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I'm the thing that's not like the others.

Monday, September 13, 2010

Sept. 11 - Spa Day!

Upon our arrival, we received a "suggested schedule for the day" which basically listed meal times and suggested activities and treatments guests may try between meals. The schedule started at 8, with breakfast beginning at 9. Since W and I are both morning people, we were up and went down to the Medical center to see what we could get done. We couldn’t do anything before breakfast and none of the 8 different massages that were listed were available at all. Nothing started before 10. So we went back to the room and hung out on the balcony until we woke S for breakfast.

After breakfast we went back to the med center to see about getting pampered. I booked a mud bath and a "hydrotherapy pearl bath". S got the same and W got the mud bath and colon cleansing (it’s exactly what it sounds like).

My mud bath was interesting. There’s a tub and the technician turns the tap and watery mud fills the tub. Then you get naked and climb in (if you’re lucky, the tech leaves - sometimes, she doesn’t). I was in the tub for about 10 mins. when the tech comes in and does something and the mud starts to slosh. I thought at first that she’d pulled the plug, but the level stayed constant, it just moved in waves. After 10 mins of waves, she came back and pulled the plug, telling me in Georgian to wait there. She left again, neglecting to close the door behind her. Gradually, the mud drains and I am becoming more and more exposed. By the time the tech came back I was curled in a ball trying to preserve my modesty. She turned on the showerhead and stood beside the tub (where I’m still naked), waiting for the water to run warm. When it did, she gave it to me and left again. I rinsed, toweled and dressed faster than I ever have before.

Poor S was more exposed than I was. During her shower, a guest wandered in to check out the facilities, while she was standing in the tub, naked. But since this is Georgia and they have no sense of personal space, no one but S saw anything wrong with that. W had heard both mine and Sarah’s stories before going in for his mud bath, but apparently, Georgian women are only comfortable with female nudity. The technician filled the tub for him and left, only coming back to pull the plug. When she did pull the plug, she showed him the showerhead and ran out of the room, never to return.

My next procedure was the pearl bath. Essentially, this consisted of my lying (naked, again) in a tub, while the technician used a high pressure hose to give me a massage. It sounds weird, but it was kinda cool (once I got over the naked part). It really worked my muscles, but because there was no rubbing, my skin didn’t chafe and I wasn’t covered in sticky oil at the end. For this one, S’s experience was pretty much exactly the same as mine.

Since I was done first, I went back to the room to shower while the others finished. Then we hung out watching videos until lunch. After lunch, we asked at the desk about a marshrutka home on Sunday and we were told that it would come at 9am (before breakfast) so W and I walked to the little store for breakfast supplies, while S had a nap. When we got back we asked the receptionist about the marshrutka again and she told us that it would come pick us up at 11:30. We went back to the room, told Sarah the news, finished our TGS marathon, watched some more videos and a soccer game until dinner.

After dinner we went into the city to explore. We all took our cameras and got many pics of each other wandering the streets of Borjomi. Most of the stores were closed, but there is a big bridge that is lit up at night. We goofed around taking pics of each other with city statues and cool streetlights and stuff. It was kinda chilly, so we headed back to the hotel, where a bottle of champagne was chilling.

Back in our room, we all put on the complimentary hotel robes and slippers. We turned on the video channel, which happened to be having a sing-along hour to some great music. So we partied in our robes, drinking champagne and strawberry juice, alternating between music videos on the tv and other youtube videos.

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