Fish Pedicure!

On Saturday myself and couple of friends went for a fish pedicure in Cheltenham. I hadn't heard of such a thing until I read a friend's blog last week - Silver with Lesley.

Hmmm. It looked like a different sort of experience so I convinced Chui and Kathrin to come with me...thinking we'd go for 15 minutes, but Chui persuaded us to try the 30 minutes session!

Well, a picture is worth a thousand words so I'll show you some pictures:

The fish are Garra Rufa fish and they nibble away at dead skin but leave healthy skin intact!  They are also called Doctor Fish or Nibble Fish! They have an enzyme in their saliva that breaks down dead skin cells.  The fish have been used medically to help those with eczema and psoriasis.

There are quite a few fish pedicure places in Britain where you can go and get your dead skin nibbled away!  Check out AppyFeet for a location near you!!!

 The initial experience was really pretty yucky. It doesn't feel like tickling - instead it's more like pins and needles. We went first thing in the morning as we wanted the fish to be hungry - and the tanks to be clean!! There are debates about the whole health and safety thing of the same fish eating various people's skin etc.... - which means that these "spas" are banned in several US states.  But no conclusions have yet been made ...and so far, we have survived :-D

Chiu's new fish booties!

Whereas you typically think of pedicures as relaxing times, often with a chair massage too - this was not quite so relaxing. In fact, we spent 30 minutes laughing and crying! The fish seemed to do different things on different people - presumably finding some areas more tasty than others!!!

Anyhow it was an unusual experience and our feet definitely felt softer afterwards!