Zeraph

...to someone who's never drank it.

I thought with all these heavy threads going around recently we could do with something a little lighter. My old creative writer teacher used to quiz us with these types of questions as warm ups. The hard part about this one is describing it without using an absence reference, such as "like biting into an orange without the citrus flavor."

My answer:

Water tastes like clean, mountain spring air that has become so heavy it flows into your mouth like a playful breeze.

squeeeb

i think the taste of water depends on where you live...

for me, the taste of water is like a hint of melted aluminum foil.

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MSD

Tastes like dirt at home, like the YMCA pool smells at work.

Zeraph

I mean water water, as in h20, not polluted water

Shell

...water tastes like the Creator's lite and subtle version of minerals...in it's purest liquid form

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squeeeb

we are talking about water. depending on where in the world you live, water tastes different. fish taste different depending on where they are caught, because of different minerals and different other stuff in the water.

i'm not trying to derail your thread. it's an awesome thread, and a great writing exercise.

i answered honestly, water to me tastes like a hint of melted aluminum. i don't live by a fresh mountain stream nestled high in the sun kissed mountain tops.

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onward to mayhem!

Jetée

I don't think I could even describe the taste sensations of a banana, or a Big Mac, or Lo Mein, so to provide indicative examples of what something as formless yet varying as water is a task indeed.


"Taste" is very hard for my mind to quantify properly because it usally involves comparing newer foods to the most familar of those you have already sampled, like "This tastes like chicken, only more sinewy". Also, it relies very heavily on texture as opposed to what percolating flavors are being experienced. Also, it is not helpful at all when friends tell me that a new snackfood at 7-11 "tastes very blue and sweet".

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Zeraph

Touche

MSD

I haven't tasted that in a long time.

After exercising or on a hot day, it's like a cold front moving through your mouth and down your throat.

Baraka_Guru

Water tastes like liquid air.

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Punk.of.Ages

Water tastes like poo...

I really hate the taste of water.

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Jetée

After giving it some thought, I came up with this descriptor:

If you have ever gone into an empty room of a standard hostipal where the air conditioning is circulating throughout the room, and as you enter the vicinity of the space, you simultaneously smell the ventilation and swallow a gulp of saliva, this is comparable to what water tastes like.

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Redjake

tastes like metal here.

fresnelly

Like your tongue; only moreso.

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girldetective

Like a soft cloud melting in your mouth.

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Jetée

See, I uttered this similar phrase to my friends when pressed to describe the taste of SmartWater

... and they just chuckled and remarked, "So you've tasted clouds before?".

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noodle

Dansani water for some reason is one of my favorite tasting waters for all its odd mineral flavor. My favorite water is in the mountains of North Georgia/South Carolina/North Carolina where it comes out of the tap so cold it hurts your teeth... it's the cleanest tasting thing ever.

Out of my current tap, it tastes like pennies. My hair is tinting red again and starting to fall out a bit more... guess what's in my pipes.

I love water. On a good day I drink almost a gallon. It soothes me and often makes me sleepy at night. In the heat of the day, the coolness tastes like childhood. Okay, so hose water tastes like childhood, too... we were hoodlums.
And I have to tell you, every time I see this thread, I'm reminded to get up and refill my cup. I'm going through a 2.5 gallon jug of Zephyrhills every couple of days, with bottles, too.

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Xerxys

Ya'll are gonna hate me here. I <3 Sams club. It's the only thing that actually tastes like real water to me. I know where it comes from, they distill it and add nothing to it. So great, as for describing it ...

Sam's club water does not taste like mud, in fact, it tastes like the air that you breath early in the morning on a February after coming from a long and laborious work session and craving something with a hint of nature in it!

Dang', get the landlord or property management or someone!!

noodle

that's the area I live in xerx. it jsut takes some getting used to. I don't DRINK it. eew.

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spindles

You are supposed to flush before drinking out of the toilet bowl...

Xerxys - I reckon Sam's club has you duped - paying for bottled water just seems wrong to me.

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ItWasMe

There are a couple of bottled water brands that taste like snow when chilled. Not meant to be funny because I can't say that about all water.

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Jinn

I guess I'm the only pedant here who saw this question a bit differently.

One of the very definitions of H20 is that it is a clear, colorless, odorless, and tasteless liquid.

To someone who had never tasted water, I'd inform them the above; it has absolutely no taste.

Any level of impurity in water will make it taste differently, but trying to explain all of those variations is tough even to someone who HAS tasted it. Water itself should have none.

And that's totally ignoring the issue of someone who has never tasted water - how have they survived, up to this point? Without some sort of intravenous drip of water, they would soon die. My primary concern would be in helping them start drinking water, not explaining to them what it tasted like.

This is probably why I'm so bad at creative, expository, or imaginative writing.

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Xerxys

Jinn ...

Yeah, you suck at this!!

Fremen

Water, it tastes like life.

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Shauk

Like my mouth got stuck open during a thunderstorm.

MSD

Even distilled water out of a glass container has a certain taste to it. I'm not sure how to describe it, but it's there.

Lasereth

Cold spit.

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-deathboy-

...like a cascade of glacial refreshment that cleanses the palate and fills your body with an instant feeling of well being.
that about sums up my thoughts on water!

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