getting walked all over

Today I paid good money for someone to walk all over me! It was so great that it was all I could do to leave without making an appointment for the same tomorrow but I decided I should pace myself.

The 3 Sisters. I like their name and would have visited them for that alone but, really, I went because Harini, the youngest sister, is known through the yoga grapevine for her amazing massages. I'd been reading about her on various yoga sites for months before I even left Canada and knew that one of her massages had a definate place on my 'to do' list.

Harini learned to give a massage from her grandmother, who learned from her grandmother and so on and what's different about their massage is that it is given primarily using the feet. The room looks a bit dodgy: debris packed high along one wall, thatched roof with the sky peeking through, large red plastic mat in the middle with a rope suspended from the ceiling running its length. I knew what to expect from the various accounts I'd read before so I was well prepared for the room and the feet (I hate feet) but none of the descriptions I'd read mentioned the loincloth. That was a bit of a surprise.

After instructing me to strip, Harini tied a string around my waist and tore a strip of cotton from a large sheet which was secured, one end in the front and one in the back - kind of like a sumo wrestler. I suspect that it was meant more to protect my uptight Western sensitivities more than anything else because as soon as I lay, face down on the mat, off came the loincloth and I was left in all of my naked glory.

I didn't have too much time to wonder about the picture I presented because four hands began smoothing oil over me and, after that point, I really didn't care. I spent the next two hours naked as a jaybird and happy as a baby being pushed, prodded and suspended. It's amazing what exquisite pain was wrought by those two feet but the experience was fantastic and fueled my 'I'm not coming home' fire ;)

For those of you reading from India, the directions are a bit vague for first timers (lavender door near the Kavari Lodge), the contact number is 2522788