Would You Try a Python Neck Massage? Bookings Are Full!

A German hair salon offers its clients an extraordinary massage service: a python. The salon, located in Dresden, offers any interested customer a massage by wrapping the snake around their neck. By the way, the python isn’t an official employee of the salon but rather the private pet of the salon owner.

Pythons may not be venomous, but they are deadly: they kill their prey by coiling around it and squeezing. Considering this, it’s quite surprising that the Dresden salon finds clients willing to wrap this "killing machine" around their necks. However, the salon owner insists in media interviews that his private python, Monty, has been trained to be more gentle, and that his body, ninety percent of which is muscle, is an ideal tool for delivering a relaxing massage. Experts, on the other hand, say that Monty probably isn’t dangerous – he’s too slender to strangle a human to death – but he’s also not particularly beneficial to the customer’s neck. In other words, Monty doesn’t really "deliver massages," he just moves around a bit, as pythons are wont to do.

A customer named Nadine Knecht says she was indeed apprehensive at first, but Monty quickly dispelled her fears. "I thought he would be cold, but no, his body is warm and it feels very nice when he’s wrapped around your neck, and he does a sort of massage," she says.

If you’re convinced and want to travel to Dresden to book an appointment with the snake masseur, sorry to disappoint. The pampered Monty works only two days a week, and all his slots for the coming weeks have long been booked. By the way, a massage with Monty costs $38.