Yes, of course turn the air conditioning on! That is if you have it, you can afford it, and you're indoors. But if you need extra ideas to help keep you cool in a hot climate or during a heat wave in a usually tolerable climate, try these:

(By the way, if you do have air conditioning units and they are getting on a bit, consider replacing them with modern units. They are much more efficient. And don't have the air conditioning switched on in rooms that you're not using.)

Get a fan

A light breeze blowing across you can have a wonderfully cooling effect. Just the air flowing over your skin takes heat away from your body. At night, if you don't like the air blowing directly at you, point the fan away so that at least it is still circulating air around the room. A ceiling fan is a good thing to have installed in living rooms and bedrooms if you know the hot period where you live or are staying is going to last a long time.

I'm not sure how practical this is, but I once saw a suggestion that people without air conditioning could contrive their own D.I.Y. version by placing, say, a bowl of ice in front of a normal little fan, or even a bottle or two of semi-frozen brine that had been taken out of the freezer. Personally I'd be very wary of putting liquid in any form near an electrical fan, but presumably it's an idea that appeals to some people.

Avoid using, or being near, anything that generates heat

If you have to use or be near machinery or equipment that throws off a significant amount of heat or even bright lights of the old fashioned type, or if you have to do any oven/hob cooking, try to do it early or late in the day when the ambient temperature is lower, and not late morning or in the afternoon when you will presumably already have more than enough heat to cope with.

Keep interior doors open

You don't want heat to build up in one particular place by shutting interiors doors, so keep those doors open and let the air circulate throughout the place.

Keep windows, and exterior doors, closed

Most people seem naturally inclined to do the opposite, but opening windows just lets the hot air outside come into your place. Keep it out by keeping the windows closed. This only applies during the day when it is hot. If at night the temperature drops and becomes relatively cool, then once the sun has gone down you should open your windows and let some fresh, cool air circulate through wherever you are.

Keep curtains, blinds and shutters closed

Again, this somehow seems unnatural to a lot of people, but you want to keep the sun out, so block it in whatever way you can. You can even get reflective blinds and linings for curtains that reflect back the heat of the sun, and I know that at least one glass manufacturer makes window glass that is especially designed to help keep out the heat of the sun as well as its harmful rays. You could also put drop-down tightly woven screens or shades on the outside of your windows, and also on the outside of doorways (where you don't have security concerns) so that you can leave the door open but keep the sunlight and the heat out.

Have hard, reflective flooring rather than carpets

Hard floor surfaces are probably preferably to carpets anyway for various reasons, but as far as heat is concerned, hard flooring subjectively gives a cooler impression, and also it reflects heat away rather than absorbing it as carpets tend to do.

Keep in the shade

Pretty obvious this. If you have the choice of getting in the shade or being in direct sunlight, you should obviously go in the shade.

Go on the side of your property that is away from the sun

I live in the northern hemisphere, so it means the south of my house gets the sun. In the winter therefore, when it is cool, I use the downstairs room on that side of the house. In the summer, however, if it's a hot day, I use the downstairs room on the north (shaded) side of the house. This can also apply to where you sleep. Of course a lot of people might not be able to move from one bedroom to another according to the season, but just as I change the rooms that I use downstairs according to whether it is cool winter or hot summer, likewise I change from using a south facing bedroom in the winter to a north facing bedroom in the summer.

Have extendable awnings put over the windows on the sunny side of your property

This enable you to block out the sun in the summer, but in the winter you can leave them furled up so that they don't block out the relatively little sunlight you might get at that time of year. A more permanent, structural approach is for your property to have covered verandahs or porches.

Keep your home well insulated

Insulation does two things. When it is cool it keeps the heat in that you are generating within the home (e.g. from a central heating system), and when it is hot outside it helps prevent that external heat from getting into your home. Workplaces probably also should be well-insulated, but the sort of work that goes on there has to be taken into account. Probably people who work in furnaces wouldn't be too pleased with having their place of work super-efficiently insulated.

