The Moroccan bath

After a lot of contemplating, deal hunting and preparation Sang and I finally booked ourselves in for the Moroccan bath. Both the super excited Moroccan bath virgins have managed to do some reading about the ‘deep cleansing using Moroccan black cleansing soap, which quickly penetrates the skin breaking up any dead skin cells that accumulate on the body over time. The room then fills up with steam and is relaxed for about twenty minutes to let the skin soften for exfoliating’. It is all nice and sophisticated right up to here.

What I realized on the ‘R’ (relax and rejuvenate) day at the spa is that there is no guide for beauty tots like me to prepare sufficiently for the maiden experience. Now why does one need to prepare for some massage, steam and exfoliation?

To start with, if you have NEVER, EVER booked yourself in for Moroccan pampering it comes as a bit of a surprise that the lady clad in a bath towel is your therapist and not the previous client. Why on earth does this chick not wear some kind of a uniform like in the other spas, rather the first and only spa I went to before this place? Secondly, there is a locker with some clothes in it. Thank god for modesty’s sake. Hang on a second, I have this flimsy plastic coin like thing in my hand and I do not know what to do. Now this confusion is not very fun since I have forgotten my glasses in the car and I am trying to do things without highlighting my bat-sight. The only consolations are my powered shades and Sang guiding me from the adjacent dressing room.

I get the bathrobe part, but I am sure that there are other garments that need to be a part of this bundle. Instruction to me from the outside, the small plastic coin like thing is to be unfolded and worn. WORN!!? This is a delicate item and not really something that fits my definition of covering anything.

Flimsy thing check, bathrobe check, powered shades check, therapist in towel check, I am escorted to the steam room. So you expect a nice room to walk into with your bathrobe on, waiting for that massage….what the hell….?! Why are you removing my bathrobe lady? ‘You go inside no bathrobe Madame’ says my therapist. Oh okay then. But, honestly she could have waited until I got inside the room.

Marble slab kind of thing in the steam room makes me feel like I am going to be embalmed. Anyway, before I know the therapist is applying the famous Moroccan soap. Now this soap is not like a bar of soap, it is clayey and gooey. I get this FULL BODY rub with this so-called magical substance and I am trying hard to cover up (again for modesty’s sake) using my hands and standing cross legged as she proceeds with the rubbing process like my mum probably did when I was six months old. ‘First time Madame?’ coos my therapist and she knows that she has a first timer at hand.

Well the rubbing is over and I am asked to lie down on the marble slab. ‘Face up or face down?’ I asked her. ‘Anything that comfortable for you’, replies the therapist and then comes the crucial part ‘Now I put on steam, but you no touch your eye’. I can do that, as in not touch my eye. The steam is turned on and the therapist leaves. I must admit that I have never before wanted to so badly get out of a steam room. Droplets were forming on the ceiling and dripping onto my face. Guessing it is normal to have steam turned droplets fall onto your face and around it while trying to RELAX? Plop...that is a drop in my eye and can’t blame me for wiping it away with the back of my hand. It is burning, why is my eye burning? Damn, the therapist had warned DON’T touch your eye and I just did.

Damage control, I need to wipe my eye. ‘Excuse me’…’EXCUSE MEEEE’ no response. I am going to have to do this myself, so I gingerly slide down the godforsaken slippery marble slab, try to find my bathrobe hung somewhere close by. In a room filled with steam and with gooey stuff on you that makes you slip, this simple task can seem to be a monstrous ordeal. Anyway I manage to find the handle of the door, open in a tad bit to let some steam out and get hold of the robe. Eye rubbed, extra carefully I climb back on to the slippery slab and this time I lie down face down.

One…twooo…three…ten and ‘Madame you no like steam’? That sounded more like an accusation than a question from the therapist. ‘No, no I love the steam, just a little too hot’ I respond. ‘I make it less for you’. Finally, a steam room with temperature set to comfortable. The therapist finally returns for the scrubbing part and starts with ‘if it is not hot it is not Moroccan bath’. My mind says if it is that hot, then I can be boiled chicken for your dinner and note to self, next time tell the therapists to adjust temperature before scooting away.

The scrubbing process begins and all the ‘tut..tut..tut’ from the fine lady forces me to inform her that I have at least two showers each day. ‘Does not matter’, replied therapist. ‘See this…too too much. You should come once a month compulsory and you have more smooth skin. Make your man feel special’. Ahhaaa…right of course, the point to be noted here is making the man feel special by me going through intense scrubbing at the hands of a woman, twice my size, set on a mission to rip off the first two layers of my skin.

The exfoliating is over and followed with some more washing which happens with less complaints from the therapists and more friendly chat. By now I am dying to get out and that is what finally the therapist said I could do. I was helped into my bathrobe and escorted to the relaxing lounge. Sang is already waiting and I add further entertainment to her afternoon my wearing my powered shades in a dimly lit room making me look like exactly what I was without the shades on, BLIND. Can’t complain about the complimentary ginger tea that we got while we were recovering from the pampering we just went through. Overall experience was educational!


Anyone reading this and scheduled for your first time Moroccan bath… I am guessing you are now better prepared than I was to enjoy the whole experience.