The Sawasdee Thai Spa is located in Ambience mall on the second floor (just below Rockman’s Beer Island). You can walk in to a nice snug reception and the folks behind the reception desk are very friendly and helpful. There is a menu of treatments and massages that you can choose from, and I chose to have something called the Lotus Signature Massage (it wasn’t really called this, but something similar) – this massage was a combination of Swedish style and hot compresses – it sounded good.

You have a choice of a male or a female therapist, with your choice not necessarily always available (a busy place this is). I waited for about 10-15 minutes while they prepared the room. In the meantime, they brought me a glass of water – this is important. Before any massage, you should drink water because a massage releases toxins into the blood stream, and if there is not enough water in your body to dilute and ‘wash-out’ the toxins, then you will end up with a headache after the massage (as the toxins hit your brain). It is very important to have water before and after your massage. And since I didn’t ask for the water, it shows that they know their business (not every spa I have been to does this).

Before you are led to your room, they get you to change into soft slippers (you leave your shoes at the reception where they are placed securely in a shoe rack behind the counter). The room was very nice – clean, softly lit, with a built-in shower area. The masseuse that was assigned to me was really strong. She gave my body a very nice workout and squeezed weeks worth of stress out of my body. I have to mention the quality of the place a little more in terms of cleanliness – I have visited other spas in Gurgaon (such as Body Spa) and sometimes felt very dissatisfied with the cleanliness of towels and sheets for the massage table. But this place I had no concerns (by the way, its new, so let’s see if they keep their quality up).

I felt very good after the massage, and I got the impression that the masseuse was a qualified professional who knew what she was doing. There was hot tea offered post massage, which is a great alternative to water for hydrating your body. I felt so relaxed that I started walking out without my shoes and would have if the receptionist hadn’t called out after me to remind me. Another point I noticed is that there was no external noise in the massage room. This is something that is good. I think its very important for the mind to relax as the body is being worked upon, and there should be no intrusion on your mind during this period. I often fall asleep during a good massage, and the same thing happened here.

Obviously, I recommend this place highly.

Now for the cost – this 90 minute massage cost me almost Rs. 3500 (they have an introductory discount going on). Needless to say, it is not cheap. However, if you compare this to places such as Body Spa (which cost almost as much and doesn’t provide a fraction of the quality that this place offers) and also the fact that it is situated in one of the best malls in Gurgaon, the price is reasonable.

Another thing to notice is that you might want to call up in advance to book an appointment. While I was waiting for my room to be prepared I saw a number of people who came and left disappointed because there was no open slot available. Their website is still under construction, but it tells you the number to call: +91 124 466 5454.

Have you visited Sawasdee? If yes, please leave your impression in the comments.

Almost all malls in Gurgaon have a salon – a lot have more than one. The mall that I most visit is Ambience Mall on NH8, and the salon present in this mall is called Hair n Shanti. I am a regular at this place, as is my wife, and this blog post is a quick review of our experience with Hair n Shanti.

If you are in a hurry, here’s the quick review: generally, you will be pleased with the outcome of your visit. There are no red flags in terms of services provided and the quality of service. So, I recommend this salon.

However, if you need a little more detail, read on.

The place is usually crowded, so either take an appointment, or be prepared to wait a little while you are adjusted in between appointments. I normally just walk in there the moment I enter the mall to see when the next slot is, and then adjust my other activities in the mall accordingly.

The services offered to the ladies are fairly good (as witnessed by my wife – she has never complained once, so it must be good).

For myself, I can vouch for the haircut and head massage which are always excellent. I have been nicked a couple of times while getting a shave, so I generally avoid that (but I think that is pretty much the norm anywhere). My wife forced me into getting a manicure once, but I didn’t like what they did and nor did she. However, there are always plenty of men getting a variety of face and hair treatments, so overall it should be good.

Most people seem to be regulars (as evidenced by the familiarity between the service providers and the customers). What this says is that they are happy with what they get and that is why they return.

The guy who I normally get catered by is named Sahil, and he is fairly good. You can ask for him by name.

Now the main negative – the place is expensive. A men’s haircut costs Rs. 400. So you can scale the other things accordingly. I guess that is the price you pay for the location and the convenience. But if that doesn’t bother you, this place is certainly recommended.

Have you had experiences at Hair n Shanti? Please leave comments.

Two incidents happened which has almost ensured that I am never going back to Artemis.

