Everything about the hamman's internal operation was efficient. The mallim was the man in charge. The Master of the Furnace, assisted by his wakked, or strokes, kept the hammam's fire's blazing and the cauldron's of water bubbling. In spite of - or pehaps because of his euphemistic title, the Superintendent of Dung Fuel was looked down upon. Masseurs were designated by order of seniority. But before the massuer could work on you the undressing process had to take place.

Take an authentic 19th century Arabian Bath.

Note: The process described here is for men but can easily be modified to suit all travellers. Use this as a guided imagery and after you have 'snoozed' complete a piece in your journal.

Arriving at the hammam's entrance you pass into a quiet, steam filled world.

After walking down a narrow passageway you come into the meslakh (reception room), with its central, often octagonal fountain of cold water, in contrast to the heat from which you have come.

Divested of all you stood up in, wrapped from head to food in towels you clatter over the slick marble floors, passing through a series of small rooms, each much hotter than before, where little jets of gurgling hot water induce the profuse sweating required before the hammam ritual can begin in earnest.

As the heat becomes progressively more intense, servants remove your robes, one by one, until you are left with a loin cloth. Opening yet another small door, a servant ushers you into the dim heart of the hammam, the hararah, a steam filled chamber much hotter than any before. Overhead a masonry dome, pierced with small glass openings, admits narrow shafts of sunlight down onto a faskeeyah, or fountain spouting steaming hot water. Laid out on the wide octagonal marble perimeter of the faskeeyah are your fellow bathers, prostrate, sweating, some worked upon by equally sweaty masseurs. Here, amid the what-have-you of humanity, the masseurs are not above calling out sly asides to each other about the bodies in their grasp.

Emerging silently in his bare feet from a steam cloud and looking like a wrestler your mukeyyisate - your masseur - advances.

The mukeyyisate motions for you to lie down on a towel he spreads on the marble platform beneath the steaming fountain. You are now ready to submit to the onomatopoeic first stage of the hamman ritual, the taktakah, the cracking of joints. Each limb of your body is wrenched first one way, then another, a process designed to make your joints supple. The pulling and cracking of fingers and arms is followed by similar work on your neck: a twist left, crack, then right, crack, yet done with great skill. Next your ears are twisted and made to crack. Your masseur sits you upright and next jams his knee against your back and pops each vertebra: crack... crack... crack.

Another attendant advances and begins to rub the soles of your feet with a kind of rasp called a hager el hammam. The scraping of your feet sends you into shrieks of laughter. Finally, using the perfumed white fiber of a palm the mukeyyisate starts to lather the flesh and rinse the sea of foam with ladles of hot water, repeatedly thrown.

Twisted, manipulated, washed and wrung out to perfection you are led to the hammam's last vaporous chambers, the maghtas. A steady stream of hot water pours down from the dome overhead into a deep plunging pool. This is the climax of the hummam's hidden glory.

After all the rigor of the hammam's ritual to recline in deep hot water, overlooked by such beauty is a delight of delights. When you finally emerge all aglow, a servant of the bath quickly re-swathes you from head to toe in turban and towels and you are led back to the retiring room and placed upon a mattress and cushions amid other swathed figures and given coffee or fruit juice to sip on. It is a good time to snooze.

Outside, back in the dusty world of Arabia you clamber back on your camel, ready for the journey to Alexandria.

Extract from Joys of the Bath by John Feeney. Printed in Aramaco World March 2004