Weird & wacky beauty treatments

Health and Beauty has always been two major preoccupations for human kind from pre-historic times. And now it is all the more true. Snail massage, fish nibble, bull semen, bee venom, leech bite, herbal beer bath, mud bath, red LED light, and what not! East and West, North and South, people are crazily pursuing all sorts of therapies to enhance beauty and health. Primitive as well as sophisticated methods are equally welcome, more welcome if it has the 'natural' tag attached. Some are traditional treatments from less known groups, some are well branded and marketed with appealing names, like ‘Apitherapy’ or ‘Ultimate Total Body Hydra-Dermbrasion Resurfacing’. Here are a few from different parts of the world.

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Beer bath: luring tourists
Wearing only his gold necklace and grasping a large beer, Russian businessman Andrei relaxes voluptuously 17 March 2006 in Chodova Plana near Marianske Lazne (Mariendbad) in a herbal beer bath, the latest Czech "therapeutic" offering the country's first "beer spa". "We Russians love natural products. Here, the beer is the best quality, brewed in the old style without any chemicals, "he explains. Owners of the town's ... more
Beer bath: luring tourists
Wearing only his gold necklace and grasping a large beer, Russian businessman Andrei relaxes voluptuously 17 March 2006 in Chodova Plana near Marianske Lazne (Mariendbad) in a herbal beer bath, the latest Czech "therapeutic" offering the country's first "beer spa". "We Russians love natural products. Here, the beer is the best quality, brewed in the old style without any chemicals, "he explains. Owners of the town's Chodovar brewery, still producing along artisanal lines, launched the beer baths with the target of tempting tourists to their new hotel rather than boosting production. With West Bohemia's six traditional spa resorts competing vigorously for customers with special health programmes and weekend health breaks, the brewery decided it required a different recipe. AFP PHOTO MICHAL CIZEK less