Mani pedi heaven

Manicure and pedicure, for the uninitiated. I'm back home in my lovely waterless flat (apparently it's going to be off for a couple of days. This'll be interesting.) But I must be feeling better, I popped into the Beauty Salon to find out if I had to make an appointment and came out 60 minutes later all spruced up.

What an experience. Pay at the reception and then follow the ‘girl’ to the mani/pedi area. This walk took me past the hair cutting area, the hair colouring area, the eyebrow threading area, the facials area, the waxing area, the arm hair bleaching area, the make-up area, the henna hands area. Anything else? Probably, but I was too astonished to see much more. Each area had at least 20 girls working furiously on 20 different bits of at least 20 different women’s bodies. The place was a beauty factory,  humming with activity, talking, laughing at the soap opera that played continuously on the TV in the corner of each room and sideways looks at the bideshi – foreigner – me.

I joined the ranks of women sitting at little tables with their hands and feet in basins of hot water with their hands and arms, and legs and feet being worked on. Well, no wonder so many of the women in the street have wonderfully clean feet and perfectly manicured toenails. Count me in. From feet to knees, and from hands to arm pits I was scrubbed to within an inch of my life. Basin after basin of hot water appeared. I was scrubbed with soap and brush, had face-packs (Leg-packs? Arm packs?) applied, washed off, scrubbed off, massaged off. Then lotion was applied. Then oil. Then the nail varnish.

How much? £6.

But would I trust them with my hair – or hair colour? Now that’s a different matter.