Vietnam as Nammers Know It

6 days till Vietnam, and I got my first Sweddish massage. It was free. And it was good.

My muscles never felt so important. Each and everyone of them…from the little pocket behind my elbow to the strand of ligaments that for the last 26 years have been hidden behind my shin, hopelessly crying out for attention.

But I am getting ahead of myself. Like how my buddy treated the experience itself, I gotta describe it properly.

Now I’ve got massages before. Different parts of my body have been massaged separately at one time or another, in one country or another. I got the occasional back massage from a caring girlfriend. I got my $5 foot massages at the airport in Thailand, hands rubbed at my auntie’s nailshop, and legs thoroughly pounded by the sport masseur at the USC Lyon Center or between rounds by the Taekwondo coach. But never a full body Sweddish massage.

So when the offer came: a free 90 mins massage by a friend who is considering what seems to be a great career change, I jumped right on it. Frankly, the idea of anything Swedish never appealed much to me: meatballs, Ikea, Abba…but this friend of mine usually knows what he’s doing once he’s into it: fire-spinning, navigating Death Valley, where to get good lachons in LA. That’s the kind of guy I trust, licensed or not.

The only catch: there will be a new student watching him work and perhaps taking note or sampling different techniques on me. I heard she’s cute, so I picked out a decent-looking underwear, since the chance of stripping down was good.

It turned out I didn’t get a chance to show off my brand-name boxer brief in full view.

I arrived on time. The place smells nice. The background music reminds me of the jungle of Vietnam, with birds chirping and monkey howling and flute playing. The massage table is brand-new, resting nicely on the rug in the chic-decor living room. Add an opium lamp, and I’d feel right at home…

It already felt professional, so I tried not to laugh when asked “would you feel comfortable with a gluteus massage” (that’s “butt” for the uninitiated). “No, do what you gotta do!” was my reply. I don’t want to try anything half-assed. I dont want the dumb-down version of a Swedish massage. I want it like a self-respectable Swedes would want it on Christmas Eve, after a long night of drinking and badly beaten up by hooligans.

I was handed a black drape to wrap myself with after stripping down to “whatever I was comfortable with.” 5 mins later, I came out out the bathroom looking like Dark Vader in funny-looking boxer. Face down on the hole on the massage table, Dark Vader submitted himself to the oh-so-pleasurable force of not just two, but occasionally four, highly trained hands on his back.

It was like eating something new for the first time and not knowing what the hell the cook put in the food, just know that it’s good, and in this case, it is good for you. You let the host walk you through the experience, you don’t question, you don’t ask “how the hell did you do that?”. You don’t make pretencious empty remarks on the experience. You are simply too busy enjoying yourself to care. While lying there, you also realized that you got a lot more muscles that you thought, that they all have been neglected for way too long, that some do need attention more than the others. And just when you start to worry that the force above misses a spot aching for TLC, a hand…or elbow…moves there, gently rolling out the knots. Under your skin, your muscles rejoiced, and you make a short list in your head of people you’d recommend this treat to. Let’s see, future wife after having my first child, next person who saves my life…

My legs are tough. And I don’t mean that in a nice way. If we were to get lost on an island and you have to resort to cannibalism, I would not recommend my legs as first course. There are muscles on my calves that develop as a result of Taekwondo that must have been a bitch to massage. Yet twist my leg a certain way, and they all pop out…all of them…and it hurt. It hurt so good. Where was my friend after the 2004 Stanford Open?!! 

A nice glass of cold water brought me down to earth, refreshed and thoroughly relaxed. Sitting down was not optional. The three of us sat and chatted into the night. I learned a thing or two about hand massages. These guys were really into it, like I am into writing this blog. They care. They want to excel at this. Isn’t that what’s it’s all about?

I drove away into the cool LA night. Popping my favorite CD in the player, I called my friend, telling her I wouldn’t be visitting tonight. I suddenly felt the need for a cigarrette.