How do you keep cool with out an air conditioner in a 12 months of record-breaking warmth?

Last week we featured a narrative by heatwave researcher Dr. Gulrez Shah Azhar about how he dealt with brutally high temps whereas rising up in India with no A/C. And we requested NPR readers to share their suggestions.

Here’s a number of reader responses, edited for size and readability. And we additionally requested Azhar to supply his tackle their recommendation – in addition to to share extra insights.

Watch what you eat!

Colette Parry, Boston, Mass.: When I used to be rising up in Portland, Oregon, we by no means cooked in the course of the day in the summertime. We ate plenty of no-cook meals like corn and bean salad (recipe: can of black beans, a bag of frozen corn, a chopped crimson pepper or different veg and seasoning/dressing to style). Anything that required cooking, we did at night time after which both ate it chilly in the course of the day or heated up within the microwave. Azhar: Haha, that is so intelligent – easy and so ingenious. I’m all for it!

Meg T., Portland, Maine: Something I discovered whereas visiting India was to eat loads of cooling meals like watermelon and cucumber. On tremendous scorching days I’ll change to principally these meals and it makes an unbelievable distinction within the temperature of my physique and the flexibility to cope with the warmth. Azhar: Yes, meals with plenty of fluids and electrolytes are tremendous useful in retaining one cool and hydrated. I’d additionally add yogurt-based drinks like raita and chhas (buttermilk) to this checklist.

Anthea Peck, Sebastopol, Calif.: As a child from Georgia rising up in India, I’ve SO many reminiscences of the warmth. I bear in mind getting warmth exhaustion after I was 10 after driving a horse within the early morning. I bear in mind my father (who labored for the World Health Organization) giving me U.N. oral rehydration packets to hold round. My faculty advised us to hold salt packets. Azhar: Oh sure, that is so sensible. Either an ORS pack or just combine a spoon of sugar and a pinch of salt in a glass of water to replenish all of the electrolytes misplaced in sweat.

Water your self

Laurisa Rich, Martha’s Vineyard, Mass.: When I lived within the tropics, I discovered it ever so useful to maintain my hair moist and dripping. The evaporative motion on the top and shoulders is so refreshing and helps to remain cool. Azhar: Yes, that is a kind of under-appreciated however cool methods of staying cool! But watch out and avoid hard water as it could hurt your hair.

Jeff Weit, Atascadero, Calif.: Growing up close to East Los Angeles we have been too removed from the ocean to obtain any of its cooling results, so we relied on my mother for tactics to chill down within the scorching summers. For occasion, we might use our daytime water weapons, aka our mother’s Amway squirt bottles, to spray ourselves as we lay in mattress whereas my brother and I fought over how one can direct the field fan for bedtime. Azhar: In India it might most certainly be a desk fan or a pedestal fan. For taking part in with water we’d use squirt bottles to spray water. In reality, the onset of summer time is widely known with a competition referred to as “Holi” the place we spray colours – each dry and moist (utilizing water balloons and water bottles).

Sleep sensible — and funky

Scott Taylor, Lawrence, Kan.: When we lived in southern Arizona, among the older homes had an “Arizona room.” I requested a local Arizonan about these projecting, three-sided screened porches. He defined that earlier than they’d air con, households would sleep there. Being open to the breeze on three sides, it was a lot cooler than the principle home with simply the home windows open. Azhar: A terrific concept. It is such a pleasant approach to keep cool.

L. Chunn, Prescott, Ariz.: I grew up in Monrovia, a suburb of Los Angeles, with out air con, and my sister and I had a few favourite options to maintain cool on scorching summer time days within the Fifties. August and September have been at all times unbearably scorching. We took benefit of a cement ground that had been tiled over in a big room. We would strip all the way down to our underwear, seize an excellent ebook and a pillow and lie down on the chilly ground. It by no means dissatisfied! When the spot we had chosen turned too heat from the warmth of our our bodies, we’d simply roll over to a different spot. Many a pleasant ebook was learn that means, though if we tried that right this moment, we might by no means be capable to get again up once more! Azhar: I too bear in mind sleeping on the cemented roof after spraying water on it. The evaporating water cools off the roof, and we’d unfold out white / gentle coloured sheets and lie on them at night time. The sheets have been essential so we might see any bugs crawling round (by no means discovered one – i believe they too have been exhausted after the day within the solar).

Kevin Webb, Cave Creek, Ariz.: A good friend who grew up in Phoenix within the 1960’s-70’s and did not have AC had a variation on the hacks you talked about for sleeping. He slept on a cot within the yard at night time, and his mother would put a moist sheet, simply regular mattress linens, over him. Evaporative cooling made sleeping doable. Azhar: Older properties have been constructed round a central courtyard or veranda. That’s the place individuals would sleep at night time in the summertime. Elders would hold a flashlight, a transistor radio, a stick and a whistle shut by. And then generally there could be a chowkidar (guard) strolling at night time loudly shouting a supposedly reassuring phrase — jaagte raho (hold awake). And I’d marvel about his selection of phrases: Why ought to I hold awake if this fellow is strolling round at night time to guard us?!

