the turkish bath from hell

we headed straight from wadi rum to petra, where we stayed in the cheapest hotel offered up by lonely planet. that's not saying much, however, as nothing in jordan is cheap. it seems inflation has been off the charts for the past two years, and everything from food to gas to lodging fetches top dinar. we arrived on the late side and decided to indulge in the hotel's turkish bath. what could be better at the end of an adventurous day than a massage, sauna and jacuzzi, all without leaving the confines of your hotel? right? ha! seems the fates were not on our side that night. it turned into a debacle of nearly epic proportions, starting with the frenzied male guide who wasn't exactly clear about how much clothing we should leave on, and then joined us in his speedos. someone added a tad too much chlorine to the jacuzzi, and everyone but me ended up with chlorine poisoning. our guide apparently threw up out the window while i was in the other room listening to meghan and erin cough up a lung. i thought the woman giving me a massage was going to keel over. i kept telling her she could stop, but she proved to be more stubborn than i. it sounded like a horror movie infirmary, what with the bone rattling coughs and shouted instructions in arabic emanating from the fog. death by turkish bath. a surreal experience from beginning to end.