Well it is a 7 days later and we are back in Koror and off the boat. As Suzi would say, “WoooHooo!!”
We arrived way early in the morning and were met by the folks from our hotel, The Penthouse, at the airport. They streamline the check-in so 30 minutes after we landed we were all snoring in our small but comfortable room. I lied, Suzi and Tammy were snoring.
We slept in late got ready for the day and were asking at the desk the direction to Fish & Fins, the company we were diving with. As luck would have it Tova the owner was eating with her kids in the hotel dining room, so we introduced ourselves and she arranged to have a van come pick us up and take our big gear bags over to their dock.
We were also asking her if she knew where the LDS/Mormon church was and her son had a friend who goes there so he knew exactly where it was. We arranged for them to pick us up on Sunday from the church and bring us back to the live aboard. It just made everything so easy. Seriously our whole trip has had these kind of serendipitous chance meetings that have made everything go smoothly.
The van picked us up. We got all checked in and registered for the week of diving. And we spent the rest of Saturday afternoon just wandering around Palau. Walking back to the hotel, actually right across the street from the Penthouse was a Chinese Massage Spa. Suzi suggested we just check the prices.
So we go in and tell them we want an hour foot massage and they tell us $20.00, now that’s like 5 times more than Thailand but three times less than the States, so it was practically free and we told them we would be back in ten minutes. We dropped off our stuff and raced back.
Okay now you know how we said our theme was “Massages of Southeast Asia” and you know how the massages just keep getting better and better and it just seems like we are going to hit a wall one of these days? Well we kind of thought that might be the case but we were willing to risk it for our addiction… our goal.
Let me just say if all the Chinese people can do what these women did then God love ‘em and I am so glad there are like 30 billion of them. First they bring out 3 hot basins of water to soak our feet. Then they pour this stuff in it, some ancient Chinese secret that turns the water green and then it thickens up like pudding and it feels so good…. Everything is going swimmingly for the perfect foot massage.
Then, they dry off our feet and they take each one of us into a private curtained cubicle. “Well that’s interesting. Normally I just sit in a chair next to my good friends while a kind soul massages my feet taking me to Nirvana. But okay if we are have private time with my feet… I’m good with that.”
As we go into the cubicle the sweet woman who speaks no English indicates via pantomime that I need to take all my clothes off. “Wrotro Shaggy!” I hit the brakes and indicate via pantomime I am only interested in getting my legs and feet massaged. I will say this to no avail at least a dozen times.
Tammy is also trying to explain the same thing to her girl and shouts out to Suzi, “Suzi did you take off your clothes? What are you doing? Suzi…Suzi?’
Nothing. No reply. What we learned latter is Suzi had immediately stripped and was already well on her way to complete Nirvana. Tammy succumbed next leaving me alone clinging literally to my clothes.
Now here’s the other thing. Usually in the States, when you get a massage and you do take off your clothes (I always keep my granny panties on) they leave the room. Not only did this girl stay, she was helping me undress. I kid you not… helping me undress. No I lied… she was not helping me undress, she was forcibly taking off my clothes. I then, and this is not metaphorically, begged to keep my pants. She was relentless. I surrendered as I heard Tammy in the next cubicle laughing and Suzi down the hall snickering. At this point I stripped, seized a towel and got on the table.
I lay there thinking, “Go to your happy place and just know that in your happy place you are wearing clothes.” Okay now here is the miracle of the Chinese massage. Despite the early trauma, as this woman began to massage my back I suddenly realized, “This is the PERFECT massage!” The pressure is just right. She was finding every knot and slowly, methodically and with the same persistence she used to strip me working the kinks out.
I heard very little from Tammy next to me except an occasional, “That feels really good.” From Suzi we heard nothing. If they had hooked her up to an EKG she probably would have been a flat line as she was building a house in Nirvana.
The hour passed and they asked if for $10.00 more we wanted a foot and head massage for 30 minutes. I asked if I could put my pants on for that part. Suzi and Tammy both laughed again. And needless to say we were there for another 30 minutes and the Best Massage in Southeast Asia. (If this were linked to audio you would hear the Hallelujah chorus right now.)
