One in a Million….

How can it be possible that in a city of 1.6 million people you can actually feel like Number One and not just another face in a very big crowd?

This week I have been travelling in Asia Pacific, countries where the business world follows the sun 24*7. In sync with the round the clock work ethic, business tripping here also tends to push a dusk to dawn schedule of non-stop circuit training between meetings, inner-city crazed traffic and late night working dinners. Here indeed lies the proof that there are more cities than New York that never sleep and, if they do, it is most certainly standing up and with a smile on their face, ready to offer whatever service and help they can, on demand.

Today, conversely, I found myself with the rare luxury of a full day of downtime. Inarguably it is the result of the mixology of uber productivity, insomnia and energy drinks I have been cocktailing on over the last 4 days in order  to maintain the pace but, in the spirit of the cocktail glass being half full, I have used the time to its utmost decadence.

Pampering at any time is the pinnacle of self indulgence but, in a country that has a service culture that is second to none, anything is possible here whenever sir or madam so requires it.

A wholly personalised service starts on first name terms (ok, preceded by sir or miss) on arrival, as if it has been clockwatched to the nano second and a personal butler service for your every whim and need almost levitates you above the ground as you are hosted in and out. 

Admittedly, when your day begins with an aromatic soak in rose petals, you know it can only be good. Even the air is designed to smell to your personal liking with an apothecary of oils and tinctures for a massage that makes you feel you are lying on a lily pad, sole-zen occupancy.

Teleported to the hair salon is a Dorothy experience before visiting the Great Oz – parallel tinkering of fingers and toes, tresses simultaneously groomed with 4 (sometimes 6) hands, and from nowhere more hands indulge you in a neck and back massage that uncovers knots that even a naval periscope couldn’t detect. The power of these hands, combined, is greater than Midas himself, cultivating and setting free a creation of papilionaceous genius, yet oblivious to the magic of time reversal that they are conjuring.

(The nettle tea, however, I might just have to pass on 2^nd time around, but I’m sure it has cleansed me so much that I have probably earned a second ticket for entry at the pearly gates).

But, as I closed the door on my Oz Kingdom, and stepped back to the smoky hustle and bustle of the metro mayhem, I did so with more karma than I had first left it. And protected from the smog in my private bubble of scented oxygen…I wondered, how is it possible to be surrounded by so much but really feel like 1 in a 1.6 million...

'Til next time, Pandora