They don’t care about the customer’s time

I have been having a pretty severe pain in my wrist and needed to visit an Orthopedic. I went to Artemis and sat at their OPD registration desk. They told me that Dr. Hegde is on call, and I can have an appointment with him. I said, that is fine. Then as he tried to book the appointment, he told me that Dr. Hegde will only be available after one hour, and so I had to wait. Since I didn’t have the time I told him not to bother and I will come back another day (as I can’t wait for an hour). Then he told me to wait while he got on the phone. Then he said, a doctor will see me now. He said another doctor who is an associate of Dr. Hegde’s will be able to see me. Since, I was only there for a preliminary diagnosis, I didn’t care and told him that it is alright. Incidentally, this doctor wasn’t even listed in their doctors’ database, and the appointment was made in the name of Dr. Hegde.

Never mind, I said to myself; I made the payment and off I went to look for this doctor. Now here’s the kicker. I still had to wait in this doctor’s office (there were no other patients) FOR ONE HOUR. This is after I told them that I had more important things to do and I can not wait for an hour. It all went downhill from there. I couldn’t leave as I had paid already and every visit to the registration desk yielded a he’s-just-coming response. I would have expected that after waiting for an hour, Dr. Hegde will show up; but no, it was his ‘associate’. If ever, a doctor has not looked like a doctor, it was this time. In any case, all this guy did was hold my wrists for a minute or two, move it around, and then told me to go get an MRI.

That’s it.

Getting an MRI and how incompetent these people are

I went back to the OPD to see if I could get an MRI right then (I was already late), but I guess I was overly optimistic. There was no chance of that, so I left thinking that I will take an appointment and then come.

Well, a couple of days later when I did have the time, I called them up for an appointment. I asked and they gave me an appointment for the same day, and asked me to come sharply at the appointment time. Well, good I thought. Since that would mean I wouldn’t have to waste my time.

I got to the hospital almost on time, and went to their diagnostics desk. For almost 10 minutes, nothing happened. This is a private hospital, they charge a lot of money for their services, and they are still understaffed? The guy who was holding the prescription just didn’t do anything about it for 10 minutes. He just kept yapping on one phone call after another.

In any case, when I got a little pissed, he started looking for my appointment details, and then told me that I don’t have an appointment. I said that’s impossible, since I had confirmed the appointment on phone. He then looked and found out that I had been given an appointment for the next day. Once again, this was a sheer waste of my time.

I told him to cancel my appointment for the next day and left. Of course, I still haven’t got an MRI done on my wrist, as it seems that there are not enough MRI machines in Gurgaon and too many people need to get an MRI done, so there’s always a queue.

All of the major hospitals and clinics in Gurgaon now have an ultrasound facility. Here are the ones that we have been to:

Apollo Clinic – there is usually a very long wait at the Apollo Clinic. First of all, you need to have an appointment, but despite the appointment, you may have to wait for a couple of hours. This is a result of mismanagement and also the fact that they have only one machine, so sometimes it needs to be used in emergency cases ahead of the appointment holders.

The waiting area is also quite cramped and small.

Max Hospital – we have used this one a couple of times. Once again, like all hospitals, this also gives preference to emergency cases. My wife had to go in once with an emergency, and she was able to get it done immediately.

Another time when she called for an appointment, she was told that there was no slot available for 3 days. The overall feel of the place is however better than Apollo.

Artemis Hospital – this is of course a super speciality center with state of the art facilities. The best thing about Artemis is that they have two independent Ultrasound rooms, and so there is always plenty of availability and you usually get an appointment without too much wait.

The one thing bad about Artemis is that, they are not sensitive to providing same gender doctor by default. My wife has visited the place multiple times, and once she was assigned a male doctor for a pregnancy ultrasound. We didn’t have a big problem with that, but I imagine a lot of people may have. The biggest thing is that, when we took the appointment, a lady doctor was mentioned on the actual appointment, but a male doctor was assigned instead.

All these big hospitals have one flaw however – they have a staff of doctors who operate the facility. So, there is no guarantee of getting the same doctors every time you go there.

Our Best Experience has been at a different facility altogether. We highly recommend a clinic called the Ultrasound Clinic (not very original, I know), which is run by one Dr. Girish Pandit. He is one of the most highly recommended doctors and we were referred to him from multiple gynecologists. He specializes in pregnancy related ultrasounds. The best thing about this place is that the Doctor himself is a very nice person, and has the quality which puts you at ease.

The clinic is located in Qutab Enclave market in DLF Phase I. You can only get in by appointment, but the good thing is that the appointments times are usually met, so you don’t have to wait too long.

If you have had any experiences with Ultrasounds in Gurgaon, please leave a comment.

Here’s where an Early Learning Center such as Intellitots comes in. One of the readers of this blog left a comment about Intellitots and how happy she was after visiting them (thanks Anika for pointing them out). Because of her feedback, I decided to get in touch with Intellitots and get some more information about them.

