Only in Malaysia

This would only happen in Malaysia.

YOU'VE heard of spas facing the beach or in a rainforest setting. How about one set in prison?

POPULAR: Selangor's Kajang Prison spa was opened last December. It's the first of its kind in Malaysia. PICTURE: NST

This is no gimmick. For a start, it is not for profit and your spa therapists are the prison's female inmates.

Authorities of one of Malaysia's biggest prisons came up with this novel idea to rehabilitate its inmates and has opened its services to the public, reported New Straits Times.

The report claimed that the service is so popular that on weekends, some hopeful customers are left disappointed because they are not allowed in.

Selangor's Kajang Prison spa - the first of its kind in the country - was opened last December.

Prison authorities embarked on the project to teach skills to women prisoners, some of them foreigners who were ironically thrown behind bars for working illegally in beauty and massage parlours.

Corporal Rahmah Zawawi, a warden who has been working at Kajang Prison (women's wing) for the past 22 years, said the spa and salon training had been such a success that private beauty parlour owners had inquired about hiring the prisoners.