Cupping

What can I say? I’ve seen the marks on tourists backs before and thought why? But after watching Jackie Chan do cool stuff with fire in “Karate Kid” on the plane to China and reading rave reviews of the Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) used at the Kanjung Massage Centre in Shanghai, China, and yes, and the fact that I was still suffering from a stomach bug, it seemed like a good idea at the time.

It’s not cool and they don’t use fire, just plastic suction cups. It felt like someone was placing wooden clothes pegs on my back, and it really isn’t the kind of treatment you want two days before you’re going up a mountain wearing a back pack.

This treatment is also known as moxibustion, and the theory is that by creating suction and negative pressure within the cup you “suck out” toxins or bad chi or something like this (can you tell I lost interest when it started hurting?) Personally my thoughts are that when there are so many lovely therapies that don’t hurt, why would you go for one that does?

Of course I added injury to injury by having Gua Sha or Scraping at the same time - it was just nasty.

Luckily I was on Massage Road (Dagu Road, Shanghai) so I popped into Peony and Dragonfly (where they do speak English) and they reassured me that it would be fine and to stay out of the sun for 4 hours at least. Later on I popped into the Peninsular and their Spa Supervisor told me that it was okay, but would take at least a week to clear up.

On the upside, after these two treatments, some Diareze and a 90 minute reflexology session in Dragonfly my stomach did settle down.

If you really, really must try this type of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) can I suggest that you go to the Tian Spa at the Hyatt in Beijing where they assure me that they don’t leave a mark.

Click here to find this title on iTunes

The marks on my back from Cupping and Gua Sha (Scraping) from Kanjung Massage, Shanghai, China

Follow @PearlEscapes

Pearl's Blog

Email pearl@pearlescapes.co.uk