lovinglife23

Is the water safe to drink, or do you have a filter at home and purchase bottled water on the go?

Bluenose1

I wouldn't recommend drinking the water without boiling it first. Even m-i-l does that, although I think I have seen some of the family use tap water when brushing teeth!

In Melaka (not sure about the rest of Malaysia but probably the same) there are loads of machines where you take your own bottle and fill it up. It is filtered water but my wife advised me to still boil it anway as she's not sure how often the filters are cleaned! We have 6 x 5.5L bottles and one of around 9 or 10L. We fill these up every couple of weeks. Around 42 or 43 litres costs about RM6. You can also get filter machines to connect to mains water. Some fridges out here also have filters for connecting mains water to.

I use tap water for boiling vegetables, cooking pasta etc. If making sauces, and for baking though, I use the boiled filtered water. If I am in during the day then I'll fill the kettle with the filtered water, boil it and fill up a flask. That way I can have coffee whenever I want it. Useful for using in sauces later in the day if not finished by then!

bakedbean

We buy bottles of drinking water. Like Bluenose, I'll boil up veggies, pasta etc in tap water though.

roystevenung

It is very common for households in Malaysia to have at least one water filter system installed in the kitchen.

http://www.phhp.com.my/en/products/c...tration-system

bakedbean

That looks neat, Roy

rogerluli

I believe that many of these purely filtration systems might not be completely adequate for purifying water. This phhp filter seems to contain some "snake oil" elements. If you want to be sure of your drinking water a reverse osmosis system is the best alternative.

lovinglife23

Thanks for the replies. A reverse-osmosis home filter sounds good, but I wish there was a more environmentally-friendly alternative for on the go (is there a recycling system in KL?). Have any long-timers tried to get used to the water? How long is the adjust period (nausea, vomiting)?

SpacialTomato

I brushed my teeth with tap water when I was there. I always finished by rinsing my mouth, and toothbrush (not at the same time), with bottled water though. That was for one week only during last November. I've yet to see some side effects. My stomach has been through its fair share of upsets from dodgy food in various potentially dodgy countries, so maybe it's a bit tougher than it used to be? Drinking I always use proper water.

ruby_tuesday

Same here.
We use the tap water to brush our teeth too. I always thought this wouldn't be a problem-correct me if I'm wrong?

Bluenose1

Not me (nor my Malaysian wife), and don't know! As roystevenung says, most Malays use a filter system in the home. That's good enough for me! Here in Melaka they do have water treatment plants, but I'm afraid that alone wouldn't encourage me to drink tap water! Having said that of course, I said we use filtered water from the machines at the road-side - we don't really know for certain what the source of that water is!

I would say not. I just remember when we used to go on foreign holidays, using bottled water to brush teeth. As SpacialTomato said, no ill-effects! We now use tap water to brush teeth too.

MInd you, I also remember being told to run the shower as hot as you can for a couple of minutes before showering in foreign climes. Couldn't do that when we moved here as we only have a cold water supply (so cold showers only)! Fixed that now as we have finally decided we're going to be renting a bit longer than we originally thought, so we had an electric shower installed! Ahhh, the luxury!

lovinglife23

Thanks for your reply. Sorry, I don't follow the terminology...what's an electric shower? I didn't know there was more than 1 type of shower. I suppose you had a hot water heater installed due to the cold shower, but I don't understand what's an electric shower.

roystevenung

Okay, now I am confuse. Haha..

So you guys dont brush teeth using tap water? How about back home?

I dont know of any Malaysian that uses boiled water or bottled water to brush teeth. Most are from the tap.

But of course we do install our own water filtering system from the meter before it comes into our homes. We also install a finer water filter at the kitchen, for use to cook foods and drinks.

Due to this, the water pressure that comes in might be low and we may have to install a pump type of hot water shower for bathing.

Bluenose1

Well, I suppose you could call it a water heater! It is probably more correct to call it either a converter or exchanger (I have always referred to these as electric showers). Basically, it's a machine attached to the wall that takes in the cold water feed and converts it to hot water. There is a switch (connected to the mains electricity, and runs to the machine, hence my term "Electric" shower!) outside the bathroom. Put the switch to the on position. The machine on the bathroom wall has a shower attachment. The machine converts the cold water to hot water. There are 2 dials - one for the water temperature and another for the pressure. All we did was to disconnect the original shower attachment from the tap and re-direct the cold water, using a pipe, into the machine. When finished with the shower, turn the switch to the off position. In reality, we are probably talking about the same thing!

My term electric shower is as opposed to actually having a separate boiler and a hot and cold tap (or mixer tap) from which to attach a shower head. We do not have a boiler - as I said, we only have cold water (and single taps at each sink/wall outlet) throughout the house. Typical of a large number of houses in kampungs throughout Malaysia.

Hope that explains it!

Nakrob

We always use tap water for brushing teeth, even with our daughter. It's rinse and spit so shouldn't be a problem. I've always done the same in other SEA countries and not had ill effects attributable to this. Drinking we use bottled water bought in bulk. Also use the bottled water for cooking and even for tea/coffee. Having a water filter/purification system on the tap supply would solve all these issues but we're renting and haven't suggested this to our landlord. How much do they cost to install and then run as I believe you need to regularly replace the filter cartridges?

bakedbean

I use tap water for cleaning teeth....all OK so far. Mind you, we have a good Dentist over the road.

Those "electric" showers, aren't they a bit weak and feeble?