Keep the humidity down

But don't use dehumidifiers and air conditioning in the same space. Remember that dehumidifiers are a bit like fridges in that although they may be cool inside, the heat they have taken out of what is inside them gets put into the air that is outside them.

Have trees around your home

Apart from the ecological and environmental benefits, the two benefits of having trees is that they can provide shade (although you want to be careful where you position them and you need to be aware of how big they will grow) and they also throw off a lot of oxygen, which can be very cooling, and is a great boon on a hot, stuffy, stifling day.

Have house plants

This is for the same reason as having trees outside your home, excluding the potential shading effect.

Be aware of the affect patios and terraces near your home have

If you have terraces and patios abutting your home, bear in mind that if they are light colored (think here of a light colored marble, for example, but it could be any material) they will tend to reflect the sunlight, and therefore its heat into your home. There a darker, less reflective material might be more appropriate.

Make sure you use appropriate bedding

In a cool climate you might need a pretty thick duvet to sleep comfortably at night, whereas in a very hot climate you might just put a single sheet over you, or even have no bedding over you at all.

Install a swimming pool at your home

I just thought I'd throw that one in to annoy all the people who live in apartments, or who are struggling just to pay the bills at the moment!

Drink plenty of cold water

This is doubly effective. Cold drinks take heat out of your body, and because you'll sweat (sorry, perspire) a lot in hot weather, the fluid level in your body will become depleted if you don't keep it topped up. Water is the most natural liquid we can take into our bodies, so that is obviously the one to go for.

Avoid hot drinks

Rather bizarrely, when I was young, I was often told by older people that on a hot day, a hot drink could help cool you down. This is patent nonsense. Drinking something hot is simply going to pump more heat energy into your body, when what you want is to get rid of the heat energy that is there already and to stop any more heat than is necessary getting in.

Avoid alcohol

I'll admit that on a hot day, few things are nicer than a big glass of cold lager or some other 'long' alcoholic drink, but alcohol dehydrates you, and really what you should be aiming to do is keep yourself well hydrated, and that means drinking water rather than anything else. Apparently caffeine also tends to dehydrate.

Spray yourself with a mist of water

The simplest, cheapest version of this is simply to have a spray bottle, fill it with cold water from the fridge, and spray yourself every now and again to help take the heat out of your body. (The water droplets act like sweat, taking heat away from your skin as it evaporates.) A rather more expensive, but convenient, version of this is something you might have seen at other people's houses (or even at your own!) or at outside eating and drinking places, where tubing with very fine holes it is placed above where people are sitting, and as cold water is pumped through the tubing, it pushes out a fine mist on the people below. The first time I experienced this, it rather took me by surprise, but the fine mist of water droplets acts as a very fine coolant, and after a while it is hardly noticeable at all, although its action remains just as effective. If you haven't come across this and you're intrigued by it, to get more information, just do a search for 'mist cooling' or 'misting systems' - that sort of thing.

Use natural fibers, not man-made

This applies to clothes, bedding and furniture coverings.

Wear a hat

This is so obvious that it's a real surprise to see so many people out on a hot day without any head covering. Some sort of headwear to shade your head and face has really got to be one of the best investments you can make when you're going to have the sun beating down on you.

Wear white or light-colored clothes

Occasionally there's some dispute about this, but it seems pretty obvious to me that white and light colors reflect heat and light (and that includes sunlight), and dark colors absorb heat and light (and then transmit that absorbed heat to your body), so it must surely make sense to wear lighter colored clothing rather than darker.

Wear lightweight fabrics rather than heavy ones

You want to make it easy for your body heat to escape.

Wear less rather than more

Of course if you're in your own home (or amongst tolerant family and/or friends) you can even wear nothing, which is probably the best thing you can wear on a very hot day. Just give some consideration to what's permissible, tolerable and hygienic. Really this only applies to being indoors, however. If you're out in direct sunlight, you really want to keep yourself covered up as much as possible - ideally from head to toe - in light-colored, lightweight natural material.

Consider wearing sweatbands on your head and wrists

This reminds me of when I used to play tennis If you can't avoid sweating, you might as well at least keep yourself as comfortable as possible and prevent your sweat from causing you any more inconvenience (and perhaps embarrassment) than is necessary.

