First Turkish bath experience

WOW!!!  I think that probably sums it up! It was my first experience to receive a Turkish bath today or also called Hammam.  I had won a gift voucher last year during the PTA Pink Day at school.  I had almost forgotten about it.  Thankfully it had not expired yet!

Here's what the spa looks like:

Pretty fancy, eh?!  It's basically a communal area but I was the only one there, so it was like my private spa for the morning :-)

But first, before the bath - I am put into the steam room for 5 minutes. I am not so fond of the steam but thankfully there was a shower head/sprayer with cold water so it didn't feel like I was suffocating in there.  Then, my spa therapist tells me "Time to bake!" so she directs me into the sauna room for another 5 minutes.  It's HOT!  I took a peek at the thermostat in there and I think it was like 85C or 185F.  Phew!!!

Ok, finally I am laying on the marble slab!  She scrubs me with some sort of exfoliation glove from head to toe.  After that, more scrubbing but this time with Moroccan volcanic mud followed by Turkish coffee grind.  Talk about getting my caffeine in for the day!  She is constantly "watering" me with pitchers of water, kinda like in this photo I found online.  Almost felt like she used 5 bath tubs full with water!  Okay, I may be exaggerating but it seemed like a lot!

Alright... what was next?  She then washed my hair with mint shampoo followed by Jasmine conditioner.  It smelled so good!  And then, finally some olive oil soap on my body.  She made lots of suds and put them in a pure cotton towel that was sewed up at the end/bottom. She sort of skimmed it along my body and then squeezed out all the suds over me. Kind of a weird feeling but made me think of how much fun Graham and Charlie would have had with all these suds in a bath tub!!!

In the end, the therapist told me to sit by the edge of the table and she said something like "Okay, I am going to wash you now".  And before I knew it, she dumped out two pitchers of water, one in each hand right over my head!  I did NOT see that coming! HAHAHA!!!  But ahh.... everything smelled so good - my body, my hair... and skin was so nice and soft!  She probably scrubbed of layers and layers of sunscreen!

I was then whisked into the relaxation lounge for about 10 minutes. Oh, the refreshment was a Turkish yogurt drink with some salt and mint. I sort of made a face so she insisted I have the ginger honey tea instead.  Good call!  After some Turkish sweets, I was off to my 45-minutes massage.  I am sort of spoiled with 90 minute massages now so 45 minutes was over in a blink!

Nonetheless, I felt so relaxed after 2 hours of pampering.  Hmmm... Mother's Day can't come soon enough to ask for one of these vouchers! It was just under Dhs1000 which converts to around USD250.  That's not asking for too much, is it Bobby... a.k.a. honey bunny? The love of my life? The apple of my eye??? Hint! Hint! :-D