Hamam Day in Baku

Welcome to the Taze Bey Hamam, near (but not in) the Old City of Baku

Light vacation posting today, which is, sadly, my final day in Baku and Azerbaijan.

The posting is scant because today was a work day..  It happens.  Which is why retirement keeps calling my name louder and louder.  I want vacations that are pure vacation.

I had only one mandatory agenda item for today -- apart from the "digital nomad" day of working remotely via laptop -- and that was to visit a hamam.

A hamam is a Turkish bath house/spa. The Azerbaijani have the own (slight) variation on this theme.  The chosen hamam came highly recommended by my hotel and by tour guide from yesterday: Taze Bey.  It is, I believe, the oldest operational hamam in the city, although I might have pulled that out of a place known for lacking in sunshine.

The walk from the hotel to the Taze Bey was not long at all.  It took me past the beautiful Ismailiyya Palace building:

I soon was walking up the street where google maps on my phone was telling me the Taze Bey would be.  Then I saw it:  a boatload of beautiful golden kitsch:

So golden!  So kitschy!

It had to be the place and it was.

Kitschy kitschy ya-ya dahhh,

Let's go in, shall we?

And then the kitsch became overwhelming:

The decor did not appear to be traditional Azerbaijani, as one would have expected from the oldest operational hamam in Baku. But it was spectacularly beautiful in its own bizarre way.

Are we going to have a look inside the hamam itself, beyond the entryway?  No.  Not allowed.  And for good reason:  too many men wearing nothing but towels.  And who wants to see me wearing nothing but a towel?  Or, worse yet, nothing but soap bubbles.

The place was an assembly line of hamam pampering.  First came the dry sauna.  Then the cold plunge.  Which was really really cold.  So cold that the only option was a full plunge rather than a gradual descent.  Then it was time to lay down on a marble slab where what felt like rainwater poured down on me from the ceiling.  Next was the Turkish sauna, or steam room.  Not too hot.  Not too steamy.  In the steam room, you get beaten with eucalyptus branches.  Not too hard.  I guess it's for the circulation.  Or it could be that this is way for the steam room attendant to get his jollies.  Then came the body scrub, known as the kisechi.  (The word for that in Turkish hamams is similar, but a little different.)  Then the most powerful jacuzzi I have ever been in ever.  Then the massage.  Finally, the process concluded with getting soaped down.

In all honesty, I don't think I've felt this clean in some time.  And my skin feels smooth from the scrub.  PS:  I screwed up the process by not tipping my scrubber, my masseuse or my body-washer (who also was the body scrubber, but not the masseuse).  I didn't tip because I had been told repeatedly that Azerbaijan is not a tipping country.  Well, there are exceptions to every rule and tipping your attendants at an Azerbaijani hamam is one of those exceptions.  Next time I know.  If they let me back in for a next time given that I failed to tip my hamam attendants.

It being night when I left the hamam, the path I walked to get to the Taze Bey now was lit up for the evening.  For example, above. the Ismailiyya Palace.

Or this:

The Fountain in Sabir Bağı park.  Lit up for the night under the glow of the crescent moon, which is perfect for a modern Islamic country.  Tomorrow:  Tbilisi.