Wear sandals

Don't wear shoes unless you have to. Don't wear socks. (Certainly don't wear socks with sandals, otherwise you'll get arrested by the fashion police.) And don't go barefoot, because that is just asking for trouble, either from getting your feet burnt or from getting hurt by stepping on glass and stones, etc. There's also the hygiene aspect. So really sandals are the best, and perhaps only, option on a very hot day.

Take a cold (or at least cool) shower

This one speaks for itself. Don't go mad and jump in a freezing cold shower if you've been out in the sun such that your skin is beginning to burn. The shock won't do you any good. Better to get into an lukewarm or cool shower and then turn the temperature down further, if the shower you are using can manage that.

Stick your feet in some cold or cool water

And your hands. And your feet. In other words, if time and/or circumstances don't allow you to go for the full immersion, at least get your extremities wet so that you can get some heat out of your body that way.

Use an icepack

Personally I'm not so keen on this, but some people like the idea of putting an ice pack on their head. The well known alternative is to grab something like a pack of frozen peas out of the freezer and use that.

Have the right diet

In cold countries it might be appropriate to have a heavy diet, full of meat, carbohydrates and calories. But when it's hot you want a much lighter diet. Actually most people should probably really have a light diet anyway, regardless of where they live and what sort of climate they are in. But if you're living somewhere that has scorching sun, you're absorbing a lot of energy from that sun, so you don't want to exacerbate your bodies problems by overloading it with yet more energy from a huge food intake. So have light meals, as few as necessary, containing as few calories as you really need, and probably comprising mostly of salad, fruit and perhaps vegetable. Keep off heavy food, processed food, junk food, carbohydrates, and as much as possible keep off food that might broadly speaking be called 'unnatural'. Infrequent, light, natural and raw wherever possible might perhaps be your guidelines for eating when it is hot. The process of digestion involves the body expending energy, which causes your body temperature to rise, so that is another reason to keep eating to a minimum when it is hot.

Treat yourself to some ice cream or sorbet

Having said you should go for natural food, you can still give yourself the occasional nice treat that will also help absorb some heat from your body too.

Eat spicy food

This one I'm not really sure about, but I have had it pointed out to me on a few occasions that people in hot countries tend to eat spicy foods, so there must be some good justification for it. It can certainly make you sweat more, and sweating takes heat away from the body, so perhaps that is the reason why it is meant to be good. Anyway, consider it possible, if you are currently somewhere hot, that it might benefit you to follow the example of people who live in hot countries.

Do as little physical exertion as possible

Physically activity raises your body temperature, so save physical tasks and chores for when the day has cooled down a bit.

Go downstairs rather than upstairs

Heat rises, so, all other things being equal, you are likely to be better off being lower down in a building rather than higher up.

Lie on the floor!

Taking the above reasoning from what you might call a macro level to a micro level, it follows that in any particular room it will be cooler nearer the floor than the ceiling.

Take a siesta

As a north European, I used to find it amusing and annoying to go to Spain and find that the whole country seemed to shut down in the afternoon. It doesn't happen so much these days, but it made sense - certainly in the summer. People would go to work - and children would go to school - early, when it was still fairly cool. They would then finish in the early afternoon when the heat was beginning to become unbearable. The school kids would be finished for the day, and they would go and do whatever it is that kids do, and the adults would retreat indoors (closing the shutters on the windows of their apartments and houses) and have a rest. Then later in the afternoon they would go back to work and carry on into the evening as the heat faded away and the sun went down. So during the hottest part of the day you too might consider taking a break and retreating to somewhere cool and shady for a rest.

Take refuge in an air conditioned public building

If you're out and about and the heat is getting too much for you, pop into an air conditioned shopping mall or some other public building for some cool respite before venturing out into the heat again.

Before going to bed, put your next day's underwear in the fridge

I say this with a completely straight face. Indeed why not go the whole hog and put tomorrow's undercrackers in the freezer? It'll certainly put a spring in your step as you start the day.


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