[ninjin]

Interesting. Living in Japan there is still a strong culture to try to avoid using air conditioning at night (in particular among the elderly), so there is a whole market for both staying warm in bed during winter and cool in bed during the hot and humid summers. My own family has primarily been using mattress protectors that conduct heat more efficiently [1], towel blankets (タオルケット) [2], and gel pads than are stored in the fridge and then put under the pillow cover just before you go to sleep. There are plenty more on the market, but I have solely by using the conducting mattress protectors been able to sleep with the air conditioning several degrees higher than I would have been able to in the past.

[1]: https://www.nitori-net.jp/ec/product/7567051s

[2]: https://www.nitori-net.jp/ec/cat/Shingu/Blanket/BlanketTowel...

[trogdor]

> in Japan there is still a strong culture to try to avoid using air conditioning at night

Why?

[smithcoin]

Superstition

[gboss]

It’s not just superstition. Air conditioned air can be bad for you if you’re not maintaining it. It is also drying so it can bother your throat, eyes, and skin. It might make it easier to transmit COVID though that might just be in door air. I definitely prefer comfortable outdoor air to air conditioned air.

https://www.webmd.com/a-to-z-guides/ss/slideshow-what-ac-doe...

https://time.com/3942050/air-conditioner-healthy/

[nomel]

There’s a little subtlety to it. In some (all?) parts of Asia it’s intentional misinformation to reduce power usage.

[EarthMephit]

No I think that there's more to it than superstition - We often blame things on superstition when we don't understand them ourselves.

I've been playing around with sleeping with a fan & air-conditioning and I always notice that my throat is all dryed out in the morning from the air flow directly over my face.

I need a couple of glasses of water to re-hydrate after sleeping with a fan or air-conditioner, so if its not too warm a night I prefer to leave them off. I seem to get a better night's sleep too, but maybe that's just because it's a cooler night.

[mmooss]

Aim the fan at your legs; in my experience it cools effectively (I assume because blood is circulating) and dehydrates less.

[nomel]

You should look into this more, including the state sponsored news reports of fan death.