Now let me also explain that the massage was the first one I'd ever had in my life and I didn't know that I could speak up and ask for a lighter or firmer touch. As it turns out, I'm a bruiser when I get massaged. There's that one spot at the base of your skull that they typically poke their thumbs straight through...this is to help you relax, a thumb going through your skin straight through to your skull to tickle the brain...relaxing. (Disclaimer: I'm sure there are people who LOVE that, I, obviously, am not one of them.) All it did for me was make it so I couldn't move my neck for two weeks. Not fun.
Also, at the end of that bone-breaking massage I was hard-sold the products used on me. All for my own good, mindja, apparently I REALLY needed these things if I wanted to continue to breathe, at least that's almost how they made it sound. Frankly, I couldn't take the pressure and I bought the stuff. Never once touched it until I threw it away during a recent purge, but I bought it nevertheless.
I've since joined a massage "club" for lack of a better word for it. I pays my monthly fees and I gets me semi-regular massages that don't break the bank. It works. It's no Mandara Spa, but it works. Anyway, being more seasoned in getting exactly what I want out of my massage and no longer afraid to say "no, thank you." and mean it, I was actually kinda looking forward to that first massage/facial duo thing Ray had set up for me for sail-away night.
But things are very different at Mandara. Even had I not been right up front with my likes and dislikes and the pressure that works best for me, by pure measure of the pre-massage questions, I'm pretty sure I would have still walked away from my massage happy and satisfied. Without becoming super medical on me, my masseuse (I want to say Lily, but really brain-death is truly a bitch, so if the name is wrong, I truly apologize) asked all the right questions and by discussing my health openly she was able to design the massage around what she felt I most needed...relaxation. It's true, by the time the ship set sail I was tied tighter than, well, something really incredibly tight! My shoulders were somewhere around my temples and my back was hunched. I'm sure figuring out what I needed wasn't exactly rocket science, but knowing how to get through it, now that's a science of a whole other kind...
Remember, I got this insanely wonderful treatment two days in a row!!! And day two was even better!
Now, I've known about aromatherapy for a long time and have even used it on occasion during my land-based massages. With my place they put a couple of ounces of this scented cream in a plastic thing for you to take home, but they warn you to use it immediately as the scent fades in about a week. So hearing my wonderful masseuse say she was going to use lavender on me, there was no surprise. But this lavender oil is a completely different animal than the cream stuff I've had used on me. It did relax me completely and I was interested in the product, but I know me. I buy this stuff, put it on the pretty shelf in my bath area and watch dust gather on the bottle as it evaporates. That's a nice chunk of change to let just let sit. I promised to talk to Ray about it and left it at that.
Let me explain something about Ray. How to explain this...he doesn't exactly go for the aftersell stuff. Yanno what I mean? Listen, sometimes it's all I can do to get him for any sell at all. I'd say massage, he'd say he hates them. What he meant to say is "I won't spend that money on myself." So I just figured by not saying yes I was doing what he would want me to do, even if I did like the stuff. But that was BP Ray (Before Pampering). Pampered Ray is very receptive, it seems. Let me also be clear that neither of us experienced one incident of hard-sell in Mandara. Just suggestions, but no feeling like if you don't buy someone is going to cry!
Let's put it this way, out of the ten days of cruising, he spent more than half of the days in the spa in one place or another. The spa, mindja, not the gym, the spa! (Full disclosure: I spent more than my fair share in there also, I just clustered things together for myself so I wasn't running back and forth. This cruise I had 2 facials and massages, reflexology, scalp massage, pedicure,
botox, tooth whitening, my hair done and my makeup applied. If there is
any service I got which I forgot to list, please forgive.) Sometimes Ray's visit to the spa was proceeded by a lecture on, say... how you walk. Well, apparently he does it wrong. They got a product for that! They've got a product for just about everything. And I know first-hand about one that's sold in bulk -- you know, to hold you over till your next cruise. This is not to knock the products, I did wind up buying four for myself before the cruise ended--one being that lovely lavender oil, another a neck firming cream that made me stop looking like a turtle, a package of maintenance tooth whitener tubes and another oil to be used on my cottage cheese thighs.
Ray bought product too. Boy did Ray buy product. Apparently I never knew Ray harbored a secret cellulite issue. I hate my cellulite. The first time I got a really good glimpse at that situation, it took me completely by surprise. I was sitting in an out of the way corner while we were getting ready to move. I just needed to stay out of Ray's way. Once he gets a move on, the best thing to do is just make way. The man is a human tornado. So anyway, I'm sitting cross-legged on a loveseat and when I looked up a mirror had been placed in just the perfect position for me to get a whopping view of it in all it's spread-out glory. Cellulite cream? Yeah, I sorta kinda need it. But let me tell you something. Never once in all my years with Ray did I ever hear him say word one about his cellulite because yanno why? He hasn't got any. Not real cellulite like what I have anyway. He maybe has the kind of "cute" cellulite. Or maybe it's shy and it only comes out when he alone can see it.
Yeah, Ray was either laying hints for me or suffering hallucinations about himself because the man bought like a 12 pack of the cellulite stuff! LOL OMG! I, of course, had no blessed idea he did this because all he said when he came back into the cabin carrying two big bags of stuff after one particularly long session in the spa was, "don't ask how much I spent. As a matter of fact if you want another syringe of Botox, go for it." But of all the things I thought he might have bought, cellulite oil was not at the top of my list.
You want to know what I think about all this?
I think it's a-freakin-dorable!