The very thought of a spa is enough to give a tingling vibrance to our tired body. In the fast-paced life with heavy loads of work we hardly get the time to take care of our body. No wonder, the advertising agencies cash on the word spa to sell all kinds of products. In the midst of all these connotations we may lose the real meaning of a spa. Literally, the word spa refers to a health resort located near a water body like a spring or at the seaside.
The word comes from a place called Spa in Belgium where there are those historic springs. In the olden days the wounded Roman soldiers would come to these mineral springs to bathe after war in order to soothe their aching bodies and heal their injuries with the warm water of the spring. Since then any natural or manmade place that has medicinal spring is called a spa. In eastern New England these mineral springs were also called soda fountain.
However, according to another story the word spa is derived from the Latin phrase ‘sanitas per aqua,’ or ‘health through water’. All this shows that spa is synonymous with water having medicinal value. That is not to say that the spas that pop up in...