As college students, most of us get sick pretty often. We all know how it goes–first the tickle in your throat sets in, and then the dread. Despite chugging orange juice or other home remedies for colds, you soon turn into a sneezy, runny, headachy mess.
Unfortunately, not only does being in college mean you probably get sick more often, it also means you can’t just lie in bed and watch movies while your parents dote on you and bring you their comforting home remedies for colds.
For me, the home remedy was always Progresso chicken soup. But a sick college student on the other side of the world would most likely be nostalgic for a completely different food or drink. From kumquats to snails, here are some home remedies for colds from around the world.
1. Hong Kong: Lizard Soup
If chicken soup is Jewish penicillin, then lizard soup is Hong Kongese penicillin (although apparently lizard meat actually tastes more like fish).
2. China: Deer Antler Velvet
Chinese silk scrolls dating back as far as 168 BC talk about the fuzzy covering on young stags’ antlers as a sort of miracle drug, which is used to treat everything from infertility to anemia.
Though nothing about deer is actually miraculous or magical (except maybe for certain reindeer), many people in China and around the world today still swear by deer antler velvet as a home remedy to boost the immune system and fight off colds.
3. Russia and Ukraine: Gogol Mogol
Like a Jewish eggnog, Gogol Mogol is made with raw eggs, milk, sugar, and sometimes rum or other alcohols. Unlike eggnog, it’s much more likely to be consumed when you’re trying to fight off a cold than when you’re trying to get in the Christmas spirit.
4. Spain: Garlic Tea
Hot tea with honey and lemon is a pretty common cold remedy, but many people of Spanish or Latin descent will tell you that your drink isn’t complete without some garlic. The oils that make garlic so pungent are supposed to suppress your cough and act as decongestants. While drinking garlic tea may make you feel better, it certainly won’t go down easily (unlike this garlic bread, which will disappear in seconds).
5. Japan: Sniffing an Onion
Anyone who’s ever chopped an onion knows that the fumes get your eyes and nose leaking almost immediately (here’s why, by the way). In Japan, many people turn this miserable experience into something beneficial by sniffing raw onions to clear out a stuffy nose.
6. Germany: Snail Syrup
Using snails in medicine actually goes at least as far back as Hippocrates and Pliny. Of course, back then you would have to pick your own snails off of nearby rocks, but today in Germany you can still buy snail extract syrup as a homeopathic remedy for coughs.
7. Iran: Turnips
In Iran, people often eat turnips either mashed or as honeypots to fight colds with their high vitamin C content. Though there’s no evidence that turnips actually help with coughs, they’re undeniably very healthy, so you might as well dig in anyway.
8. Taiwan: Kumquat Syrup
These tiny, tangy citrus fruits are native to Taiwan and China, where many people candy them or cook them into a sweet, throat-soothing syrup. Have your kumquats with tea or just as is (or infuse it into alcohol, though this is harder to justify as good for your health).
Though the home remedies for colds vary around the world, one thing is consistent no matter where you are: being sick sucks.