Touchy-feely Thai massage

Massage, in and of itself, is a personal experience. You let someone you don’t know put his hands all over your body as you lie naked, and then, at the end, you pay for this service.

In Vail, all sorts of massage are available, but the relaxing, therapeutic Swedish massage has always been my favorite, so much so that I’ve never ventured from it. But upon arriving in Bangkok, I decided a proper Thai massage was in order. And at 400 baht, about U.S. $13, for an hour and a half of massage, who could say no?

If Swedish massage is a personal experience, Thai massage is an intimate one. Not only does the massage therapist touch you with her hands and arms, just about her entire body comes in contact with yours through the dance that is Thai massage.

Instead of starting nude and face-down on a massage table, I donned some thin pajamas and lay on my back on a thick mat at floor level, my head resting on a fluffy pillow. Going without massage for a year in Korea (where the snap and crack massage, quite frankly, freaked me out) I almost groaned with pleasure as she started in on my feet.

In Thai massage, the therapist sits right there with you on the mat or next to it. She spread my legs and then sat between them as she worked her way up my ankles, calves and thighs. She lifted, kneaded, bent and stretched my muscles, at one point even holding each leg in her lap, and I could feel the fleshiness of her thigh as she pressed my leg into hers.

Eventually, I was asked to turn over, and she lifted up my shirt to rub cooling eucalyptus lotion into my back. She used her feet to stretch out the big muscles in the lower back. Her toes dug into my hips, slightly stiff from my recent hours on a plane. Then, I was asked to sit up, and she sat behind me, wrapping her legs around my body. She placed the pillow on her torso, and I lay against her as she continued to massage my chest, neck and head.

I could feel that our time was coming to an end, but I wanted it to go on. I lazily wondered how much massage my body could soak up in one sitting before getting tired of it. Finally, she sat me up and announced our time was up. Stifling the urge to ask if we could go one more round, I smiled, thanked and tipped her, and wandered out of the spa as loose as a Jello mold of Gumby.