It's summer. Those months where you had to attach crampons to your boots just to pop to the corner shop seem a world away now. And just when the beleaguered masses are getting used to a reasonable degree of heat in their lives again, the Moscow United Energy Company (MOEK) goes and snatches the experience away from them. Yes. It’s that time of year again when summer is neither warmly received, nor warmly delivered: the hot water cut-off.
When those busy little worker bees at MOEK pull out their spanners, many Muscovites pull out their spare saucepans, but MOEK may be doing the populace an unwitting favor. It seems the cold showers that the hardier Muscovites resort to at these times might actually be doing them some good.
As contradictory as it may sound, bombarding yourself with water that’s a few degrees shy of crystallization helps prevent sickness, according to Dr. Alexa Fleckenstein. In her book, Health₂0, she propounds that a daily cold shower will strengthen your immune system, fighting off colds and influenza.
Did someone say Swine Flu? What Swine Flu?
Cold showers also rid the body of toxins, and improve circulation and respiration. And there’s more, (oh yes, this cold shower business is to personal hygiene what garlic is to the culinary world!) Although the dampening of a rampant libido is the first thing that comes to mind when someone utters the words 'cold' and 'shower' in the same sentence, gynecologist Dr G.N. Mansukhani states that it actually helps to raise your sperm count. So there’s something to be said for the old Soviet centralization practices after all.
Unfortunately for me, I'm not a bath person, even when the alternative is water that's not just cold, but subarctic bone-brittling cold. I just don't get on with ‘still’ water. If you're the same and you should find yourself void of the usual options when the stoppage rolls around, (one, no friends with hot water; two, all of said friends have stolen your saucepans; three, the saucepans are actually theirs, because you stole them last year) then here is my personal recipe for a bearable cold shower. *
The hands, feet and face are the most resilient to cold, and are the recommended starting points by Dr. Fleckenstein. After wetting them, rub your hands all over your body, this helps ease your skin towards the heart-stopping temperature it will soon endure beneath a stream of virtual ice crystals. Once that’s done, soap up thoroughly (and frantically) using your preferred scrubbing device. Don’t skimp on this step because the lather will provide a good buffer between you and the blast of liquid nitrogen you’re about to subject yourself to—at least for the first second anyway. Rinse off the arms first. Hand-feed water to the neck. Then, tease the chest, stomach, back and hips beneath the spray, like you’re going through poses for a Hawaiian ‘hula’ style photo shoot. By this time numbness and gravity will have taken care of everything below the waist.
Done.
A handy side effect, by the way, is that the bathroom mirror won’t steam up. This fact will save your life. How else would you realize how blue your skin has turned from the combination of the scientifically impossible sub-zero water and the fact that you’ve been holding your breath in shock for ten minutes straight?
Oh. A word of warning before I leave you. There are one or two areas that you can’t trick—the cold will affect them as normal. Sorry guys, but that's the price of good health.
*Please note that this is not professional health advice, merely a suggestion as to how to cope with the temporary lack of a basic necessity!
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