Pray, Love:” Ham-Sa. I Am That. And for now, “that,” for me, is terrified and sweating profusely.

Suddenly, I feel a hand holding a soft cloth to my face, and, with the same expert touch a mother has with her child, the boy begins wiping the sweat off my cheeks, around my eyes, on my chin and finishing on the forehead. He’ll do that every few minutes, or whenever he sees me twitch. That boy saw me through my half hour burial and I love him for it—though I think he was lying to me the final ten minutes when I began to ask for a countdown; I KNOW how ten minutes feels, and my friends, this was longer than 10 minutes. I struggled again and again. Just get up. Just get up. But I stuck it out until the boy gave me the okay.

I am super lady! For a moment, anyway.

After showering the sulfur off I am led to Dante’s next level of hell and am packed in mud and told to bake in the sun. This time a female attendant sits with me. She asks me questions about the US and why I am there. She is a nice distraction.

By the time I had my Thai massage, boy, did I need it. The therapist was great and the spa feeling I love so much returned. Best of all, I lived to tell the story here. Whoo-hoo. Happy birthday to me!

Blog Action Day Dedicated Post

Today is my dad’s birthday. He would have been 87 years old if he hadn’t died this year in May. My dad was “buried” in a mausoleum, a practice that saves land space. I was just there yesterday with my mom and sister and we were all commenting on how much nicer it is to visit him in the covered outdoor space instead of having to go tromp to a grave, especially when it’s raining, like it was yesterday.

Though mausoleums help the environment, my dad was still embalmed, and that’s not such a "green" practice. Had he been cremated it wouldn’t have been much better, since that wastes a lot of energy and fossil fuels.

For those interested in eco-friendly ways to consider burial, for yourself or a loved one, here’s a great web site to look at the facts and some options.

Also, in 2005 the writer Tad Friend wrote an interesting piece about a man named Tyler Cassity and Fernwood, his eco-friendly burial business. It’s just the abstract—the New Yorker doesn’t make their archives easily available—but maybe you can do better at finding the piece in its entirety.

Left is a picture of him when he was already pretty sick. He's posing with my sister Anita.

Happy birthday, Ralph Spinelli. You were and are a sweet and lovely father. I miss you lots.

And Yea for Blog Action Day!