Tap Water

There is a story here in Korea that the tap water is unsafe to drink. Unfortunately, no one told me that when I got here so I’ve been drinking from the tap for the last five days. I’ve heard multiple reasons why the water is unsafe, from lead, arsenic and heavy metals to hepatitis A, estrogen and other prescription drugs. Thankfully it’s all bullshit. The water here is safe to drink from the tap and doesn’t taste any different than safe tap water in the States. However, less than 10% of Koreans actually drink tap water, or so a study claimed. Why? If the water were safe to drink, why wouldn’t Koreans drink it? This is where the myth starts, if Koreans aren’t drinking the tap water, the tap water must not be safe to drink. Who can see the faulty logic?

Here is what I have found from my research. There are two major reasons why Koreans don’t drink tap water, one scientific, and the other social. I’ll start with the scientific reason. In the past ten years, there have been around six chemical spills that have contaminated the groundwater, which then contaminates the tap water. Not a big deal, right? Once the news gets out that the tap water is contaminated, stop drinking it and buy bottled water. Problem: it often takes weeks after the contamination for a report to come out about the leakage. That means that for those weeks (at least 1 or 2) anyone that drank the tap water is at risk and wouldn’t know until the report was released. This was the "in" that marketers needed.

It has become sociable here to drink bottled water. Just like the States, bottled water has become an image thanks to good marketing and a market that isn’t as trusting of the tap water. Brita filters are also extremely common for the same reason, marketing.

Long story short, the water is safe to drink. However, there have been chemical spills in the past and there will probably be spills in the future; it all depends on how safe you feel drinking the water. Don’t be fooled by myths or bad logic, make up your own mind. Since a 2 liter bottle of water only costs 1,300 Won, I intend to switch to bottled water for drinking, but everything else will be out of the tap.