We arrived way early in the morning and were met by the folks from our hotel, The Penthouse, at the airport. They streamline the check-in so 30 minutes after we landed we were all snoring in our small but comfortable room. I lied, Suzi and Tammy were snoring.
We slept in late got ready for the day and were asking at the desk the direction to Fish & Fins, the company we were diving with. As luck would have it Tova the owner was eating with her kids in the hotel dining room, so we introduced ourselves and she arranged to have a van come pick us up and take our big gear bags over to their dock.
We were also asking her if she knew where the LDS/Mormon church was and her son had a friend who goes there so he knew exactly where it was. We arranged for them to pick us up on Sunday from the church and bring us back to the live aboard. It just made everything so easy. Seriously our whole trip has had these kind of serendipitous chance meetings that have made everything go smoothly.
The van picked us up. We got all checked in and registered for the week of diving. And we spent the rest of Saturday afternoon just wandering around Palau. Walking back to the hotel, actually right across the street from the Penthouse was a Chinese Massage Spa. Suzi suggested we just check the prices.
So we go in and tell them we want an hour foot massage and they tell us $20.00, now that’s like 5 times more than Thailand but three times less than the States, so it was practically free and we told them we would be back in ten minutes. We dropped off our stuff and raced back.
Okay now you know how we said our theme was “Massages of Southeast Asia” and you know how the massages just keep getting better and better and it just seems like we are going to hit a wall one of these days? Well we kind of thought that might be the case but we were willing to risk it for our addiction… our goal.
Let me just say if all the Chinese people can do what these women did then God love ‘em and I am so glad there are like 30 billion of them. First they bring out 3 hot basins of water to soak our feet. Then they pour this stuff in it, some ancient Chinese secret that turns the water green and then it thickens up like pudding and it feels so good…. Everything is going swimmingly for the perfect foot massage.
Then, they dry off our feet and they take each one of us into a private curtained cubicle. “Well that’s interesting. Normally I just sit in a chair next to my good friends while a kind soul massages my feet taking me to Nirvana. But okay if we are have private time with my feet… I’m good with that.”
As we go into the cubicle the sweet woman who speaks no English indicates via pantomime that I need to take all my clothes off. “Wrotro Shaggy!” I hit the brakes and indicate via pantomime I am only interested in getting my legs and feet massaged. I will say this to no avail at least a dozen times.
Tammy is also trying to explain the same thing to her girl and shouts out to Suzi, “Suzi did you take off your clothes? What are you doing? Suzi…Suzi?’
Nothing. No reply. What we learned latter is Suzi had immediately stripped and was already well on her way to complete Nirvana. Tammy succumbed next leaving me alone clinging literally to my clothes.
Now here’s the other thing. Usually in the States, when you get a massage and you do take off your clothes (I always keep my granny panties on) they leave the room. Not only did this girl stay, she was helping me undress. I kid you not… helping me undress. No I lied… she was not helping me undress, she was forcibly taking off my clothes. I then, and this is not metaphorically, begged to keep my pants. She was relentless. I surrendered as I heard Tammy in the next cubicle laughing and Suzi down the hall snickering. At this point I stripped, seized a towel and got on the table.
I lay there thinking, “Go to your happy place and just know that in your happy place you are wearing clothes.” Okay now here is the miracle of the Chinese massage. Despite the early trauma, as this woman began to massage my back I suddenly realized, “This is the PERFECT massage!” The pressure is just right. She was finding every knot and slowly, methodically and with the same persistence she used to strip me working the kinks out.
I heard very little from Tammy next to me except an occasional, “That feels really good.” From Suzi we heard nothing. If they had hooked her up to an EKG she probably would have been a flat line as she was building a house in Nirvana.
The hour passed and they asked if for $10.00 more we wanted a foot and head massage for 30 minutes. I asked if I could put my pants on for that part. Suzi and Tammy both laughed again. And needless to say we were there for another 30 minutes and the Best Massage in Southeast Asia. (If this were linked to audio you would hear the Hallelujah chorus right now.)
ahahahaha I thought I heard that somewhere...........
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