Ice packs are your buddies

Anne James, San Leandro, Calif.: I reside in an older dwelling with out air con. One factor I do is hold ice packs in my freezer.About half-hour earlier than mattress I place them between the sheets to chill off the mattress, which regularly will get very heat. Depending on how scorching it’s I’ll lay on the ice packs as effectively. Azhar: Cool!

Lisa Downey, Lahaina, Hawaii: Another tip ( you menopausal sisters) is to make use of a gel pack from the freezer, wrapped in a cotton tea towel, below your neck — and maybe a second gel pack in your chest at bedtime. Placing your wrists on the gel pack may also assist quiet down these scorching flashes. Cotton tea towels work effectively for wrapping because the pure fibers will not make you’re feeling hotter as artificial supplies do. You can wrap the gel pack with one, two and even three layers, relying on how chilly you need it. Azhar: This sounds so cool! I ought to do this.

Jackie Bencke, Kumamoto, Japan: You know these little packs of gel/ice packs that you just get to maintain meals cool? I freeze them and put them in a small DIY material cowl and pin them into the armpits of some shirts whereas I make my approach to work within the morning. Game changer! (They promote these items in Japanese shops as skinny gel “pack” stick-ons that adhere proper to the material of clothes however who needs so as to add extra plastic to the oceans?) Azhar: Yes I’ve read about cooling vests.

Homemade AC

Ann Wasgatt, Roseville, Calif: I grew up in California earlier than air con. My grandmother closed all of the curtains on the sunny facet of the home. Then she put ice cubes in a tray and turned on a fan to blow over the tray. When I labored summers cooking the weenies and beanies on the meals stand below the bleachers on the race observe, it wasn’t air-conditioned both, however my grandmother’s previous trick labored there too. Azhar: That’s sensible! Yes, it makes a lot sense to have heavy curtains drawn when it is sunny outdoors.

Keep these wrists cool

Nancy Gerhardt, Westminster, Colo.: I grew up within the south with out A/C and my mother taught me to run chilly water over the within of my wrists. Azhar: Yes, there’s this concept of pulse or pressure points. Blood vessels in these locations are so near the pores and skin which you can cool off your blood and physique temperature by getting the world involved with cool water.

Roger Crescentini, Tampa, Fla.: I used to be a toddler in Columbus, Ga., within the late ’50s. Kids like me have been in a position to get a fast cool-down by spending 5 cents to purchase a 6.5 oz. Coke and shortly placing it between our wrists. The shock of the sudden temperature change from the chilled bottle raced all through our our bodies. The method included retaining solely our wrists involved with the chilly glass to pay attention the impact. The trick was usually used then and it nonetheless works now! Azhar: Oh wow, by no means considered that! But to keep away from the temptation of these empty energy I’d do that with a can of water!

Sock it to me

Anonymous: My daughter-in-law, who grew up in New Orleans, advised me she wore moist socks to mattress to maintain cool on scorching nights. I’ve tried it, and it really works! Azhar: OK, I’m going to do that tonight!

And in conclusion ….

Some closing ideas from Azhar:

Many of us consider that we cannot win towards the wrath of Surya the sun god in summers (when he’s particularly indignant)! To please him some visit his temple, a UNESCO world heritage website in India’s Odisha state.

So we don’t ever, ever take summer time warmth frivolously. And at all times be ready.

One of the childhood classes drilled into my head was to at all times concentrate on your hydration standing. And drink water even when in small sips as quickly as you do any bodily exercise. Carrying a water bottle if going out isn’t just widespread sense however is life-saving.

When feeling scorching, go take a chilly bathe or no less than periodically splash water in your face and arms and douse your head in water.

Another lesson was to by no means exit on an empty abdomen — at all times eat one thing earlier than going out so your physique has salt and electrolytes. Even when you do not feel like consuming a big meal, a light-weight snack will do the trick.

Heavy bodily exercise — like agriculture and fieldwork — could be achieved throughout cooler elements of the day. And if doable, work within the shade, below a tree. (Thanks to our forefathers for planting them for us! And we return the favor by planting bushes now even once we know we aren’t going to take pleasure in that shade in our lifetime. Our children will. And that is what makes a civilization!).

Rabaris (a nomadic tribe in western India) and lots of different tribal communities use small mirrors on their clothes to replicate daylight. The selection of coloration of their garments can be ingenious. They cleverly make use of this undeniable fact that black not solely takes in warmth quicker than white it additionally offers off warmth a lot quicker than white. Due to the character of labor, girls often go out and in of their tents whereas males grazing livestock keep out for longer durations. Therefore to remain cool it is sensible for girls to put on darker colours (these hues quiet down quick as quickly as girls go indoors) and males to put on lighter colours (they warmth up extra slowly than darker colours throughout extended intervals of time outdoor).

Right from the British colonial instances to these days in India, schoolchildren (like me) throughout English poetry courses have at all times puzzled why English poets would expound on warm summer days. For us within the Global South, there wasn’t a lot to be joyful about blistering, burning summers (besides the mango fruit). Summer was a matter of survival, someday at a time, one hour at a time, daily.

Sadly, now this appears to be true for the complete world.