Just a Rub Please

One of the really nice services on offer around Saigon and all over southeast Asia is body massage. There are many establishments in Saigon's Pham Ngu Lao area offering massage, many of them with 'salon' or 'spa' in their names, some of them not. These types of businesses operate under a cloud of suspicion that they are actually something else and that perhaps their names should include words like 'brothel' or 'cathouse'. All I can say is that this suspicion is not without merit. In other countries such as Thailand a massage parlor is often nothing more than a front for a brothel. To be fair I should add that one can find the same thing in the more developed world and the US has no shortage of massage parlors that are understood to offer a wide range of services.

I haven't seen quite the same thing in Vietnam and maybe that's because I simply don't know where to look, but in any case it's a bit more subdued here than in some other countries and the extent of extra services I've heard of here only goes to what's commonly known as the 'happy ending' which involves the masseuse offering to massage her male client in that special place.
There are many massage businesses around Saigon and in the Pham Ngu Lao area that operate on the happy ending business model. If you're a neophyte you may unwittingly find yourself lying on a massage table 20 or 30 minutes into what you thought was going to be a 60 minute massage being pressured by some combination of broken-English euphemisms and unambiguous hand signals to avail yourself of the masseuse's special service. If this is what you came there for, no problem. If it's not, well you probably wasted your money. This is because those businesses that operate under this model depend on willing customers to make it work and expect customers to participate. If the original quoted price for your 1-hour massage seemed too good to be true it's because it was and it was nothing more that a loss leader to get you to the point of lying almost naked on a table in a room with a masseuse pressuring you to give in and let her earn some extra money while helping you to relax. The too-low price is the easiest way to spot an extra services massage parlor. Currently around Pham Ngu Lao, any price under 120,000 vnd for a 1-hour massage is most likely a loss leader designed to extract more money from clients after the massage has started. For me and others I've talked to on the subject the biggest drawback to this type of business is the massage itself. It's lousy and it's lousy simply because that's not the business they're actually in and if you refuse to buy the service they really want to sell you, don't expect either the lackluster massage you've had or the lukewarm attitude you've seen up to that point to improve any.

A friend of a friend back in the Bay Area told me of an amusing experience he had somewhere in southeast Asia when he politely declined the offer of a happy ending mid-way through a massage. The masseuse abruptly announced to him 'massag-ee over!'. Talk about a reality check!

I still vividly remember my first massage in Vietnam. It was on my first trip here in December 2008 and I was traveling up north near Ha Long Bay (Vịnh Hạ Long) with a friend from the States and we had booked a package tour that had us in a 5-star luxurious resort on the last night. The place was plush. Of course there was a spa there offering massage and we decided to try it out. They gave us pyjama-like clothes to wear and we each went off to our separate rooms for the massage. My Vietnamese masseuse came in and I quickly learned she didn't speak a word of English. At that time I could speak (literally) a word or 2 of Vietnamese so not a lot of conversation took place but that didn't matter. She proceeded to give me an incredibly relaxing and skillful massage that went the full advertised 60 minutes. And she was also very cute and friendly so I had absolutely no complaints. The price for this 1-hour stellar massage by a cute skilled masseuse at a 5-star resort? It was $9 US and I tipped her $3 so it set me back $12. The same massage in the US would have run about $70 and would have actually lasted only 45-50 minutes.

So the bottom line is that unless the happy ending is what you want, stay away from massage businesses that operate on the expectation that you do and the best way to know whether that's the business a massage shop is in is by the quoted price for a massage. The general appearance of the staff and the place of business are also good clues and the usual stereotypes apply here. If the staff are well-dressed in actual uniforms as opposed to tank tops and shorts and the business is on a main street and not down an alley and they also offer other beauty and spa services, especially to mixed clientele, it's probably a legitimate massage shop.

Today in the Pham Ngu Lao area a good 1-hour massage can be had for 120,000 vnd or about $5.75 US. At this price it will not be in a private room, but in a large room with around 6 massage tables side by side serving other customers. Initially I didn't like the idea of being in a shared space like this, but I've found that once the massage starts I become pretty much oblivious to what's going on around me. Other than when other customers come and go I don't really feel at all disturbed. If you want more privacy you can always go to the higher priced salons around the high-end hotel area near the Opera House and pay $15-$20 US for 1 hour which is still a really good price. I have been a loyal and almost-weekly customer of 1 particular massage shop in the Pham Ngu Lao area for over a year. The service there is really good and the staff turnover is low. It's on Do Quang Dau (Ðỗ Quang Ðẩu) street that connects Pham Ngu Lao (Phạm Ngũ Lão) and Bui Vien (Bùi Viện) streets and I believe the name is the Hoang Thi Spa. The staff all wear maroon colored dress uniforms and sometimes they can be seen out walking the area handing out spa flyers. The price for a 1-hour Vietnamese body massage is 120,000 vnd and a tip should always be given as the staff aren't paid much. I will usually tip 100,000 vnd as I've become sort of a regular and am always treated well and many of the staff know me and are friendly to me. Even including my high tip the 1-hour massage only costs about $11 US.

A couple of times when I tried other massage shops the masseuse pulled out a sheet of paper when it was time to tip her that had names and comments from alleged former customers along with very high tip amounts on the order of 100,000 vnd and higher. I was then asked to write my name and comments and of course my tip amount below the others. This was just a tactic to pressure me into giving a high tip while documenting it to be used for added pressure on the next customer. I just politely declined to write anything on the paper and then tipped what I felt like, more like 50,000 vnd. The fact that the comment sheet was used to pressure me put me in a negative disposition. There is no such practice at the Relax Spa.

On one of my many trips to Nha Trang, I decided to try a massage at a new high-end spa that targeted the Russian tourist market that has become more prevalent in Nha Trang and Mui Ne. Both of these beach resort towns have becone very popular with Russians in the last few years to the extent that many businesses now have signs in Russian only. The last time I was in Nha Trang a woman started asking me a question in Russian until I smiled and shook my head. She then just stopped and made no attempt to speak English. I don't remember the name of the spa, but it's on one of the main streets 2 blocks off and parallel to the beach, Nguyễn Thiên Thuật I believe. It looks very nice on the outside and the price for a 1-hour massage was around 450,000 vnd at that time. They gave me the massage pyjamas and a locker and a cup of tea and I sat in the nicely appointed lounge amid the sounds of soothing music and trickling water before being taken upstairs to a nice new large private massage room. The massage itself was just ok and they employed the tactic commonly used in the US of giving a massage of about 50 minutes and calling it an hour. They had a policy of no tipping so at least I didn't have to worry about that, but I wasn't satisfied with the experience at all. When it comes to massage I've come to prefer substance over style.

Who left the roof open?! One of the buildings just below my window was undergoing some renovation and they had installed a roof that didn't have what it takes to withstand the high swirling winds that are so common in the rainy season. The problem was quickly fixed and all seems ok now.


Another rainy Saigon night. This was taken at the corner of Pasteur and Lê Lợi streets across from the Saigon Centre shopping center.