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Q: Kitchen safety in China?
I went to have dinner at a friend's house last night. She just moved into a renovated hutong apartment in central Beijing. As the place is super old, it didn't have a gas line coming in for the burners, and instead was connected to a big, rusty propane tank sitting like 2 feet away from the counter. She hadn't yet used the burners, and I was tasked with boiling some pasta so I went to turn it on and nothing happened. After tinkering with it for a few minutes and using a match to start the busted igniter, I finally got it to turn on....and it blew up and caught the entire countertop on fire briefly, also singeing all of the hair on my arm. Awesome guy that I am, I tried a second time with the other burner and the same thing happened. Scared the shit out of me. We eventually called the landlord who came over and tinkered with it for awhile and then said it was broken and would be replaced today.
My question is: is this kind of setup (propane tank next to the burners) common in older housing? It seems insanely dangerous. How are houses not blowing up all of the time in China?
11 years 1 week ago in Health & Safety - China
Hilarious. The place I used to live in in Liuzhou was pretty old and the gas stove was also powered by a propane tank which I tried to keep as far away from the stove as possible. There would often be gas smells coming from kitchen however as it took me a while to get used to actually turning the knobs tight enough so they were actually cut off.
yes, in our backup apartment it is made like this, and it is a very recently renovated place. the propane tank is in a cupboard intended for the purpose, and the counter is made from stone, so I would guess it will take some minutes from it catches fire until the roo is blown off the building.
I have seen the same setup in several other places.
I would personally go for an induction top if I was to renovate something in a place without proper gas pipes.
One of my favorites in the safety category is a power outlet below the shower head, the normal indoor kind.
diverdude1:
haha,,, i touched the electrical outlet beneath the shower head in my current apartment. I was treated to a bit of 'current'. shocking experience. zzzzt :-)
Safety? hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaahahahahaahahahahaahahahahaah
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i would never mess with propane tanks in china. think about!
I live in Shijiazhuang and this is the norm for here.
There have been few places that have plumbed in gas, unless they are pretty new. Unfortunately, for most expats there is no chance of getting one of these flats and you have to run the guantlet of the rusty tank.
Guilin, it was like you have said (OP).
My gas tank was about two meters away from the burner. What DID worry me was the guy who would come and change the tank. He would do so WHILE SMOKING! I asked him to put out his cigarette many times, but he would just laugh, so I would always wait outside when he did this. He could have robbed my house and I would not have known, but there was no way I was going to stay inside while he changed the tank and smoked.
Man, this is freaking terrifying. I don't think that I'd be able to sleep at night knowing that there's a propane tank just siting in the other room.
@ Scandinavian: my shower has one of these outlets in it too. WTF? Actually none of the outlets in the bathroom work anymore, probably due to water sneaking in and shorting them all out. At least mine have covers over them.
