New York City, an urban sprawl of infinite indulgences and seemingly unlimited income to throw at them.

Nowhere, is this excessiveness more apparent than within the realm of the various spa and beauty services, which are unabatedly offered on every street corner in every neighborhood. Indeed, you need not walk more than a block to find an available nail salon jam packed with women (and some men) from every imaginable walk of life, be they flipping through last month’s Vogue or down on hands and knees vigorously rubbing away other people’s dry skin.

Maybe it’s because of the stress that the city inevitably incurs, but for some reason, the spa has a magnetic draw for us Manhattan mavens. You can imagine my unmitigated glee, therefore, upon discovering a spa-week-esque special offering fifty-nine dollar spa treatments at select salons for one week only. Overtaken by glee, and acting like any wry New York woman, I pounced, making an appointment post haste. What I failed to remember however, was another golden rule of city living; namely, you get what you pay for. Even though for my fifty-nine dollars (well, actually, sixty one fifty with tax) I got an exfoliating body wrap, manicure and mini facial, the circumstances proved to be less than ideal.

My roommate and I arrived at the salon and were ushered into a chaotic world of Russian speaking women, all of whom were barking at one another over a intricate series of intercoms.

As I received my manicure, I found myself alternating between staring out the window and casually glancing at the hands of my own manicurist, which were harboring some unfortunate looking substances beneath the nail. I had noticed her eating a knish right before being assigned to my nails and I deduced that the aforementioned food had remained lodged beneath her nails.

My manicure turned out sub par which is somewhat expected, so I ventured towards my body wrap optimistically, never having received such treatment before. In a cubicle sized room I stripped naked, put on disposable underwear and awaited treatment. When Gladys, a sixty something, red haired, tracksuit clad woman came in, addressing me “skinny baby”, I smiled encouragingly. Alas my happiness soon turned to certain dismay as Gladys slathered me all over with scalding hot brown goop, refuting my innocent pleas against the burning sensation it incurred. Lucky for me, the pain of treatment didn’t last too long for as soon as she finished, BAM, down goes the entire massage table with a goop slathered, naked me on top of it.

Once the table was reinstated (Gladys had to call for reinforcements while I stood there, awkward and uncovered) she proceeded with my “facial” which was basically her telling me that I had very dry skin whilst rubbing aloe vera on my face in circular motions.

To make the rest of a long story short, I ran from the place, sixty one dollars poorer and still covered in the reminisces of my body wrap but wiser one more essential New York City rule of thumb: for as fancy and indulgent as the city can be, when it’s bad, it is extremely so…beware the “spa special”