Beware the Cold Night Air!

A country-wide superstition in Guatemala is that anything cold will kill you. I would imagine this started in the mountains and gradually migrated north to Petén. We were told about this, but our first encounter with it was during the first medical clinic we were a part of:

An old grandmother brought her two granddaughters with this complaint: "My granddaughters wake up early in the morning before I do and drink ice-cold water and now look how skinny they are!" Of course, they were skinny because of the parasites and amoebas in the water, but she wanted the doctor to tell the girls to stop drinking cold water.

This irrational fear of anything cold presents itself in conversation several times each month. Parents won't let their children ride in the cab of the truck because of the air conditioning. When I got Dengue Fever I was cautioned to not turn on the air in the truck, and Shelley was told that she had to open the fridge for me because if I stood in front of the fridge with a fever I would die.

It is easy to think that this thinking would be limited only to those uneducated living in small villages, but recently we have had stupid conversations with a whole different class. Keep in mind that on a regular basis the temperature here is over 100 degrees in the afternoon, but because of our concrete walls and roof it will still be over 90 in our house until 2 am.

A few weekends ago I went to a wedding. The reception was held at one of the most expensive restaurant here with over 200 in attendance. At least $10,000 was spent on this wedding, so we are talking about a very wealthy upper class family. They live on the border of Belize and Guatemala and went to Belizean schools, therefore the family speaks English. While almost everybody was dancing (except for the lone gringo who bowed out with the accurate generalization that white boys can't dance) a recent mother was telling me about how well she was raising her 4 month old. She said, "I give her a drink of cold water every morning so that she will develop immunity. Isn't that right Jimmy, a child can develop immunity to things like that if you give it to them when they're young?" She went on to say that it was Salvavidas pure water, so I told her that she was correct in that when her daughter grows up cold water won't hurt her.

This past week we sat next to a lady who owns our favorite hotel in Petén and was the owner of our house when we lived in Santa Elena. She was giving advice on how to raise our twins after they are born. She said that we need to put a fan in their room as soon as we get them home so that they will develop immunity to the fan. Her kids always had a fan, so they had no problem, but whenever her sister's kids sleep with a fan in their room they get the flu, therefore you have to start early. We of course did not open the can of worms of telling her our plans to have an air conditioner in our kids' room.

I do remember when my grandmother used to tell my mother to get her kids out of the bad night air, so this superstition is not too far removed from the States, but how many years ago did we discover germs? Has that information just not made it yet?