China - Binary health
While in Traditional Chinese Medicine there are five elements, everyone I know and have shared health experiences with here in China just refers to two different states: hot (“shang huo”) and cold (“zhao han” or “han liang”). Xiao Zhang*, a college graduate in Kunming, tells me “whenever I get a cold, I first feel for the symptoms to determine whether it's a cold cold or a hot cold. Actually, I always listens to my body to feel what's missing, to stay balanced. If I feel “shang huo”, I eat “cooling” foods to regain my balance.”
Eating in China is all about maintaining balance. For example, fatty foods and most meats lead to an “overheating” of the body with symptoms such as zits and cold sores. Eating bitter tasting greens and roots can have a “cooling” effect and bring your body back into its balance.
This mindset stretches way beyond the freshly prepared foods, into the heart of the supermarket snacking aisle. Lay's has cleverly identified this underlying mental model for their sales of chips. Chips being greasy automatically classify as hot foods, leading many people to hesitate before purchasing this snack. Who wants to break out in zits or even get a cold? Lay's came up with rather unconventional flavors that claim to counteract the heating effect of chips: cherry tomatoes and green cucumber flavors to be cool and refreshing. I wonder what the impact has been on their sales numbers.
The Chinese supermarket snacking aisle also has numerous other cures for overheated bodies, for examples Gui Ling Gao herbal jello and Wang Lao Ji herbal tea. For the first time, I came across apple vinegar drinks. Before I'd only heard about them in the US (thanks to Helena and Rebecca) and now they have them in China, too. Unfortunately nobody could tell me whether this would help with excessive heat or cold.
Curious about other conditions, I ask Xiao Zhang whether the flue is hot or cold. “The flue is a very complex condition. One has to be very careful,” she concludes.
*Name has been changed to protect anonymity of the patient.
