The psychology of the wash

A bath or a shower

When I owned my own place, it is strange that the decision to buy my apartment could have hinged on the bathroom having a bathtub instead of the installed shower unit.

There were times during the negotiation process where that was a niggling thought at the back of my mind, the place became a stronghold, a refuge, a kind of security from the things that ravaged my life and worth many years later. I spent ten and a half wonderful years there before I sold up.

The shower was a special place, the feeling of water cascading down my body, the temperature of the water set to just about bearable, but very comfortable, the floor of the bathroom heated such that the cold of winter was barely noticeable.

The wash for something

Indeed, there was something about the wash; I could adjust the showerhead to deliver the spray as a soft rain through to a pulsing massaging hosing down.

The quest for cleanliness also offered a cubicle of meditation, but there were times when I spent much longer in the shower as if I could get rid of a dirty thought or a feeling of a grimy existence not cleansable with the shower gels scented for seaward ambience and greenish blue hues.

We all have a predilection for some sort of wash, especially we of African descent, whilst those of other cultures might have concoctions to drink and possibly ointments or powders to rub on our skins to provide protection, fortify us for the formidable or empower us from some nondescript daring-do, we have the wash.

The ritual of the soap

I have prayed over waters and bathed in the strangest places, using soaps that would not pass the science of reasonableness to be applied to the skin.

Yet, the soaps, black or any other colour purported to grant powers for the favour from all mankind or defence from the dark arts are well sought for by the many who publicly appear rational but privately can be found in grottos ministered to by shamanic priests, fetishists or witch doctors.

The wash is not limited to these events, Christianity talks of the wash too, the washing away of sins as much as it pertains to baptism as a sign of faith, the Mohammedans perform the wash of ablutions before their prayers as a sign of purification before approaching their deity in submission and supplication.

Ritual purification is a function of many belief systems as Hindus will wash in the River Ganges, and the River Jordan has significance to both Judaism and Christianity.

The wash is deeper than the skin

For the holiday, the wash is in a swimming pool or at sea, we have an affinity for water caressing our bodies with or without particular reason – we cannot deny that regardless of who we are, the wash is critical for our presentation and thereby it determines how we are accepted.

We find that the whole context of clean and being clean is defined by the wash, the health of the body, the mind and the spirit might we be affected by the wash too even though the water only really touches the body, but the effect is much deeper than what we see or feel.

Holiday Snaps: A Turkish Scrub

Try Turkey

Turkey is a country of many things and for any visit to Turkey you are expected to try a number of things like authentic Turkish delight, baklava; an overly sweet dessert, Turkish coffee, a Turkish bath, raki; an alcoholic beverage amongst many things, this list not being exhaustive by any chance.

Today, it was the Turkish bath though I was not sure of the kind of massage I would receive from the benign oil massage to the muscular type that had a naval officer of seriously manly bulk off HMS Illustrious think he had been mugged.

So, on getting to the Turkish bath, I was advised to put all my things in a locker and putting on a geometrical print towel I first made for the sauna.

Prankish silliness

After 15 minutes by the hour-glass I moved to the bath house where a number of patrons were in prankish abandon having been covered in foam and wearing silly hats has pictures taken in the silliest of poses – I could find no mirth or humour in that apart from the public setting of the place.

I was asked to lie down on a marble slap and I got scrubbed down with a sponge that exposed the fact that the medicinal qualities of a mud bath did not include any cleansing ability.

I was amazed at the kind of oily grime mixed with exfoliated dead skin that came off every part of my scrubbed being, I could barely look at the stuff but it was a relief to see that there was some benefit to the scrub.

After a wash-down, foam was applied through the technique of soaking a pillow case in soapy water, this was then aerated with a billowing shake through the air and with the open end closed the inflated pillowcase was rubbed along the body with the expelled air coming out of the body of the pillow case creating lots of foam. I refused the pleasure of being photographed in a less than decent pose.

Tools to the pedicure

My Turkish bath deal included an oil massage with optional extras, I decided on the pedicure, it was the first time my feet had received any non-medical treatment after I had cancer. I did inform the man in charge that my feet were the state they were because of cancer and he did not think that was a problem.

At first the dry skin was filed, scraped, cut, shaved and picked off, he has a filer, pliers, scissors, special shaving stick and sandpaper; my soles are full of the colour of medical condition, but the pedicurist was not fazed by any of that as he worked on both feet. My left foot was somewhat tender after he started working on it.

Garra rufa fish

Then, reclining in a deck chair a mud screen was applied to the feet and left to dry after which they were washed and then I put my feet in an aquarium of Garra rufa fish [1] (Cyprinion macrostomus) which are supposed to feed off dead skin just as bed bugs do their thing, though they were quite ticklish at first, the effect was soothing.

It appears to be a sort of health craze and now I read that there might be some health consequences for such treatment though some anecdotal evidence points to its therapeutic effects for those suffering from psoriasis.

The 20-minute nibbling lead to a foot massage and then an oil massage, it was all refreshing though not as dramatic as I expected it to be, but I can say I have been to a Turkish bath too and feel the better for it.

Sources

[1] Doctor fish - From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia