Monday, December 17, 2012

What Is a Hookah?

By John McCree


Used for smoking flavored tobacco, a hookah is device that purifies smoke with a water basin prior to inhalation. The components of a hookah are relatively basic and straightforward, but the craft of making hookahs has been perfected over centuries in and around the Middle East, and most high quality hookahs continue to be produced in this area.

Parts

The end of the body is submerged in a water jar through which the smoke produced by burning tobacco passes. The smokes comes out of the bottom of the body and is purified by the water and kept in air chamber over the water. Passing smoke through water cools down the temperature of the smoke and makes it more suitable for the lungs, which is an additional positive side effect of purifying smoke with water. On the top left section of the water jar in this diagram is the hose. It is not shown in the diagram, but the length of the hose is approximately one meter. As the smoker puffs on the hose, the purified smoke exits the air chamber and is breathed in by the smoker through the hose. After inhaling, the smoker exhales neat and aromatic smoke. Generally, people smoke hookah while sitting in groups with their close friends on family enjoying their company.

What Do You Inhale from a Hookah?

Hookahs are traditionally used to smoke flavorful tobacco often called "shisha". Nowadays these things are used to prepare shisha: tobacco, treacle (uncrystallized syrup produced in refining sugar), honey, sugar, molasses, glycerin, nicotine, dried fruit and distilled water.

Shisha is usually fruit flavor based. However, flavors that are offshoots of these fruity favors like Banana split are now gaining popularity.

Adding flavor to tobacco at the time of production has become easy and now one can find a variety of different flavors. The dried tobacco, glycerin, and sweetener can be combined with basically any other ingredients to make unique flavors.

The Origin of Hookahs

The very first hookah was designed by a Persian physician known as Abul-Fath Gilani in the 1500's. The term hookah originates from the indian name of this device "huqqa." He developed the hookah to create a mechanism to purify smoke by passing it through water, thereby eliminating the many health hazards of smoking. But, it is said that even before he invented it, hookah existed in other regions of Persia. Once it gained popularity in Indian it spread all through Pakistan and Turkey. Hookah gained fame throughout the Middle East after reaching Turkey. As it spread through Middle East, it began to gain popularity in regions of northern Africa. It is now gaining popularity among the rest of the globe.

Throughout its journey, the hookah has picked up a number of additional names:

Nargile (also pronounced Argilee) - Mainly used in Italy, Turkey and Israel

Narguile - used in Spain

Lula (or lulava) - used in Albania, Bosnia, Herzegovina

Sheesha - used in Morocco, Egypt, Kuwait, Qatar and Saudi Arabia

Qalyan - used in Iran

Karim Khan - used in Russia, Belarus

Chillim - used in Afghanistan and Uzbekistan

Huqqa - used in India and Pakistan

Gudugudaa - used in Maldives

Marra Pipe - used in the UK

I Wish To Buy a Hookah, Where Should I Go?

You can visit a shop in-person to purchase a hookah or you can buy one on the net. Since the beginning of this century, the number of hookah shops and hookah bars in the U.S. has increased. People who live in the more populated urban areas can certainly get a hookah shop near them. In the Mediterranean countries and the Persian Gulf, hookahs have grown to be a part of everyday life of individuals. However, this is not the case in the U.S.

In case you are not able to locate a hookah shop or you like to shop from the convenience of your home then you can buy a hookah on the net.

What You Need To Know About Health Hazards Before Beginning to Smoke Hookah?

The debate rages on about whether or not hookah smoking is less hazardous than cigarette smoking. Those who are in favor of smoking hookah point out that the smoke that comes from hookah is cleaner since it is purified through water and that the temperature of the smoke is also mild. Detractors say that hookah includes more toxic compounds as compared to cigarettes. It contains compounds just like tar, carbonmonoxide and heavy metals. Another factor is that a hookah session may last as long as 1 hour and sometimes even longer while a cigarette goes for just 3-4 minutes. On the other hand hookah seems to be less addictive in comparison with cigarettes.




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