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Q: why chinese people prefer hot water?
they have to boil the water to get the impurities out of it
Hot water and cold water are both bad for your throat.
Warm water is best because it hydrates you quicker.
The body trying to warm water up is a more industrious process than cooling down the water.
woody:
BS. Just about all Chinese I know who tell me the cold water BS story just happen to eat plenty of ice confectionary in summer. I try and use the "L" word and ask them why the ice block does not have the same issues but they seem unable to grasp my point. Sheeesh....
The belief is that anything cold is very hard on the stomach--cold food (why you don't see fruit refrigerated), cold drinks. Even if it's summer, the Chinese believe that drinking very cold drinks is very bad for you and puts too much stress on your stomach, which is why you'll see -many people drinking hot or luke warm water.
China is the only place I have seen people taking ice cream on a bowl and placing it inside the microwave to heat up before eating it. And I have seen many weird customs in my travels.
Jnusb416:
Honestly they don't seem to have much ice cream here to begin with. It's not like I see a tub of ice cream. They're all about one serving size, and very limited flavors like vanilla. I can't wait to go home and having something with tons of stuff in it, like mini peanut butter cups.
I was just reading about water in China, didn't know this. I use a jug of water a month.
If you are using the drinking water contained in a large plastic barrel, it's recommended that you use it up within one week. Once the date range spans more than seven days, the water can cause a health risk as bacteria may become present, especially in summer.
Boiling water kills the bacteria, but does not remove most other contaminations.
This is just a rationalizaton though and not the full story of hot water in China.
I am not sure about the water in other places but in Guiyang we usually don't use tap water for drinking or cooking. The reason is not because of pollution (as an environmentalist pollution if anything that is present above natural level then it is pollution) rather than the geography of this region. As it is a Karst area, water contains high amount of Carbonates which is very costly to remove. Though they are doing their best and recently saw them changing the main pipelines. Even though, I frequently put the water in the bottle for many days (sometimes months) to see if any growth of algae. If water has anything favoring algal growth (nutrients such as nitrates and phosphates is must for algal growth).
I do same with jar water also. Usually I put them in a bottle and I am happy not to see any precipitates or algal growth.
About other harmful trace elements, as I work in the lab, i frequently tested them for elements such as Pb, Cd, Sb etc and I found below detection limit (probably in nanogram range).
About warm water: I asked some chinese colleagues and they said it is helpful to clean oils in the digestive system beside other advantages. But for me doing this kills adaptive behavior of my throat. So I prefer water with room temperature.
But I just could not understand why my GF prefers to use warm water shower even during summer! When asked, she said it is nice and helps to keep her skin young...Then i wonder why GrandPa and Grand ma who are both above 85 and who never took warm shower are still active (more than me) and healthy.. Even during freezing temperature they just go for cold shower between 5 - 6 am.
@ TED: one reason for consuming the drinking water in plastic jar soon is that there my be leaching of some trace elements or organic compounds from the bottle if you keep longer. Few years ago one research has been done about leaching of Antimony (Sb)from the bottles. Though the results showed that there is continuous leaching of Sb but even within 6 months the amount was not significant. I am not sure how they make the plastic bottles in China and no research has been done so far. I asked my colleague to do (as I was part of that earlier research) it but seems no one is much interested.
They say it is better for your health and let's just leave it at that. Besides that I haven't heard much else about it. I always say drink cold water when it's hot and hot drinks when the weather is cold.
Hot water cures all ailments...hands down... it's greatest remedy of all time.
Well at least that's what they think.
But...I will say hot water does help ease the shit out.
HugAPanda:
amen cooter... if I gotta drink hot water it better have some coffee in it. Or at least caffeinated tea.
thedude:
I prefer coffee too. I almost never drink hot water but the gf swears by it and I have read that it helps with digestion.
HOT WATER SOUP, Mrs. Douglas specialty.---------------------------> Green Acres
1. It purifies the water
2. They believe the stomach is warm inside, and they think it's bad to disturb the warmth with drinking cold water. So to keep the stomach at peace, they drink warm/hot water. They say it will ruin your stomach if you always drink cold water.
you absorb more when u drink hot water(not super hot), it makes you poop in time and your skin will get better and better. cold water is never good for your stomach. Actually if you drink too much cold stuff u will put on weight.
I disagree with cold water causing weight gain. Your body needs to warm the water, which requires calories. You're actually burning calories by warming the water. Since water is a 0 calorie substance, you will lose weight with cold water.
