...or Foreign Massage Should Come with a Nudity Warning
Our first day at Riu Bambu in Punta Cana, Lauren and I were hoping for some pool time. However, Mother Nature had some rain in mind. We were already by the pool, with our swimsuits on, so we decided to start our vacation out right--at the spa!
We picked the body scrub, wrap, facial, massage,
manicure, and pedicure package for the low price of 5400 Dominican Republic
pesos or $138.43. Gotta love a favorable exchange rate!
The girl
behind the counter said they had now available if we wanted. Yes! But
we needed to go back to the room to get our credit cards. So we hiked
back
to our room and came back with our credit cards. And by hike, I mean
walk--we were in the last row of bungalows, but it was all flat, paved
ground. I actually had to shuffle so as not to slip out of my wet flip flops and break another ankle.
The
good and bad thing about an all-inclusive is that you don't have to
carry around money. Good because you are not going to get mugged and do
not have to pay for food and drinks. Bad because if you want to book any
additional excursions, you do need money, but it's in the safe in your
room.
We paid (the girl was confused that we both had the same last name--"somos hermanas") and were led back to the waiting area. Then, we were called into a room...together...and there were 2 massage tables set up, complete with flowers. So yea, sister couple's massage! I'm thinking, 'we'll be covered, so it'll be ok.'
The masseuses started clearing the froofiness off the massage tables, and one of them said, "You take clothes off."
Now, we looked at each other like 'Is she serious? They're still in here?' I looked around for a curtain or closet--nope. We shrugged and started taking off our cover ups then paused. One came over, threw her arms over her head, and said, "Everything off!" Lauren was apparently lagging behind because the girl grabbed her swuimsuit bottoms and insisted, "dees too."
We lay on the tables face down...no bum cover...just naked. Then the body scrub started, and I found out why there was no bum cover: it was scrubbed, too. Whispered in my ear, "tin ofa pwis." "What?"
"Tun ofa pees." "What?" "Tun ova pwees." Oh 'turn over, please.' I did get a cootchie cover while on my back, more like a bandanna. I later learned Lauren was not so fortunate there.
While on my back, the girl exfoliated my cleavage and
under my boobs and my sides. Not the tots themselves, but definitely between and all around them.
Lauren was told to go to the shower in the back of the room to rinse the scruby off. When it was my turn, I sneaked a peak toward the shower through squinted eyes to blur my vision. Lauren was getting out; she was given a very large towel, bath sheet-sized. So she was completely covered while we had to pass each other. I was not. We just looked away, and I tried to cover the important bits.
When I was done rinsing, I received a hand towel.
That's right, a hand towel. I kind of questioned the unequal
distribution of towels, but whatever, the whole situation was already a hot mess, and the hand towel did the job. Before I stepped out of the shower, my girl told me to turn around and slathered something slimy on my back and backside.
When I got back to the table, it was covered in a large sheet of plastic, Dexter-style. I wasn't too scared of getting stabbed through the heart, so I laid down on my back, which was particularly difficult because the goop on my back was super slippery. Later, I learned Lauren did not have the luxury of being slathered before getting back on the table. No, she had to lay face-down then flip over while gracefully attempting not to slide off the table.
Keep in mind that in the US, we'd have been
covered, and the masseuse would have lifted the cover, looked away, and
replaced the cover once flipped. But I will remind you: we were completely naked. Just imagine her flipping while trying desperately not to turn the massage table into a slip-n-crack-your-skull-open (aka slip-n-slide).
But I digress. Once the goop was spread over our bodies, the plastic wrap was pulled around, except that I had a foot-wide naked strip down my front. A sarong was laid over that. Also, the overhead fan was on full force, so I was thankful to be wrapped up because the slime was cold as it evaporated.
On to the facials, which were pretty uneventful. Lauren's girl did say to my girl, "Esta máscara está muy bien buena!" (This mask is very good good). They put cucumbers on our eyes, and we heard the door open and shut. Neither of us could see if they were both out of the room, what with the cucumbers and all. So we didn't say anything.
A few minutes later, the door opened and shut, and they finished our facials. We showered the goo off, and the towel disparity continued. Then, we were massaged, including the buttocks. The cootchie cover inequality also continued.
Whispered in my ear, "aw feeneesh." Lauren was not given any indication her massage was over, except that it stopped. The door opened and closed. We looked at each other, and Lauren questioned, "I guess we're done?"
We had a little giggle but were afraid the masseuses were listening just outside the door so did not collapse into uncontrollable laughter like we did later. So we just put our swimsuits on while averting our eyes.
The manicures and pedicures were also relatively mundane. We were given German fashion magazines to read. Neither of us knows German, but I think it was all they had. I kept chipping the manicure by dinking my fingers into the bowl or the towel on the table. That girl spoke very little English, but she kept making fun of me through random squeaks and pointing. I scraped all the nail polish off my fingers by the time we got back to the room (finger nail polish makes my nails feel heavy and unnatural).
The moral of this story is that foreign concepts of modesty are much different from the US, so if you're not at peace with your body, you may want to avoid massage out of the country (or at least discuss prior with the front desk/masseuse).
