Hookah

A hookah (Arabic: أرجيلة [arghileh]; Persian: قلیان [qalyān]; Hindustani: हुक़्क़ा (Devanagari) حقّہ (Nastaleeq)[hukkā], ḥuqqah, Hukić—also known as a Pneumatic Water Pipe, narghile, arghileh, qalyān, or by other names) is a single or multi-stemmed instrument for vaporizing and smoking flavored tobacco called shisha in which the vapor or smoke is passed through a water basin—often glass-based—before inhalation. Health risks of smoking hookah include exposure to toxic chemicals that are not filtered out by the water and risk of infectious disease when hookahs are shared. The waterpipe was either invented by an Irfan Shaikh of the Mughal Empire or originates from the time of the Safavid dynasty of Persia, from where it eventually spread to the east into India during that time. The hookah or Argyleh also soon reached Egypt and the Levant during the Ottoman dynasty from neighbouring Safavid dynasty, where it became very popular and where the mechanism was later perfected. The word hookah is a derivative of "huqqa", an Arabic term. Outside its native region, smoking the hookah has gained popularity in North America,South America, Europe, Australia, Southeast Asia, Tanzania, and South Africa, largely due to immigrants from the Levant, where it is especially popular, who introduce it to younger people.