I wish I had a better camera, so that you could see that the first floor of this building was vacant, completely dark, and there was construction debris hanging from the rafters (you can see a bit on the left). I thought maybe the place was closed - but no, there was a guard standing by a side door that led to the spa on the second floor. Ah yes, this is India!I climbed the stairs and entered the spa. There was a very loud woman with bony shoulders, and a lovely British accent, waiting on the sofa next to me. She would soon choose, not surprisingly , bright purple nail polish, while I opted for clear, after realizing that I had yet to see an Indian woman in the spa or elsewhere, wearing colored polish. Probably another sign of being a prostitute (there seem to be a lot of signs of being a prostitute: wearing shorts, smiling, uncovered shoulders - it's hard to look honorable around here - you would think that being over 50 would have it covered). The spa smelled faintly like cat pee. Everyplace here smells faintly of cat pee. But it's not the smell you would expect at a spa.
Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures from the spa, but I'll see what I can do here. It seemed a bit impolite to take pictures of people in corpus partly exposed embarrassi, so I didn't. But . . . well first, the manicure and pedicure. Two men, one doing the manicure and the other doing the pedicure, dressed in black shirts and pants,
while I sat in what felt like a royal throne, overseeing the construction.OK, so they didn't look quite like this, but they WERE wearing uniforms
Ok, so she doesn't look exactly like me either, but you get the general idea.
There were men in black shirts everywhere, bringing drinks to the customers, or just standing in packs watching the other men working. It's a bit unnerving first of all, to have two men massaging your forearms and legs while casting surreptitious glances at you which you are afraid to meet, due to the complex social code here about eye contact - it's ok to glance, a brief half-smile maybe, but an actual look or a full smile - verboten, lady, of course, unless you're a prostitute. These rules are hard to follow when there aren't many other places to look. And it only makes it harder when 5 other black-shirted men are standing about 5 feet away watching, talking to each other in Hindi, occasionally laughing, and also looking at you with the same "look."
They didn't look like this, either, but nice picture, eh?
So I did my best to look at everything else going on in the room. As in other places of business, uniform color is key. The black shirts do the manicures and pedicures, but the grey shirts do hair - clearly a superior job, as there were fewer of them and they had more jewelry. A lady next to me had two men washing her hair while another gazed on fondly. I thought he was her boyfriend until her boyfriend arrived, and then I realized that the first guy was just in training. Probably they were training him in "the look" also. Then some weird steam machine was put next to her and she disappeared in a cloud. I asked the manicurist what was going on and he said, "It's a special hair treatment to soften the hair." Then he looked up again and said, with a smile, "Your hair, madam, is already soft." Imagine the word "soft" held for about two seconds, like a pillow mint on your tongue. That's how he said it, as he of course was massaging my arm up to the elbow . . . shoulder?
Another lady was having - huh? - her face flossed? I had never seen anything like this - it was fascinating (I've led a sheltered life). She was sitting in a chair, her head back, while a young woman held the end of what looked like floss in her mouth and the other end between her hands. She moved the floss quickly across the woman's face, and at the same time moved her head like a woodpecker on a tree. Like some strange ritualistic dance. I had no idea, again, what was going on. This time I asked the pedicurist, and he murmured, "It's to take away the hair, madam. Is this pressure ok?" He was massaging my calf with long strokes (sorry if this is overheating your computer) - actually, it hurt like hell, but darned if I was going to be a wimp.
Several other people were leaning over and their eyes were closed - they looked a bit too ecstatic for a public place - I found out that they were getting the "Indian head, neck, and back massage" - 45 minutes for 500 rupees ($10).
Suddenly my manicure and pedicure seemed meaningless. Is there such a thing as massage envy? If so, I had an acute case. But what was wrong with me? Two men fawning over me and I'm looking elsewhere?
Please note: this picture is merely simulated pleasure, stolen from an internet ad for Indian head massages.
OK, the blissful moments had to come to an end, and I went back outside. But before I went back home, I wanted to show you what this high-end mall looks like.Crumbling infrastructure - Check.
Old bicycles, sleeping stray dogs, stray laundry hanging from trees, and lotsa trash - Check.
Last but not least.
Cow blocking walkway.
I approached this cow and thought about walking behind it - naw - then I thought about walking in front of it, until I looked carefully at the long, curving horns - then I decided that I really didn't need anything from the grocery store anyway - chocolate soy milk is great on cereal!
And thus ends another adventure, er, day - well, not really.
I haven't mentioned later that evening (this is yesterday, remember) - the hour-long cab ride with the driver who was too high to talk and wove between three lanes at about 15 mph - we should have realized this was not a good idea when (he'd been perfectly sober when we asked him to wait for us at 7:30, though hmnn . . . he did ask if it was ok if he went for an hour to get something to eat) at 11:30, when we emerged from the "Global Arts Village," where we'd gone to hear a Portuguese fusion band (don't ask me - but they sang in several languages and someone told me they were "the BEST Portuguese fusion band" - are there a lot of Portuguese fusion bands?), the driver was sleeping, shirtless, across the front seats.*
That's normal when someone has to wait for 3 hours at night in a remote place. But they couldn't wake him up. Three guards yelled at him - no response. Finally they threw water on him - and he still didn't respond for a minute. They had to tell him to put on his shirt and start the engine. And when I asked if he was ok, in my advanced Hindi "Him OK?" one guard said "Not ok" but then there was a brief discussion, after which they announced that he was "Yes. Ok."It's amazing how well denial works when the only other option is walking a mile on a dark road and then hoping that some cab is available so you don't have to walk 20 miles on the highways. I think we got home mostly because the driver was kept awake by Spring's "Oh My God - there's a truck ahead," or maybe Sarah's loud squeals, "Watch out - a dog!" or my nervous confessions of every intimate secret I've kept in my life, just in case anyone might want to summarize them on my gravestone.
But we all lived to see another day . . . a quiet Sunday, but wait, not so quiet . . . .
*Some of you Sherlock Holmes types may notice, that I have shamelessly yet again, stolen a photo from the internet, as those with extra-keen perception can see that this cab driver is sleeping BEHIND the cab, not on the front seat! Bravo - come to India to claim your prize.
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