Came here to say the same thing. This whole article could be summarized as "I was pampered growing up. I was pampered through school. I was so pampered I had no concept of what things actually cost because everything was paid for me."

It's quite a shock when you start noticing that $3 bottles of water start adding up.

Unless you are in a country without potable water (like China where a bottle of water really is just 24 cents), then by all means, that bottle of water is a good investment.

You could live like locals and just boil the water. It doesn't get rid of everything in there, but it's better than drinking straight from the tap. I run mine through a Brita filter first. I know that the Brita doesn't actually do much, but it tastes much better at least.

Depends where you live. I have fine tapwater and drink it, but if I was even 1% worried - I would pony up for the 5 gallon jugs of bottled water. Life is too short to save $10 a month and die of cancer.

Except my friends tell me that the big water dispenser jug services are actually not trustworthy. Heck, this is a country that is currently experiencing a big vaccine safety scandal that's hard to imagine happening in many other countries. Then again, I wouldn't have imagined Flint's water problem to be as bad as it is, but something similar once happened in Canada too in a small town that found e.coli in their water. BTW, if it's not clear, my comments are regarding China.

Ya, avoid the big water dispensers. We just buy boxes of bottled water now.

Or if you live in Flint, Michigan or any other number of places in the US that don't have potable water.

I highly doubt the poster lives in Flint.

Not if you are in Thailand or some other strange country. Camping water filter, or UV purifier is the cheapest option in that case.

You get used to the local water, it's safe in most any urban area in SEA.

Refrigerated bottled water is cheap though, only 12 cents, but I know many locals who perceive drinking out of plastic bottles to be a bigger health risk than drinking tap water.

exactly! bottled water is a good that is well-known to be over-priced

Over priced and 100% unnecessary, unless you live in Flint

That is 100% untrue, even the flint water could be treated to be potable.

In your home? If you knew the water was that contaminated would you trust your home water treatment equipment to remove everything? In that situation I think I'd buy bottled water until things are resolved.

Distilling water with an activated carbon filter does remove everything.

Sure, how much does that system cost and does it actually taste good to drink? I've heard distilled water tastes horrible.

if you remove everything from the water with this method, or any other method, there is systems to re-mineralize water... (Reverse osmosis would also remove most of the lead)

I'm sure even bottled water isn't prone to pollution, but more and more alarms are raised about medical pollution in tap water. So I'm still happier when I drink out of a bottle.

you might be happier, but that's just your emotions playing with you, no rationality. I see it all the times with colleagues - they have amazing tap water coming straight from Alps (it really tastes well) and 2 metres next to it vending machine with 2 euro per 0.5l plastic bottle. Well guess what they do every single effin' time...

most of bottled water is tap water in plastic bottles, potentially infused with mix of BPA and other if ever exposed to slight amount of sunlight. don't ever think they use some high quality inert plastics on that bottle, because they don't.

with true deep well/mountain spring you are getting potentially better quality prior to bottling, and no idea what in final bottle.

if you have really poor quality tap water where you live, that's your best choice. it still might not be a healthy choice though.

My city's water comes from deep aquifers. In theory it is high quality, but in practice it tastes horrible because it is so hard.

My city just kicked off a project to deepen the wells so they don't need as much anti-bacterial treatment and the savings will be used to soften it a bit.

I once went to the town of Evian and saw people ordering bottles of Volvic in the restaurants...

Plus there's nothing wrong with buying a washable travel mug and just filling it with tap water.

Yes - I found it reading like he hadn't hit rock bottom for the VH1 Behind the Music story to be complete. :-) "But look at me from my great new life in Thailand." Umm... ok - I guess your life didn't really end then.