The Not So Perfect Send Off

I know this is going to come as a big surprise, but after I got back from the Temple of Heaven we went to the Silk Market. We spent hours shopping for souvenirs, purses, and shoes . . . again. This time we had to buy a bag to haul around all of our purchases. We got some pearls for ourselves and our mothers, shirts for dad and the boys, and other odds and ends. The calligrapher drew up some names for Daniel and Brittany.

After a long hard day of shopping, we decided to get a massage. This experience was markedly different than our last massage. We asked the concierge to give us a recommendation. Her directions were not great so we walked into the first place that we saw that remotely resembled a spa. There was a picture of a woman with hot rocks on her back. It looked promising. We went in. They did not speak English (and the very limited Chinese I learned from podcasts did not cover massages). We pointed to a picture that we thought would be a relaxing massage. We second-guessed our choice, however, when they made us take off our shoes, walked us past a group of guys playing pool, and left us in a room with two beds and a tv. It resembled a rent-by-the-hour hotel room (not that I've been in one) more than a massage suite. They didn't give us sheets or instructions (not that we would have understood) so we just sat there trying to figure out what we were supposed to do. After about ten minutes, we opened up the door and looked out, debating whether we should walk down to the desk and remind them we were here. We realized that we would get lost trying and that we would have no way to communicate our predicament to them if we did find our way.

Before we could figure out what to do, two "masseuses" finally showed up. They motioned for us to lay on the bed. What happened next can only be described as amusing torture. There was some hitting, lots of jerking, and some very confused clients. To give you an idea, they started by making short firm multi-finger pokes to our head. When they worked on any of our limbs they started by grabbing the ends (for example my fingers) and jerked them quickly up and down as if they were trying to pull the limb out of the socket. When they finally got us on our stomachs they sat on our backs and pulled up our shoulders. To this day, I still don't know whether this was a serious massage or a trick they like to play on the tourists. If it was real, it was the strangest and most painful massage I've ever had.

Much like our stay in Beijing began, it ended with dinner at the Traveler's Den.