Hair salon offers ssssoothing python neck massages

A German hair salon is stretching the boundaries of who ― or what ― can be a masseuse.

The Haar Mode Team salon in Dresden is now offering neck massages performed by Monty, the owner’s pet python.

Monty Python sits around the customer’s neck and gently pulsates in a manner that is probably ssssoothing if you’re not snake-phobic like Indiana Jones.

Although a python tends to kill its prey by wrapping around it and squeezing it to death, Monty’s owner, Falk Dohler, said that his python masseuse has been trained to be slightly more gentle.

Still, it’s no stretch to say customer Nadine Knect was slightly apprehensive about the massage.

“In the beginning, I was a little bit afraid,” she told Ruptly in the video above. “I thought the snake would be cold. But I should say, no, it is warm and it is a very pleasant feeling when it pulsates, when it massages the neck.”

Terry Phillip, the curator at Reptile Gardens in Rapid City, South Dakota, doubts that the snake has been “trained” to give massages.

“This is carnival kind of shit,” he said. “The snake is just doing what is natural for it ― it’s not a real massage.”

However, he says a snake of that size would be unable to suffocate a human.

“It sounds scary, but that snake is no wider than a golf ball,” he said.

Monty’s massages cost around INR 2,479.85, but good luck getting an appointment. He only works two days a week and is booked weeks in advance.