Ear Candling in Kuala Lumpur

This isn't the illegal remains of what you might think. Here in Malaysia, drugs of all kinds will get you 30 years in the slammer and several lashings.

Rather, it's toxins and residue from 2 candles that burned brightly in my ears during an ancient practice called "Ear Candling." Yup, I'm still here in Kuala Lumpur and things are getting stranger by the minute.

I trusted our guide, Sara to educate me on the process before I blew $50 on the luxury. She said it would improve circulation, balance and rid wax from my ear. I was skeptical but after the fish spa I was anxious for another radical experience. She encouraged me to visit a new spa with numerous awards called Jojoba Spa.

As soon as I walked in I was greeted with the soothing scents of sandlewood and frangipani. 3 smiling women in Asian dress gently offered me a menu of services to pick from. But I knew what I wanted and waited my turn, a little weary of the process.

A fragile Malay woman escorted me to a back room decorated with bamboo, stone strips between slabs of floor tile, low lighting and light instrumental music. I undressed from the waist up and lay down on my side on a toweled message table. My therapist (that's what they like to be called) placed a 12-inch beeswax stick in my ear, struck a match and lit the wick.

Oh no, I thought. Even with a towel over my head, my hair was full of flammable hairspray. I prayed that it wouldn't catch on fire.

The sizzle and crackle echoed lightly in my ear drum. It was a pleasant, nostalgic sound that reminded me of sitting around an open-air campfire roasting marshmallows. I was quickly lulled into a place of comfort and tranquility.

Then, the shoulder message began. My therapist proved to have magic fingers and poured her energy into relaxing every sore muscle in my back. Even though she was tiny, her fingers were strong enough to crush steel.

While she gave me the back message of a lifetime, the flame got closer and closer to my ear. Supposedly, the process was creating a vacuum that was removing the impacted earwax and other impurities and sucking everything up onto the wax paper. As far-fetched and ethereal as that sounds the practice has been around for hundreds of years.

"Would you like me to dig deeper?" asked my therapist. "Sure, why not," I said. The pressure nearly strangled me to death but the effect was worth it. I stumbled out of Jojoba like a boiled piece of stringy spaghetti. If only I could take my therapist back to New York with me!