A friend and I were having our morning chat by the coffee maker in our lunchroom this morning when she told me about a show she watched on the Food Network last night. The hostess of the show was in Las Vegas and visited a hookah lounge. THE Hookah Lounge, to be exact. When she watched it last night, I'm sure her first reaction was "WTF?" Then knowing I would find the answer for her, she came to me. I'd heard of how hookah lounges are becoming the trendy place to visit if you're a smoker. I knew that it involved a bong-type device, but after doing a bit of research I found a plethora of information.
First of all, a hookah is a pipe with long, flexible tubes connected to an urn of water, which cool the tobacco smoke as it is drawn through. The tobacco comes in a variety of flavors. Traditionally, it is long pieces of tobacco mixed with a sugar-based syrup mixture and fruit bits or extract. The fruit flavors are strongly tasted in the smoke, and the cooling action of the hookah provides added smoothness. Usually hookah lounges add ice to the hookah water. Flavors include apple, peach, raspberry, mixed fruit, orange; just like Skittles candies. The tobacco isn't burned to complete ash, but rather it is cooked by the coals that sit on top of the hookah.
It is said that the water pipe originated in India where it was made from coconut shells and then spread to Iran and into different parts of the Arab world before moving onto Turkey. One of the oldest and deep rooted traditions in Turkey is smoking the Nargile (Hookah). Turkey revolutionized Hookah smoking and today it's a very important part of the coffee shop culture. For centuries, even around the time of Murat the IV in the 1600's, Hookah smoking was popular. During the 19th and in the beginning of the 20th century, hookah smoking was very fashionable with elite ladies and many wished to be photographed smoking one. Around the world, this smoking device is known by many different names. Some call it a hookah, hooka, huka, shisha, sheesha, shishah, nargile, narghile, and Hubbly Bubbly just to mention some.
Traditionally in many parts of the world, smoking a hookah with someone expressed a gesture of trust and bonding. The ceremonial gesture has translated to our society in that the elevated status of smoking a hookah has been preserved, and that people who smoke one are above and beyond the norm of society. If this is the case, I'm sure that Louisville's first hookah lounge will be in the East end of town. I'm sure you've probably figured out what a hookah lounge is. It's simply a bar or coffee shop with hookahs. They cater mostly to Middle Eastern clientele, but as stated earlier, the popularity is spreading to this side of the world. The lounges have workers to will tend to the coals, and all you have to do is make sure the bowl of the urn is full of shisha, the hookah term for tobacco. Hookah lounges are exotic - most have huge velvet pillows for you to sit on while you smoke. I'm envisioning a very Ali Baba-ish experience.
I did some more checking, and unfortunately for us here in Louisville, the closest hookah lounge is down in Nashville on 21st Avenue, called Mediterranean Cuisine. I don't smoke, and don't plan on picking up the habit now, but on my next trip to Nashville I will definitely stop in and check this place out.
One more thing - if you're wondering why the word "hookah" seems familiar, you probably heard it in a couple of places. If you'll remember, Alice while in Wonderland came across a hookah smoking caterpillar. And for those of you old enough to remember the Woodstock era, "White Rabbit" by Jefferson Airplane was a an awesome song about Alice In Wonderland and had drug references. One line in the song said:
"And if you go chasing rabbits
And you know you're going to fall
Tell 'em a hookah smoking caterpillar
Has given you the call
Call Alice when she was just small"
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