Laura Griffin Designs

After being on our feet all day long for several days, we were all ready to experience a traditional Chinese foot massage! Luckily, our hotel had its very own Foot Reflexology Center that was open until 2 a.m. The prices were great (around $20 per hour) so we were sold on the idea.

We opted to have an hour-long reflexology massage followed by a traditional full-body massage. That’s pampering with a capital “P”! My friend Mimi joined us for the first hour & had a foot massage as well.

I’d never had a reflexology treatment before, so I wasn’t quite sure what to expect.

We were ushered into a small room where three women sat us down in huge comfy chairs with large ottomans and placed heaping plates of watermelon next to each of us to snack on. A large TV was playing “Bruce Almighty” at the front of the room. I just remember that it had both Chinese & Dutch subtitles…very strange. The girls left, and returned carrying large wooden buckets. Each bucket had a foot stool inside and I’m guessing had some sort of steaming hot rocks on the bottom. I could barely stand putting my feet inside because it was so hot!!! My masseuse put some towels over the stool which helped a small bit. While our feet were being steamed (for lack of a better term), we turned around and sat on our ottomans, and received shoulder & back massages. After about 10 minutes, they brought in a man to trim my toenails. Now normally – that’s not so big a deal…except the guy brings in a lamp, turns it on, and whips out a razor blade. What?! Well – apparently they don’t use clippers in China, they use razorblades. And he was able to trim them with all toes intact in the end. Following the trimming, my feet were covered in a jasmine-scented oil and were rubbed & kneaded for the next 45 minutes or so. At times it was actually quite painful, but my feet felt better in the end.

During the treatment, we tried to communicate with our masseuses, but with little success. The only one of us that could speak any Chinese was Mimi, and I think her skill level is about equivalent to my French (which isn’t saying much). *LOL* I just remember her saying that they kept commenting that my skin was really white. Guess it’s time to get a tan.

Following the foot massage, the same masseuses took us into a room and gave us silk robes & shorts to change into. (There were two tables in our room). They came back & proceeded to give us an hour long full body massage. I just remember that it involved a lot of back slapping. I think I was in somewhat of a zone, though, after all the watermelon & foot kneading from the previous hour. *LOL*

About 1:30 in the morning, it was time to return to the room and crash. We had to get some sleep before our morning boat trip on the West Lake.