Relaxing massage?

Friday 22nd October

Well we made the cruise, albeit 2 stone lighter from dragging our backpacks around the streets of Chengdu!

Yesterday we decided to relax at one of the many hot spring complex's near to the city centre, we figured it would be a good idea to unwind before the stress of figuring out where our ship was.

The place was huge with a variety of different pools depending on your individual tastes, the largest of which was a fair sized swimming pool that was around bath temperature and they just got hotter and hotter from there.

There was also a pool brimming with doctor fish that eat all dead skin off of your body, they started off as tiny little tadpoles but had a field day on me and must have looked like whales by the time I got out. Its the weirdest sensation having hundreds of fish decending onto every visible body part but I got totally addicted and was completely submerged after being there for a few minutes.

I even managed to convince Pauline that it was a good idea and to her credit after a few moments where she looked as though Jaws was about to engulf her in one bite, she finally managed to convince herself that it was pretty cool too!

After this I decided to get a full body massage from a tiny little chinese girl who seemed to be somewhat bored and desperate for something to do. This is where I learnt that looks can be very deciving, not only did she have hands and arms made from lead but she also seemed to be highly skilled in wrestling manouvers and was intent to try out each of them on my somewhat pasty, unprepared exterior.

At one point she made me roll onto my back and started to push heavily on my belly, then she sort of just wobbled it a lot, I am fairly certain that this wasnt part of the massage at all, its just that she had never before seen anything quite like it.

Then she invented a game to see if she could push her thumbs through the top of my skull and believe me it felt like she came unbelievebly close a few times. Once she got bored of this she moved on to my ears, sticking her entire finger into both of them and then proceeding to rub my hair all over. Whilst from my viewpoint I was unable to confirm this, I have visions of large hunks of earwax being massaged into my hair a breakneck speeds.

Finally she decided that it would be a good idea to see if she could pull each of my fingers off individually, the woman had the strength of 10 men and I started to contemplate going through the rest of my life as a stumpy. Just as I reached the point when I no longer had the will power to move, she tapped me on the shoulder, grinned inately and asked me to pay!

Due to the fact that I was so happy to be off of the torture table I too smiled through the tears and gave her a tip before limping off a broken man.

Still after her beating all of my skin to a pulp there was more food for the fish so I dived straight back in, content in the fact that they wouldnt have to be fed again this year.