Throughout much of the equatorial Pacific, it is virtually tabu to go to sleep with wet hair, or to allow sweat to dry on your back. The result, explained to me from Samoa to the Philippines, will be illness - called by various names, all generally associated with really bad cold/flu-like symptoms, and more.
There isn’t any “Western” medical basis for this, AFAIK - and I can’t think of any valid secondary worries (attract parasites, grow toxic molds on your pillow, etc…).
Any thoughts ? (If the sweat dries on your back, then you aren’t working hard enough ?)
Any other examples of illness-temting behavior limited to a geographical or cultural area ? (Other than the obvious don’t sleep in the snow in Alaska, or whatever…)
Hawaii here. My grandmother used to tell me that don’t-go-to-bed-with-your-hair-wet stuff when I was a kid and we slept over at her house. She’d make sure we dried our hair really well before she let any of us out of the bathroom. She said if we went to bed with our hair was wet, then “bumbye you going catch cold!” (That’s charming Hawaii pidgin for “You’ll get sick later.”)
The only thing I’ve found that always happens when you go to bed with wet hair is that after a while, your pillow gets a wet, icky feel and smell. Blegh.
It wasn’t really a taboo in the sense you’d be punished for breaking it, though. I just thought of it as one of those silly/unusual things my grandparents believed.
i remember being told that going to sleep with wet hair leads to a stiff neck. i’ve only noticed remarkably nonresponsive bed-head, but that’s about it.
My grandma believed that being outside and getting your feet wet would give you a cold. I don’t think it was a Southern thing, probably more of an excuse to keep me from going out in the rain and playing in puddles!
Remember kids,Outside + wet feet = cold.
“local illnesses” Did you want to hear about the local illnesses connected to a local restaurant? probably not, eh?
Midwest here, have had waist long hair since I was 11. Mom always, always told me “don’t go out with your hair wet, you’ll catch cold.”
Stopped living with ma when I was 18. So, for the next 28 years, I always went out with wet hair. summer, winter, spring, fall, rain, sunny, snowing, blizzard, ice storm, didn’t matter. If I had wet hair and needed to go outside, out I went. Never actually got a cold from that.
mom was also wrong about wearing a bra to prevent being raped.
When I lived with a Spanish family, they told me I could get sick from walking around the apartment barefoot – or from sleeping in the same room as a flower arrangement.
The first one is obviously a variation on the you-get-colds-from-being-cold myth, but the second one has me completely baffled.
I can think of only one possible basis in reality for this type of thing - that is, in some areas there are many serious diseases or parasites spread by insects or other means, especially in the tropics. You may not want to walk around barefoot, because there are some nematodes whose eggs can literally chew into your foot when you step on them, for instance. Flower arragement? May attract insects.
OK, in reality I doubt that these bits of wisdom have much to them, but it’s fun to speculate.
They were afraid of the virus-delivery mechanisms of floors. Hence, the first cautionary tale. As for the second? Flowers are delivered by.......florists :D
The prevalence of the feared “wet-hair syndrome” around the tropical pacific suggests there may be something there. That was the best example I came up with with no response. Any other thoughts about this one ?
[The southern barefoot prohibition does make sense, for example, thinking about pin- and hookworms, which can be acquired through the soles of your feet.]
And any other “folk” or “local” illnesses whose symptoms might ultimately appear to be related indirectly to the alleged direct cause ?
I always walk around the house without shoes. Goodness only knows what is on the bottom of my shoes and I certainly don’t want to spread that around my carpets ad floors. And I hate slippers because my feet get all hot.
I remember my grandmother had the same admonition about sleeping in the same room as plants. Something about plants breathing carbon dioxide during the day and switching to oxygen at night. I read this somewhere else, but it goes against everything I learned in botony classes. [Then again, grandma would save the donuts for a couple days because ‘when they’re stale, they have fewer calories’. !?!?!?!?!]
