Brazilian Wax Put to the Test - WINNING ENTRY in our annual hair removal story giveaway contest.

I was spending 2 months teaching English in Brazil; the home land of amazon rainforest deforestation, samba dancing, THE carnival, and of course THE BRAZILIAN WAX.

As a newly devout convert to the Brazilian and Hollywood wax I thought I'd leave it to the native beauty experts in Rio de Janeiro to deal with and deforest my very own little rainforest that I had developed after 5 months of basic, no luxuries or high maintenance backpacking through South America.

Unfortunately, the party spirits of the Rio Carnival had quite literally gotten to me the night before my booked appointment with the waxer and I very badly sprained my ankle (took 6 months to heal).

So the next morning; my almost broken ankle, my hangover and I hobbled and limped along to the salon where I begun to get waxed as normal....

Lost in translation but with a lot of sign language, 'Gabriele' instructed me as to how I should have my legs. Spread, lift the left, lift the right, 'OUCH!' turn out your thighs...

She wasn't even half way through when she got to a 'tricky' spot and needed me to lift my injured leg up even higher, a contortion my still half drunk brain couldn't quite handle... my hurt ankle seemed to have a spazam and out of nowhere managed to kick the giant light bulb out of the main light in the cubicle.

The cubicle went into darkness for a few moments before the WHOLE SALON went into complete darkness.

I could hear a couple of screams and confused murmurs in the salon as to why the lights were out and pandemonium outside as the nail technicians dropped their pots of nail polish and the hairdressers moaning because they had to stop snipping..... all this as I laid half drunk with my legs in the air looking like I was in labour without any nickers on.

Feeling the pressure and feeling responsible my immediate reaction was to JUMP off the bed to grab the light bulb I had knocked down....

All of a sudden the manager of the salon walks in to check we are all okay not realising I had been the one who caused the problem....

she comes in with a SPOT LIGHT sized torch shining on my HALF WAXED hoohaa,

I'm crippled over because of my hurt ankle AND holding the very key to the problem, the long light bulb filter in my hand.

I felt like a naughty child and stood frozen! After a noisy and feisty conversation in Portuguese between my waxer and the manager, a few more heads popped round the door, me still frozen, and my waxer just hands me over my knickers........