Following the Thai Massage Trail….
The practice of Thai massage goes back thousands of years, developing through influences from India and China, with Thailand being a crossroads between the two. Thai massage combines pressure, reflexology, energy work, stretching and yoga, giving the client a deep feeling of well-being.
In October I spent two weeks in Thailand studying Thai massage. Chiang Mai is an old walled city, surrounded by the remnants of the wall and a moat. There are over 300 temples, and a mountain overlooks the city. Chiang Mai is scenic. Chiang Mai is also the center for the study of northern-style Thai massage, with several internationally known schools and teachers, which attract students from all over the world.
After 24 hours of flying, and another 12 sleeping, I found a massage practitioner next door to my guest house. It was a small studio, offering an hour and a half session for 150B. 40B to the dollar. Massage was everywhere in Chiang Mai-like coffee shops in Portland.
I studied the first week with Mama Lek. Her style was complemented by the use of herbal packs that she would apply in the course of a session, alternating packs in and out of a steamer. The packs helped increase blood flow, lymph drainage and the release of toxins through the blood stream. Mama Lek’s program has a book and students learn the sequence of a session step by step,
Foot Massage
The Thai Massage Conservation Society had a sign that read, ‘Massage By A Blind Man’. I was led into a quiet, dimly lit room filled with floor mats and half a dozen blind massage practitioners. About 45 minutes into my hour-long foot massage I felt a muscle release in my lower back from a strain I had been living with for a week. I signed up for Mama Lek’s foot reflexology class the next day.
There are markets all over Chiang Mai. Day markets, night markets, and a Sunday market…. Wherever there’s a market there’s foot massage. Plastic lawn chairs laid out in rows upon rows. Dozens of chairs. No demographic. And massage for Thai people begins with 90 minutes.
Hang Dong
Pichest Boonthumme lives and teaches in Hang Dong, about 30 minutes from Chiang Mai. The road from Chiang Mai looked like any other busy strip in Portland, but once you got off the street there is a rice field and you are transported out of the sprawl. Pichet lives and works just across the field, in a modest, unassuming cluster of buildings, where you’re transported even further from the day-to-day through his spiritual approach to Thai bodywork.
There were 8 students in the group from all over the world-Spain, France, Japan, Korea and the United States-for periods of time ranging from a month to a year. I was there for a week, but it didn’t matter. He begins where you are. He teaches in a way that is simple and inspiring as he urges you to throw out the book and work intuitively. He encouraged us to use our senses-to feel where the work was needed. To analyze with our hearts. One day in his class and I had learned more than I had in the previous week. It wasn’t what I thought I was going to learn, but it was what I needed to hear.
Chinese Medicine
I had an appointment with Khun Anan one afternoon. Anan was in a shared space with the Tai Chi Center on the top floor and roof of an apartment building across town. The Tai Chi Center transformed the roof by creating a garden and it was a perfect place to prepare and then wind down from massage.
Anan is Chinese and studied as a Shaolin Monk. He practices by combining acupressure and energy work. In the first session he spent 40 minutes working over my body, sensing energy blocks. At the second session 3 days later I described to him how a foot tool he had in his office was affecting my right heel. He took that and worked the corresponding energy line the entire session. It was extremely painful as he opened the blocks. Anyone who was asleep in the apartment building during my hour session was wide-awake wondering who was being tortured. It was deep tissue with a hammer. I was sore for days but the resulting feeling of freedom in my body put aside any doubts about the type of work Anan was doing. I found myself going into old habits and postures and feeling uncomfortable. I was feeling like I was learning how to walk again.
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The types of bodywork I was receiving in Thailand weren’t anything like what I had expected. For that matter, neither were the classes. I found myself absorbing information and philosophy and technique from at least a dozen different professionals, both in class and from practitioners, over the two weeks I was in Thailand. Not neatly wrapped because of the wide variety of modalities and individuals, but ready to take home to look at and think about how it relates to my own life and massage practice. Something to grow with. Mama Lek, Pichest and Anan, operating on a totally different plane than me, have changed how I work and see the world, becoming part of my “toolbox”.
There was time to spend one day in Bangkok before leaving. Two friends and I received Thai massage at Traditional Massage in the Washington Sq section of the city. For the three of us they had a room with 3 beds and we were able to receive simultaneously. There were no forms to fill out about our health and the three of us received the same sequence-it was everything I’d been taught not to do, but it felt so good! And it was the perfect thing to do before a very…. fun night in Bangkok!
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CAUTION:There are many conditions that will not respond to conservative, non-invasive treatment. Individuals with serious, underlying injuries or illness should not postpone proper medical treatment in such conditions. If pain persists, if other symptoms appear and when in doubt, consult your physician.