Intellitots is an activity center which offers a number of parent-toddler and parent-infant programs to stimulate the development of young children. Learning Centers such as Intellitots are pretty common in places developed nations such as USA or Australia, but are only now picking up in India.

About the Team

Intellitots was founded by two moms (Pooja and Shivani) who are both ex-IITians who had gone on to work in MNCs like Adobe, Palm, and Infosys. They have both lived abroad during their working times. Recently, both of them have left their professional lives to devote their time to Intellitots. They are both proud mothers of two.

Pooja and Shivani have partnered with Jimmy Eappen who is a seasoned teacher who was trained at the Julia Gabriel Center for Learning at Singapore. Jimmy specializes in speech, drama, and early childhood education, and manages all the programs at the center.

Activities and Programs

They have a number of programs that are run throughout the week, and you can visit the following page to get a complete listing: Programs. By the looks of the photograph (click the image to get a larger version), all the children are very happy in whatever they are doing (looks to me like they are building a parachute).

Here’s a description provided by Intellitots about their programs (I couldn’t have worded it better):

We offer a variety of activity based learning classes for 0-5 yr olds, designed to foster intellectual, social and physical development.  Activities include learning through music, movement and storytelling. We use age appropriate equipment sourced globally and have a professionally developed international curriculum.

Location and Contact

Intellitots is conveniently located near Galleria, in DLF Phase IV (next to Gate 1 of Ridgewood Estate). They can be reached via sending an email to info@intellitots.in. They are a very responsive bunch of people, and are always very happy to invite you over to their facility.

Conclusion

Based on Anika’s recommendation, and my discussions with Pooja (from Intellitots) I feel that it is a nice place to take your children to. If anyone amongst you have had an experience with Intellitots (good or bad), please leave a comment.

Oriental Senses is the latest massage service which has opened in Gurgaon. It is located on the second floor of DT Mega Mall on Golf Course Road (incidentally, the same mall also has an Ayurvedic Massage Center). Oriental Senses offers traditional Thai Massage, Shiatsu, and Foot Massage.

A one hour massage costs less than Rs. 1000. I think that is a great price.

The place itself is small. Once you get there, you are asked to change into soft tee-shirt and shorts which are provided. Then the therapist begins the massage in a very Thai style setup (a small mattress on a wooden floor). The entire setup is very Thai, with the next person only separated from you by a curtain (this is just how a lot of massage parlors in Thailand are setup).

As for the massage, it was great. The therapist who worked on me knew her stuff. She was able to increase or decrease pressure according to my needs. And after the massage I felt quite refreshed.

I think the only drawback is that the noises of the mall can penetrate into the massage area and so it is not as relaxing as it can be. But the quality of the massage more than makes up for this.

I recommend everyone who visits Mega Mall to take out this hour. Oh, and you should call ahead to book as they can only take three people at a time. Here are the phone numbers: +91 9818111433, +91 124 4307505.

Update (Sep 26, 2008): I visited Oriental Senses again today. And once again, I can safely say that I will continue to recommend the place to anyone and everyone.

This time it was a Foot Reflexology session that I tried and yes, even this was as good as the Shiatsu Massage. What is really good is that the therapists seem to be automatically tuned into your needs.

For example, today a group of people came in for their massage while I was having my massage, and they were (as is expected of us Indians) pretty loud while conversing amongst themselves and very chatty – with no regards to the quiet atmosphere in the facility. And it was actually quite disturbing, and my therapist must have read something on my face, because right as I was about to get up and request them to be quiet, she actually did it herself.

Have you tried Oriental Senses? Please leave a comment about your experience. Thanks.

Ranbaxy has a number of collection centers in Gurgaon, so you can even drop off the samples if you don’t like people coming to your home. You can find contact details and locations for these centers on the website (linked above).

However, it is hard to find the number for their home sample collection service. Well, I did a little bit of digging and here’s the number.

Ranbaxy Home Collection Service Number: 0124-44121212

If you have had experience using this service, please leave your comments.

We have tried sending her to a kennel. But she came back full of flees and had lost her appetite totally. For a very long time, we used to leave her with our Vet’s assistant. He used to love her, but that didn’t work out when we had to go away on Diwali.

Well, that was when we chanced upon Kennel One.

Of course, if we are driving somewhere, then we always take our pet Trinity along (her picture below).

Kennel One is one of the best facilities in Gurgaon. They have a large amount of open space where your pet dogs are actually let free. They are not kept locked in or on a leash (unless your particular pet is a trouble maker – even then the enclosures for such pets are fairly spacious).

