Until the 1970's, all around Guangzhou in the small streets and down the narrow lanes, there were small shops that have long since disappeared, but that the elders remember dearly. Today we are going to talk about the Pao Shui Guan, which filled the much needed functions of public bath, tea house, and they even sold boiling water for the locals to take home.

Mrs Ou grew-up in Guangzhou, and has deep feelings towards the Pao Shui Guan. She is now in her fifty's, but when she was a little girl she used to go to the Pao Shui Guan everyday. On Sunday afternoon, Mrs. Ou took us to a bakery on Xiaogang Road and told us that the bakery used to be a Pao Shui Guan years ago, and that her family members usually went there to buy hot water. However, in this well-decorated bakery, we could find no traces of the past. Mrs. Ou remembers the days when the citizens could come to buy hot water here, take a bath in the bath house, and then enjoy a cup of tea in the tea house. A Pao Shui Guan was a good place to meet friends. There were many of them at that time, especially in crowded areas, and they were indispensable. At the beginning of the reform and opening up, firewood and coal were supplied by tickets. Because it cost a lot to use firewood to boil water, many people meticulously planed all their expenditures and went to a Pao Shui Guan to buy water.

"I remember at that time, it cost 10 cents to buy a bottle of hot water."