Ayurvedic Massage

The power of constant advertisement is immense. First it makes you curious about the product, next interested in the product and then makes you a user or at least makes you give a try.

The Ayurvedic massage advertisement’s I have been seeing in fliers, newspaper and magazines for a few years. They first made me a bit curious then the growing curiosity made me a bit interested and as the interest grew I wanted to give it a try. The interest perhaps lay dormant in my mind as I said to myself “might give a try when in south India”

In Pondicherry when we (me and my wife) spotted one Ayurvedic Massage parlor we walked in to find that their male masseur was on leave for a couple of days and only my wife can have a massage done. My wife wanted both of us get the massage done at the same time.

Next day we walked into another Kerala Ayurvedic Massage parlor on the next street.

They looked like more professional with the staff’s wearing a grey color dress. The front office staff informed us that on that they are fully booked. However he found a slot for us next evening. We needed to confirm our booking with 25% advance payment, which we did.

The next day we reached in time for the 50 minute general body massage. We were asked to wait for 5 minutes to allow them to prepare the oil. The massages on ladies are done by females and the men by males.  Then my wife was escorted to the ladies massage room by a lady and shortly I was taken to the massage room by a man.  

I entered a small room that was dimly lit up.  The music system was softly playing something in Sanskrit. A wooden bed in the center of the room with its edges curved up like a bowl, a padded stool and an electric cook-top on which was sitting a bowl full of oil.

 I was asked to take off my clothes, even my underwear. I was made to wear a small piece of cloth just to cover my groin area.

Sitting on the stool I was given a head massage with some Ayurvedic oil. It was so relaxing that the 6-7 minutes of massage made me sleepy. Next I was asked to lie on the wooden bed and within minutes I felt as if I was swimming in a pool of oil. The short, dark, stout man was massaging the oil all over my body.

 My arms, body, back and legs all were covered in a thick film of oil. Now I realized why the wooden bed had edges curved up like a bowl, to protect me from falling down if I skid on the very oily bed. Let me assure you that fear of skidding and falling down from the thickly oiled bed were not impossible.

Like every beginning has an ending the massage ended. The Tamil masseur knew very little English but still he managed to ask “did you like the massage?” I said yes. The last part was bathing with soap and shampoo to get rid of the extra oil from my body before putting my clothes on.

To my surprise I felt my body was rejuvenated and much lighter, this feeling lasted for the entire evening. Oh god this Ayurvedic Massage is wonderful.