China's viral summer trick: sleep with a winter melon. At 95% water, it absorbs heat but won't cool rooms. Wash rind, avoid cracks, keep from babies. Edible afterward.
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By Rachel Wu
"Misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows."
Shakespeare's The Tempest, Act II, Scene II
Buy a large winter melon, wash it, and take it to bed.
Viral clips have featured triplets sleeping beside matching gourds and families adopting a one-person-one-melon policy.
Chinese netizens have filed the idea under jiàng wēn xié xiū (降温邪修), internet slang for the unconventional—and slightly ridiculous—ways people try to beat the summer heat.
Screenshot via WeChat@乌海融媒 @浙工之家
The trend has even reached Paris.
After seeing a cat stretched across a winter melon online, a Chinese creator decided to investigate the internet’s latest cooling wisdom for herself.
Upon searching across the city, the largest winter melon she could find was better suited to her dog than to her.
The dog climbed aboard, wrapped both paws around it and appeared reluctant to return it.
She tried holding the melon herself and reached a more measured verdict: surprisingly cool—perhaps not a replacement for air conditioning, but apparently not an online scam either.
Screenshot via Xiaohongshu@dearClaire
There is some science behind the sensation.
Winter melons are around 95% water, giving them enough thermal mass to absorb heat from the skin without warming too quickly.
Their long shape, solid flesh and thick rind also make them better bedmates than round, easily cracked watermelons.
Calling one a “natural air conditioner” gives the winter melon too much credit; it can absorb some heat where it touches the body, but it cannot cool the room.
Widely repeated claims that its surface remains 3–5°C below the room, or that hugging one lowers skin temperature by a precise amount, are difficult to trace to published research.
As mainstream media joined the conversation, reports brought along some practical advice: wash and dry the rind because its fine hairs and powdery coating may irritate sensitive skin, and stop using the melon if it becomes cracked or soft.
Heavy gourds should also be kept away from sleeping babies.
Will a winter melon cool your bedroom? No.
Could it make a hot night feel slightly better? Possibly.
And once its bedtime career is over, it can still become dinner.
READ MORE: Plum Rains End – Now for Sweltering Sanfu...
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[Cover image via Weibo@海市盛楼111]
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