Massages at the Women's Prison in Chiang Mai, Thailand

"Would it be excessive to get two massages today?" Jan asked Yemi with a mischievous grin after returning from her morning massage on the beach.

We are on a tight budget that requires us to make sacrifices like taking 18 hour bus rides ($15) instead of flying ($145) and leads us to more than a few hotels offering only cold showers and sporadic electricity. However, when we put together our budget for Thailand Jan made sure it included daily massages for her.

In addition to the postcard-perfect beaches and cheap pad kee mao, Thailand is known for their cheap massages. A traditional Thai massage is $5/hour and a relaxing oil massage is $8/hour.

During our three weeks in Thailand we had our share of great massages, but our best massages were at Chiang Mai's Women's Correctional Prison. They rehabilitate the prisoners by teaching them a trade like massage or cooking. We had read amazing reviews but we suspected the massages would be overrated due to the excitement people had of getting massaged by prisoners. However, they were AMAZING!

I bet this isn't what she had in mind when they told her she would be serving hard time!

Yemi had a traditional Thai massage that loosened him up in all of the right places. Days later Jan was still talking about her foot massage. Her lady seemed to be trained in reflexology. She would put pressure on a specific point of Jan's toe and Jan would feel it in her head.

At the end of the day, Jan settled for about one massage every three days in Thailand. Yemi knew the accountant in her would squash her excessive desire to double up! However, she did have one slip up a few weeks later when a massage parlor in Cambodia offered "four hand massages" for only $10/hr - who could resist that?!?