The owner (Shailendra) is a dog-lover himself. He actually put the place together to keep his own pets to begin with. Then his friends started to ask him for favors, and so a business was born. However, we have to say that it is still not run like a professional business (which is good and bad at the same time).

For example, they offer pick up and drop off facilities (for a charge of course), but sometimes their timings can be totally off. But they are good most of the times. We have left Trinity at Kennel One a number of times, and have been satisfied mostly (there was one time, when we were unhappy, and I will talk about that a little later).

The price that we pay (not sure if everyone is charged the same) Rs. 250 per day. This includes both food and lodging. The food provided seems good (as per my wife). However, extras such as giving baths, a vet visit, etc. are charged extra.

The facility is located a little further down the highway from Hero Honda Chowk in Gurgaon. But the way to get there is pretty potholed and you better not go there in your Honda Civic (maybe if you have a CRV, you will be fine). This problem is usually overcome by the Kennel One guys offering to come and meet you on the main road for pick up and drop offs. They are also courteous enough to come and meet you on the main road so that you can follow them to their facility (as you may not find it on your own easily).

So, all in all, its been satisfactory to leave Trinity there. All, except the last time. We had to leave for 10 days, and left her there. When we got back, we got a very thin and ragged Trinity. Her coat was in bad shape as well. It took about 10 days at home and she was back in good shape. We don’t know what happened, and both of us are pretty busy, and so didn’t get a chance to follow it up. Maybe it was chance, and we will have to see what happens next time.

The only other complaint I have with Kennel One is the way they charge money. First of all, they don’t offer discounts on long term lodgings (such as 10 days we left here there the last time). Second is the way they calculate the money. For example, if I drop her off today, and pick her up tomorrow, they will charge Rs. 500 (for two days). I find that very odd, and wrong actually.

But, its a one of a kind facility in Gurgaon, so right now, its the best. Their website is at http://www.kennel1.net.

Personally I feel that Ambience Mall is the best one around in Gurgaon. It’s big, spacious, has a large variety of stores, has enough entertainment and food outlets, and is classy (which other mall has a BMW showroom in it?). But, then something would happen that reminds you that you are in India. Here’s what happened:

After the movie got over, we roamed around the mall just a little bit and then went to the elevator to go down to the parking (so that we could go home). We were on the 2nd floor.

We pressed the down call button on the elevator. The elevator came, and didn’t stop, and simply went on down. Well, I thought, it must have been full. Again I pressed the button, again I waited, and again it didn’t stop and simply went down. Hmm. Another couple was waiting with us and decided to take a quick peak from the side and saw that the elevator was completely empty.

This actually happened a third time (and by this time I had lost my cool). Normally, if this happens, I would simply walk, take the stairs or the escalator. That day, my wife wasn’t well and didn’t feel like walking a lot.

When the elevator finally came, I questioned the guard who was operating it for his behavior. He of course made excuses first about how it was full and all (which we knew he was lying about). When confronted, he said that his superiors had ordered him not to stop the elevator at any floor.

I asked my wife to wait in the car and asked him to call his superior. To make a long story short, this guy was acting on his own because someone from PVR had asked him to make sure that the elevator is on the 4th floor at a particular time. The reason? Some ‘VIP’ was going to get through watching a movie, and had asked to ensure that he doesn’t have to wait for the elevator.

The problem?

Well, aside from the fact that this shouldn’t happen in the first place, there is one thing mainly wrong with this: Customer Service. If the elevator was not going to be available for some time, the least that they should have done was let us know. All they had to do is put a ‘not-available’ sign on each floor for the duration of this.

That incident completely ruined our evening.

Let’s talk a bit about the overall experience (the movie itself was just one part of it). I got to the mall a little after 11:00pm. Here’s a very important tip: for this late movie get to the mall before 11:00, and here’s why.

The basement parking closes at 11:00pm. They won’t let you in. I don’t know about you, but I feel the most comfortable parking in the basement of a mall. I had to go all the way around to the back of the mall (it’s a huge mall) and then park in the open. It was chaos to park there. Since it was in the open, a lot of people chose to park their car not in the designated open parking area, but on the road side (to save 20 rupees? I saw some pretty expensive cars being parked that way).

In any case, parking in that open area is a pain because then you might be stuck in the mall if it’s raining because it’s a good 100 meter walk before the open marking starts from the mall gate, and so you will get drenched (as I almost did since it started raining about 2 minutes after I got in my car).

Other than this instance, the experience was good. It was crazy to see a mall as big as this completely empty (after the movie). I wish I had my camera with me, I would have certainly taken pictures.