Warning about bottled water in Siem Reap
 

Hi all,
Writing from my third day in Siem Reap where we were having a great time until 3 out of 4 in our group were taken out by nasty (explosive) case of vomiting and diarrhea...we are heading into around the 15th hour and things are improving but sad to say we lost a day at the temples as a result.

We have all been very careful with food and drink but were alerted by our Angkor guide not to drink the bottled water which comes in the very soft light blue bottles (often free at hotels and commonly for sale at the temples). He always advises his guests to never drink this water because it makes many people sick. Unfortunately he didn't realize we had purchased this water until it was too late and my 65 year old mother was puking all over ancient ruins, to her mortal embarassment.

Anyway, I was the only one in our group yesterday who didn't buy water at the temple, otherwise our days were almost identical in terms of food and drink. We have met two other couples who are also ill who did not take any unusual risks but who have used this water.

Anyway, it's impossible to be sure of the cause, but this recommendation came from a local who was not making any extra money off of giving us his safe bottled water.
Hope this can prevent someone else from getting sick.
-Amy

Sorry to hear about your bad experience. We recently returned from SR and from what I can remember we drank bottled water from clear, not light blue bottles. It was water we bought at the market, (not at the temples) and bottled water that was offered at the hotel. Fortunately, we did not get sick. I'm sure it was very upsetting to travel half way around the world and lose a day of sightseeing due to illness. I hope everyone is feeling better and the rest of your trip goes smoothly.

Sorry so many got sick. I do hope all are feeling better by now.

It is, of course, impossible to tell what caused it. Most people visiting Angkor buy water from the vendors at the temples and do not get sick. Whether you guide was correct that there is a problem with one brand of water is unclear.

I do hope all of you are staying hydrated - that's the greatest danger with severe GI problems, dehydration. This is the kind of instance in which emergency antibiotics might be called for. (I believe I do remember you saying that your doc gave you some.)

Oh Amy such a pity. I so hope this passes quickly and does not leave your group lethargic and weak. This is quite worrying though to think that a certain brand of bottled water could be contaminated.

I have read reports about street vendors re filling empty plastic bottles with tap water, however, always dismissed the reports as not possible as you would know that there was no seal on the bottle.
Hope your mum is feeling better by the time you read this
Sue

Hi,
We just spent a few days in Siem Reap as well, and did not have any health issues. I think the stuff in the light bluish bottles is regular tap water that has been ozonized ( spelling?) It is not a "brand" or anything, just some type of purification. Best to stick with label water. Hope everyone gets well soon!
Kirsten

While in SR a few weeks ago, we purchased many bottles of water at Angkor. Most of the water we purchased was in a rather large aprox. 1.75 liter clear (I think it may have a very light blue tint) plastic bottle for $1 each. We also purchased the same type of bottles in SR itself for less money. I don't know it it was all the same label or not.

Except: in one case, the water was in a smaller aprox. 1 liter blue bottle; this was different than all the rest, smaller, different color bottle at the same price. I do remember that it did have the plastic shrink-wrap seal on the cap; we purchased one bottle of this and shared it with no ill effects, it tasted alright.

Amy

I know the water to which you refer.I had just bought a bottle from a street vendor and taken one sip. Ponheary saw it, snatched it from me, poured it out and told me to never, ever drink that one in the light blue bottle.

It was sealed and tasted ok. I would have drunk it had she not taken it from me.

Interesting, Lori, this sounds like a warning all new travelers to Siem Reap should know about. I'm wondering whether this is the UV-treated water... UV doesn't kill everything.

This story makes me wonder too. I was fine in SR last month and ended my stay with a couple of nights in a guest house that provided that light blue bottled water, with the shrink wrap. I drank it, several bottles over a couple of days. On the way home, I got a clear cut case of food poisoning but had blamed it on cooked food at the Tokyo airport. Althought the incubation period would have to be pretty long instead of what I think is usually only 6-7 hours or so, I am wondering if the water was to blame???

Hi all... thanks for the kind words. We are in Phnom Penh now, everyone is pretty much back to normal and feeling better.

Sounds like offwego had a similar experience to us... the water we bought was sealed. We were all well hydrated (I have been absolutely militant about it since I didn't want anyone to get dehydrated!) Anyway, what's important is that we muddled through and are continuing to have a great time... and hopefully learned something that someone else can benefit from.

Cheers all... we're off to Chau Doc on the boat today. Will post properly about our trip when I'm back in the states.

Amy

Cookview,

read this

http://digbig.com/4rqtn

could have been the water

Thanks for sharing this info. I've been to Siem Reap twice without getting sick from bottled water. I'm sure I bought water at the temples, but don't remember what the bottles looked like. Either way, by sharing yoru experience other travellers can avoid that particular type of bottle - and perhaps keep from getting ill. Thanks again..hope you are all well now.

I don't recall the color of the bottle but I purchased two bottles before we entered the Temples and I made sure they were sealed. For some unknown reason, I looked at the inside of the cap before I took a sip and it was dirty. I uncapped the other bottle and found the same thing. Needless to say, I did not drink either one. Before this incident I always felt safe if the bottle had an unbroken seal.

this is very interesting, and perhaps explains a lot!
I was in SR a couple of years ago, and my friend got VERY VERY sick. he had been drinking a lot of that water, whereas for some reason i found that i couldnt drink the generic unbranded one - it didnt quench my thirst, and sort of tasted metallic i thought.

anyway, much to everybody's horor at the time, i just chugged back lots of coca cola, which i normally rarely drink, and expensive evian or something from the FCC Hotel where we were staying.

From memory there have been a lot of stories about probs with bottled water not being filtered properly or even being contaminated in Asia ... seem to remember something about a plant in thailand having issues ... might go and research it now, as heading back there soon.

thanks for posting,

Funny this should come up again. I'm in Siem Reap now and took a picture of the offending water bottle, just for clarity.

http://www.pbase.com/loricarlson/image/87333433

It says it's been treated with "ultraviolet light". I think that means someone shined a flashlight on it.

Stay hydrated, but not with this stuff.

Cheers!

Lori, thanks for the photo and the info that it has been treated with ultraviolet light.

You and others may remember a number of discussions of the steripen that uses UV to "sterilize" water. This bottled water is a cautionary tale about UV sterilization!

Good thing to know....we'll be there in December and have no desire to get sick!

"Stay hydrated, but not with this stuff"

Very interesting to see the photo of the bad water. :(

We did purchase one bottle of this just as we were leaving AW and shared it in the car on the way back to SR. It tasted ok and we had no ill effects. Sort of a bad news / good news story.;)

FYI: everyone in our group had a bad reaction to similar looking water in Thailand.

Very interesting info, cookie, I've never seen this type of water for sale in Thailand. But your experience should be another warning for everyone.

We are on our way to Siem Reap in a couple of weeks so I would like to thank you all for this information.

It would be good to have this thread stay at the top to forewarn other travellers.

The one in Thailand (available on the islands especially for about a third of the cost of other water) came in slightly whiter bottles, but the look exactly like this. We were told that this water is only filtered. As soon as we stopped drinking it, the problems went away.

We just returned from 2 weeks in Vietnam and 2 days in Siem Reap. We took and used a water purifier on our entire trip. Made our own bottled water daily. Used our own water to make coffee each morning and never ate outside of the well known tourist hotels. We only drank fresh pineapple juice at the hotels when it was available.(yes, I know they use water to mix it - the only time we gambled - that pineapple juice is so good!!) We never drank coffee or tea or ate noodle soups. Drank only bottled beer that we opened ourselves at the table. It wasn't until Siem Reap did we drink bottled water offered to us by our guide pon heary's brother, Dara. The same day we got sick. Explosive, gut-wrenching waves of pain and diarrhea. Terrible! With that being said. I cannot say with certainty that it was that bottled water that made us sick. Perhaps a flu bug. Maybe just a change in diet. Different oils used in cooking, different spices, etc. *shrug* I don't know, but it sure put us down for several days.
What I am certain of is, on the overnight train to Sapa there was several bottles of sealed water on the table for us have. I opened one to use with a cloth to wash my face and hands. When I peeled the outer seal off I noticed that it was wet. The cap was not tight AND it was dirty under the cap. I disposed of it and got another bottle. Same thing. It had been opened and a make-shift seal was put over the lid. Another trick we saw in Vietnam was bottle water that said, "USA" claiming to be purified by NASA space technology. This is not bottled water from USA. It is a Vietnam bottled water with a name to fool you. Clever marketing trick.

Was the bottled water you drank in Siem Reap like that shown in the photo link?

book_it, it was interesting to hear your story about water in VN, especially the "NASA-purified" water. VN has very different ideas about intellectual property than we do. You may have been approached to buy books by sellers around the lake in Hanoi - all of the books are copies of the published books. In the duty free shops in the airport, you'll come across Cognac and Scotch at really low prices, and you'll be tempted until you read the labels carefully. My favorite was the one that said "Made in Scotchland."

A number of the bottles we opened in vietnam were sealed with plastic, and wet. At first i was worried, then i drank them anyway. No problems :)

I just recently toured with Dara and had no problems whatsoever with the sealed bottled water he gave me to drink.

This is such a great site! Thanks to everyone for the warning!

I got food/water poisoning in India once and thought I was going to die! It's the most dreadful type of illness because it comes on so suddenly and takes over completely. My sympathies to all those who got ill on SE bottled water!

Is there anything else safe to drink besides Coke? (Now i'm going to be cautious about drinking even bottled fruit juices!)

book_it, can you share what kind of water purifier you used?

easytraveler, this is posted here because the experience of getting bottled water that is not ok is very rare. I've purchased and consumed bottled water all over SE Asia without any problems. I do make sure thay are sealed. Of course, hot beverages such as coffee and tea are safe.

My thanks also - will be in Siem Reap in early Feb and fore-warned is fore-armed.

So the question now might be - is there a brand of bottled water sold in Siem Reap that is absolutely safe for certain ? Are imported brands like Dasani or Aqafina available there ?

Kathie, thanks for the clarification. :)

Yes, I too have had bottled water all over Asia and usually use it to brush teeth, etc. as well as to drink, so it's a bit of a shocker to have a warning about any bottled water anywhere.

How does one tell a good bottle from a bad bottle? Water is not something that one can do without.

Would you recommend that I take a water purifier on my next trip? (Planning Thailand and Vietnam, maybe South China). Thanks for any help you can offer.

All the water we drank in all 4 countries was completely fine besides the water featured in the link above, which is just filtered water. If you buy the normal-looking clear bottles of any brand, you'll be fine.

I believe the water filter we took this time was an MSR mini with a ceramic filter. Works wonderful in bathroom sinks. Fast, easy. The bottle fits nicely in our backpack to carry. Much cheaper than buying bottle water all the time.
Anyway, I need to assure people that most liquids are safe to drink, including soups, tea and coffee. But, because we are older travelers and have touchy systems that unbalance easy, we use more caution than perhaps others need to. Dara in Siem Reap is a wonderful man and great guide I would never suggest he gave out BAD bottle water. Perhaps it was just a change in the mineral content from our water to his bottled water or like I said, a flu bug or even slight food poisoning (which can happen in any restaurant, including 5 star hotels) I suggest all travelers use a little caution and a lot of common sense. Be aware while traveling that is it possible to purchase a bottle of water that has opened, used then re-filled with water from questionable sources or labels that are phoney. Make your own personal judgement as to risk you wish to take. It is different for each person. I am once-bitten twice-shy about getting sick, so perhaps I am more aggressive to protect it than others. Someone asked if the bottle water looked like the picture sent. I don't remember. Sorry.