The Russian Sauna Exchange
I sit across from the same two men, fully clothed in the office back in North London. They’re both Russian, I am English but come from Welsh decent. The company we all work for necessitates our occasional journey too and from Mars. The sauna on Mars is nothing like I would have imagined – and you get there by car after landing by shuttle. It involves buckets full of hot water that soak twigs and branches and leaves bound together with twine. You sit in just your towel fully prepared for you office colleague to ask you to remove it, approach the bench in front of him and lay flat on your back – suddenly you are faced by this man, who you usually communicate professionally with in a suit, completely bereft of clothing brandishing a collection of twigs, branches and twine in his hand. He then proceeds to whack you with them moving from your face down over your nether regions passed your knees ending with your toes. You’re left sore but surprisingly acclimatised for the galactic air that waits. But… why the ritualistic act? Is it really necessary on the evening of landing on another planet?
My brother and his partner received a present this Christmas from his partner’s mother and step father to visit a local all day spa in the middle of Nottingham Forest. They said they had to pre-book their treatments before arriving to save disappointment and began to list to me, much to my annoyance, the different ‘procedures’ they would subject themselves too. I asked the name of the sauna, they said it was called the torture rooms – I then asked them if Russian Sauna Exchange was available – to this they replied with blank faces. It’s a Russian exclamation for exfoliation and acclimatisation I said… you should try it, they do it on Mars mostly but someone might know what it means in the middle of Nottingham Forrest… it involves using twigs leaves and branches drenched in boiled water: there’s plenty of that in Nottingham Forrest.
