Please Stop Touching Me

I grew up in central Indiana.  In Central Indiana, the word “massage parlour” used to mean one thing, and you’d probably be arrested for it.  That stigma has changed a lot in the past few years, and now even Erin goes for a massage once in a while.  (Or perhaps it still means the same thing, and her unusually happy demeanor upon returning from a massage should elicit more questions from me.)

 

In any case, one of the things Erin desperately wanted while in China was to take advantage of the ridiculously cheap massages.  In Indianapolis, you can go see a dude named Filipe on the north side of town, be sort-of-pampered by some college students before being asked to fork over several hundred dollars and getting the boot out the door.  Not so in China.

 

My co-worker, Alex, took us to a place in the Shekou suburb of Shenzhen, and after some wrangling with the staff, informed me that he had arranged for us to have foot massages that would last “one half hour” or at least so I thought.  He also informed us that we should pay 70 RNB total for the two of us – no more, no tips.  This is about $10 US, so I was game.

 

His next question was whether we wanted boys or girls to give the massages.  This seemed like a very easy question to me, and I quickly said (hollered, really) “GIRLS.”  Before I finished the word, he informed me that boys would be doing our massages, because they are stronger and provide a deeper massage.  Uh…bad news, buddy.  I could kind of care less how good a massage I’m receiving, as long as I’m not being puttied by dude-hands.  I lost this battle.

 

After Alex left, we were seated in matching recliners in a dimly lit room with some satellite TV playing.  There was some kind of old-school painting of a half nekkid Chinese girl on the wall next to the TV, which left me wondering if in reality, we’d been taken to the “old” kind of massage place, which might have been funny for a few moments before Erin beat the crap out of me.

 

Eventually two very nice young Chinese gentlemen entered the room with wooden buckets for us to place our feet in.  I slowly descended both feet into the bucket, and it gradually became obvious that beneath the floor of the bucket, there must have been an open flame.  There were little pedestals in the bucket for my feet, and the temperature was just shy of the point where my feet would instantly disintegrate to ash, instead leaving them to gently sizzle to the point of turning to stew meat.

 

As I held back tears, the gentleman began rubbing my arms and hands.  This was unexpected.  I’m not much on Erin touching my arms and hands, let alone some Chinese dude, but he seemed like a hygienic fellow, and I figured “when in Rome…”  After kneading my arms for a few minutes, he began pulling at my fingers.  He also spent a great deal of time pinching the crap out of various places on my hand.  The grand finale of each arm involved him cutting off the blood supply to my hand by squeezing my arm appropriately, and then letting all the blood rush back into my fingers.  Cool trick.  Glad it only cost $5.

 

At one point, the guy stopped and made the “Look, I’ve got big muscles!” gesture that a small child might make.  I looked at him and said, “Who?”  He pointed at me and compared his lean Chinese arm to my fat, white suburban American arm and said, “So strong.”  I replied, “No tip,” and he moved on.

 

After working over our arms and hands, new wooden buckets were brought in, and I couldn’t have been happier.  The heat never expired in the first bucket, so for approximately 45 minutes, my feet had literally been frying in this stupid bucket.  I understand that if I was the one getting ready to massage someone’s feet, they would have to be surgically disinfected, but I didn’t appreciate being on the receiving end of this treatment.

 

Unfortunately bucket number two was no better.  I descended my limp feet slowly into the second bucket which was filled with boiling water.  No crap.  Boiling.  I actually jerked my foot out at first, splashing scalding water over the massage dude.  He jumped back, not happy to be wet.  Part of me wanted to say, “That’s what you get for trying to burn my freaking feet off!”  In the mean time, Erin had put her feet in her bucket and informed me that the burning sensation went away fairly quickly – coinciding with the frying of nerve endings as your flesh falls from the bone, no doubt.

 

I put my feet in the bucket (helping create that night’s dinner for someone, I fear).  Massage man went to work on my calves and legs at this point.  He pushed and pried on my legs for a while, eventually getting rid of the bucket to begin on my feet.  This portion of the massage was quite nice, actually.  At several points, he squeezed places on my foot that caused me to give quick little “Mommy!” yells, at which point he’d chuckle and back down.  As long as he didn’t put any part of me back in the hot pot, I was fine by this point.

 

At the end of the massage, I looked at my watch, and it had actually been an hour and a half for our $10.  Chalk another one up to translational difficulties.  I gave the guy my 70 RNB and headed for the door, notably relaxed and with a much happier wife, so all was well.

 

On the way out, we passed a room with about one hundred similarly dressed young ladies, all smiling and giggling.  I have no idea what their purpose was, but it definitely left Erin and I wondering.  I couldn’t help but think I’d still have rather had any one of them kneading my feet than the guy I had, but alas.

 

In all fairness, the gentlemen who worked on us were both very polite and courteous, and by the end, I was actually very relaxed.  They were very professional, and I even took note of the location of the place in case I have some free time on my next trip (it’s right around the corner from the Chinese restaurant…har har…)  I’m glad Erin got to experience this in China, and hopefully I won’t have to spend $200 or $300 for something similar in the U.S. any time soon.

 

As a final note, when I got up this morning, I noticed that my arms were bruised in several places from the massage.  Perhaps my big, strong American arms weren’t as strong as he thought.