Behind the sleepy, idyllic mountain village scene of Chefchauen, there lies a secret……the Hammam. There are two different types of Hammam, one for women…a wonderfully pleasant, relaxing experience, and one for men…an experience which my dad later relayed to me upon his return to the hotel room.
‘My god, that thing was the equivalent of five rounds with Mohammed Ali! The masseur had two teeth, scars and a big bandaged gash on his forehead. He made me lie on the heated stone floor where he then threw buckets of boiling water on me. He then scrubbed, pulled and contorted me in a bewildering dance.
Then changed to lifting me three feet off the stone floor, but he lost his grip, I fell and hit my head. So he pointed to the gash on his head and then entered into a new phase of this bath where he bent my spine right back and started slapping my inner thigh and chest simultaneously until I was gasping for breath!’
‘Oh, I thought it was supposed to be pleasant. I had a topless Turkish woman who couldn’t speak any English throw hot water on me, massage and scrub me until I fell to sleep.’
LESSON LEARNT HERE: Always inquire about what your Hammam involves before you agree to have one.
The Adventures of Elle Coco 