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Journalism of Courage
I8217;VE never been one of the spa set. To me, a massage is rubbing your temples and hoping that throbbing headache will quieten down. A manicure is rounding off the bitten ends of fingernails. And a mud bath? Well, I try to avoid walking too close to traffic on a rainy day.
So it was with a fair dose of scepticism that I fixed an appointment at a new Bandra gym that ensures you make eye contact with your face.
I was still wondering what was so wrong about wrinkles when Bachani showed up. A few years ago, she explained, she saw her face descending into much-dreaded wrinkles and furrows, thanks to the thick pancake of make-up her Bollywood lifestyle entailed. Those fine lines set her down the path of anti-ageing therapies, and she8217;s been fighting back time ever since.
Time for me to lose face, or gain it, as the case may be. We step into a disco-fever mirrored room, with just a hello-yellow carpet and reflections of my still-flabby face for company, and settle onto the floor.
8216;8216;OK, put your fingers on your eyebrows and push upward. Now, make your forehead into a frown.8217;8217; I follow, feeling like a naughty fifth grader. 8216;8216;Count to 10, release, repeat.8217;8217; Then it8217;s fingers on the scalp, make a face, pull on your eyelids, make a face8230; By the time we come to reaching thumbs into mouths and puckering up, I8217;m feeling quite foolish. No group classes for me.
Half an hour of pouting and stretching later, my face is flushed, my cheek muscles want to crawl back to normalcy, and my back aches from furniture deprivation.
Next up on my personal beauty chart8212;some calming shiatsu that involves pressing two fingers on various parts of the body. Applying pressure to my forehead, eyebrows and cheeks, I feel an immediate release from the realm of daily life.
My breathing becomes slow and deep, and I float slowly toward the ceiling8230; well, not exactly. But whether it8217;s the pressure points I8217;m hitting, or the element of meditation, the shiatsu feels heavenly. The only drawback is that it8217;s self-administered.
Soon, though, my smoothing session is over8212;I8217;ve missed out on the skin-clarifying pranayanams, which can only be done on an empty stomach, and a promising gold ion therapy polishing the skin with a face pack and cream containing gold elements, for which we didn8217;t have sufficient time.
Glancing at the mirror post-treatment, the same old face stared back at me, albeit dazed. Of course, Bachani had informed me that visible results depended on two months of diligent face-prodding. So it wasn8217;t fair to be disappointed that I hadn8217;t been magically transformed.
But would I be tempted to come back and make monkey faces to push the lines of age further away? Well, unless it8217;s for a guest session of that stellar shiatsu, I8217;d rather remain a spa sceptic.
