We’ve only just settled in comfortably in the blisteringly hot wooden steam cabin when two broad-shouldered Olgas walk in, wearing blue-and-white pinafore dresses and white headscarves. Each of them is carrying a basket of green leaves.

One of the Olgas gestures that we need to turn over; we’re supposed to lie on our stomachs.

“What?” mutters my best friend.
“No idea,” I murmur back.
We roll over obediently.
Something strokes from the crown of my head down to the soles of my feet.
“Ooh, nice,” I think, and sigh deeply.

*WHACK*

“O holy f*ck!”

We’re getting properly bushwhacked with a bunch of leafy birch branches. Head, back, bum, legs, feet.

*WHACK*

We’re in Saint Petersburg, on a decadent little mini break in February.
— Cold, yes, but also very fairy-tale-like, with the Neva frozen solid and palaces buried under snow.

After the obvious sights (the Peter and Paul Fortress, the Romanov tombs, the Church of the Saviour on Spilled Blood, the Hermitage, Nevsky Prospekt, the Art Nouveau department stores…), the insanely good restaurants and the surreal culture shocks, we thought it would be fun to spend our last day doing some proper Russian wellness at an authentic bathhouse.

So Marion had tracked down a well-reviewed banya not far from our hotel.

It was 2016; without realising it, I was already quietly sliding into the Great Burnout of 2018. On earlier city trips we’d planned things together much more, but in Saint Petersburg I just agreed to everything and let Marion sort things out.

“I don’t think I can book online…”
— That is hard to tell, in Cyrillic.

“And they’re not answering the phone. But they’ve got five stars on Tripadvisor and Google.”
“Well, let’s just go and have a look on Wednesday, then?”

On this trip I discovered the full potential of the Google Translate app, and before we set off I pre-programme a request. We’ve got plenty of time, so I go full Nirvana — ‘Here we are now, entertain us’:

“Massage + Facial + Manicure + Pedicure + Body Wrap. Is possible?”

The girl behind the counter — a cliché Russian bombshell with bottle-blonde hair, pancaked face and two-centimetre-long red acrylic nails — grabs the appointment book and starts flipping through it. Finally, she looks up triumphantly.

“Three weeks.”
Marion and I look at each other.
“But we leave tomorrow.”
“Oh.”

She starts leafing through the book again. We wait patiently.
“Tomorrow!” The red nail jabs at something we can’t see.
“But we leave early. In the morning.”
“Oh.”

The bottle-blonde hesitates. Marion and I exchange a glance.
“Maybe they’re really busy today.”
“Let’s just go, then.”
And Marion turns towards the exit.

“Wait!”
And the bottle-blonde disappears out the back.

After about five minutes she returns, beaming.
“Is possible!” — with a grand sweep of her arm towards the changing rooms.
“All of it?”
“Yes, is possible!”

We’re not sure whether to believe her, but we’ll find out. In the changing rooms we swap our clothes for thin terry-cloth robes and we wander expectantly into the bathhouse.

Not a soul in sight.

We’re standing there blinking a bit, when Olga #1 appears. Her English vocabulary turns out to be about two words larger than my Russian, but hands and feet work just as well. She gestures towards the showers and the steam room. And so here we are now, thoroughly steamed and thoroughly battered.

“You still alive?”
“Yes. That was… actually quite nice.”

*giggle*

“Do you think there are cameras in here?”

*snort*

Olga #2 comes to fetch us and points at the ice-cold plunge pool.
“Er… no, thanks.”
“Yes, yes! Is okay! Good for…” and she taps her fingers against her heart.

Marion is already walking towards the edge.
“Well, we should try everything once!”

I need a gentle shove, because I’m absolutely terrified my heart will just stop. This cannot possibly be good for a human being.
“Is okay!” Olga repeats.

Marion jumps.
I get a push in the back and

OH MY GOD THIS IS THE END

I splutter back to the surface.
Out!!

NEVER NEVER NEVER AGAIN!

Marion comes up too, eyes wide, ghost-white.
She’s not breathing.

“Out!!”
I shove her towards the edge of the pool and the two Olgas haul her out of the icy water. She’s still not breathing.

Olga #1 thumps Marion firmly on the back.
“Is okay!”
And finally she gulps for air, in deep, ragged breaths.

“Doctor?” I ask.
Olga shakes her head and wraps a towel around us. “Is okay.”

A glass of scalding, sickly-sweet tea is pressed into our hands. Marion’s teeth chatter against the rim.

“Are you okay?”
“Yuh… yuh… thinkso.”
“We’re never doing that again, right?”
“Nuh… nuh… no.”

We’re lying side by side on massage tables again, back on our stomachs. Our glasses of sweet tea sit half-empty on a little table.
“Oh, I could really do with a massage now.”

Here come the Olgas, each carrying a large bowl of... something.
“Blue clay!”
“Salt from sea!”
And they scoop out generous handfuls.

*gulp*

The massage is lovely — these women aren’t broad-shouldered for nothing — but we do seem to be losing a noticeable layer of skin.

“Oof,” mutters Marion.
“Yes, this’ll certainly get your circulation going.”

*giggle*

After half an hour of scrubbing and kneading, Olga #1 points back at the steam cabins.
“No shower?”
“No! Salt is good!”
“It’s okay?”
“Is okay!” she grins broadly.

“Why do I get the feeling this is going to hurt again?”
“Russians are masochists.”
“They really are.”

And the salt bites.

After the sauna and a hot shower we’re now slowly stewing in a thick layer of orange oil and raw honey. We’re wrapped in plastic from head to toe; only our faces are free. Not too cold, not too hot. Nothing’s stinging or hitting. It smells divine. We’re lying next to each other like two helpless caterpillars in their cocoons.

Olga #2 dims the lights and they leave us alone.
“Relax! Is okay!”

“Er… I think we’re still the only customers here.”
“Yes, weird, isn’t it?”
I’m almost asleep, it’s that comfortable.

“They could empty our lockers now and just leave us here.”

*blink*

But they do come back, and we rinse off one last time. The Olgas then briskly herd us back to the changing rooms. We’re done. This isn’t a wellness centre like in the Netherlands — there’s no heated pool with a juice bar and a hot tub where you can lounge around for another hour or two.

“Well, so much for the authentic banya experience.”
“No manicure, no pedicure.”
“Whatever. I’m so clean I’m sweating premium mineral water.”

“Say… how’s your heart?”
Marion theatrically places a hand on her chest, waits a few seconds, then cries out, eyes wide and brilliantly blue:

“Is okay!!”