Water Tasting
I was watching the
America’s Test Kitchen show on PBS. Its
Tasting Lab aired a combined result of 3 water tests:
The Bottled Water Wars,
Bottled Water for Cooking?, and
Tap Water.
Bottled water in general consists of 3 major categories: spring water, artesian water, and purified water. Spring water comes from an underground water formation that flows naturally to the surface of the earth, with its source location identified. Artesian water is spring water with source formation being a confined aquifer – the water is sandwiched between two layers of impermeable rock. Purified water may contain multiple sources and requires processing with reverse osmosis before bottling.
Four waters, including 2 spring waters, 1 purified water, and 1 tap water, were competing for final TASTING. Here’s their rank (#1 being the most preferred):
#4: Evian (spring water; the best-selling imported water; when spelled in reverse, naïve)
#3: Aquafina (purified water; the best-selling brand of bottled water in America)
#2: Volvic (spring water)
#1: Tap water from Boston!
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Republic of ---
My sister and I arrived at the blood center of Torrance Memorial Hospital to donate blood. Before donating, the donor has to “qualify” by answering questions on a meticulous survey. The survey asks for trivial details pertaining to the donor’s health conditions and travel history in the past 6 months. We just returned from Taiwan 5 months and 28 days ago.
“Is Taiwan a country?” The nurse couldn’t find the country code in the huge book of travel advisory published by Center for Disease Control (CDC).
“We think so,” said my sister, “maybe under Republic of China.” There are Republic of Chile, Republic of South Africa, Republic of This, Republic of That… No Republic of China.
“Is it China?” We looked at each other, not knowing what to say.
“As long as they stayed in the main cities and didn’t go to the countryside, it should be OK,” the other nurse chimed in. We looked at each other, again. Well, we had visited Taipei, Taichung, Tainan, and, of course, the very south of Taiwan.
“Did you need vaccination to go?”
“No!” We replied in definite unison. (SARS does not have vaccine, anyway.)
We spent 1.5 precious hours clarifying the Taiwan issue. (Could this be the reason why we were the only enthusiastic Asian donors at the blood center?) After donation, my sister and I each consumed two cups of orange juice and a banana. I even had a cookie.
Springing into the van, I noticed, at the front passenger’s seat, a paper shopping bag from a Taiwanese cake specialist that was famous for traditional engagement cakes. I glanced at the bag and suddenly wondered if I lost too much blood and began hallucinating. I rubbed my eyes and examined the bag. Yes my eyes were OK and I wasn't faint. On the bag it wrote:
台灣國台北縣淡水鎮.... (City of Dan-Shui, County of Taipei, NATION of Taiwan)
I wish that nurses at the blood center could read Chinese (or shall we say, Taiwanese, as the cake specialist seemed to claim?) so that they could see the proof showing Taiwan as a “Nation”. Maybe the nurses could contact CDC regarding this “negligence”. Maybe we could have more qualified donors if CDC could make “necessary corrections” to include Taiwan in its list of COUNTRIES.
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