Zira Spa - Heaven on Earth

After the Temples Tour I had another 1 on 1 Muay Thai training sesh and again had the entire gym to myself. This place was cool because we trained in the ring and my trainer played hip hop the entire time. Another guy about 5’7” 140lbs that could deliver a spinning back kick of doom. A little more intense this time with spinning elbows and back punches, kick blocks, and counter elbows. You might be thinking, “Wow I hope no one pisses off Nick.” Relax guys, I’m a Buddhist now, this is purely for fitness.

There’s obviously a reason I’ve been training, the main event. That evening the main event was at Zira Spa, where I took on a woman about 4’10”, 90lbs. You can forget my previous scriptures about a “Thai Massage,” now I know the ladies at the SAii Laguna Phuket were fakes (not really, this place was just sooo much better). No, I did not partake in Thai Tickle Twisty 3000, this was a classy place. They LOVE telling you about their “specials” or “promotions” as if anyone ever pays full price for anything there, witch please (this occurred on 10/30, yes I can still make Halloween jokes). I booked the traditional Thai Massage for 60 minutes knowing I would come back tomorrow and the next day for the 2 hour specials. Why not trick or treat yourself, you know? Ok I’ll stop.

This place has a koi pong with fish as big as Winston and 4 floors of massage rooms. A place where people go to release, sorry relax*, stupid autocorrect. She shows me my room and there’s a jacuzzi tub in it, ok I’m including that tomorrow I told myself. She says put these on and I’ll wait outside. What the fuck? I’m not putting on pajamas, I’m getting oiled down right? Then I remind myself I’m a Buddhist now so I take some deep breaths and put on my ceremonial satin attire (cotton pjs). What happened next was life changing. A traditional Thai Massage is an acrobatic ceremony of pure bliss. This little woman climbed on my back like a spider monkey and snap, crackle, and popped every part of my body. She pulled my limbs using my body as a brace with her tiny little feet as leverage. She bent me like a pretzel and unrolled every muscle in my body like unrolling a delicious Cinnabon.

I grimaced in pain and she asked “are you ok?” I thought to myself, how are you so fucking strong? Then something truly beautiful happened. She tried to bend my arms back as I’m in a cobra yoga pose and she couldn’t do it because I was too big of a human and I heard her grunt literally giving it her all but my body was not moving in that direction. She started laughing, then I started laughing and we laughed for a minute in perfect harmony. The main event ended in a tie that evening.

You keep your clothes on so her knees, elbows, and forearms have grip when she’s digging into your muscles to loosen up the knots. I get it now. This is not a relaxing massage, this is acrobatic yoga meets blissful torture. Whatever you want to call it or however you want to describe it, I fucking loved it. I had a smile on my face from ear to ear when she was done, thinking to myself, “how in the fuck did she do that?” The massage was 499 baht (almost $17).Read more