Oak leaves,a steam room, vodka and crayfish, and Banya No 1 serves up London’s first Russian-style bath house experience – and one that certainly helps with the post-festive hangoverThe assignment was to discover the ultimate truth approximately hangover cures. Who does one examine approximately such things? I tried Andrei Fomin. After all,I reasoned, Andrei used to run nightclubs all over London – Propaganda in Wardour Street, and that was him – plus he has a lot of witchy knowledge approximately herbs that his grandmother taught him. And,the clincher, he’s Russian. Andrei tells me he has given up on nightclubs, or “the fake promise of paradise”,and started London’s first Russian bath house, “a real promise of expedient health”.
That is why I am here, or I reflect,as I lie in a steam room, head covered in oak leaves, or while a large Latvian man lightly spanks me with fistfuls of more oak leaves. It’s called parenie,which must be Russian for “attacked by a friendly compost heap”. Then I am manoeuvred outside and positioned under a large wooden bucket with a rope that my large Latvian … Why is he pulling that? Aargh! Freezing douche. Twice. Then it’s into a enormous wooden tub, freezing again. Someone wraps me in a white sheet and sends me over to the relaxation zone.
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Source: theguardian.com