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Ars Editor in Chief Ken Fisher mentioned on a phone call earlier this week that he was totally in love with a brand of eye drops. "Rohto eye drops," Fisher said. "They're like liquid cocaine for your eyes."
How could I
not
try something with that kind of ringing endorsement? A quick check around the Internet revealed that Ken isn't alone: the Rohto brand is gaining a crazy amount of traction all over the place. The eyedrops, produced by
Mentholatum
, come in a wide variety of "flavors" and strengths, but all the varieties are designed not just to moisturize your eye, but to actually
force it to feel refreshed.
The most often-used description on the 'Net is that Rohto drops are like "mouthwash for your eyes" and that they sting at first but then provide an amazing feeling of cool relief. As a frequent dry-eye sufferer—like Ken, I stare at computer screens all day long!—that was more than enough to get me to whip out my credit card and hit up Amazon, which had several varieties for sale.
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This is what I received. It manages to be both futuristic and ominous all at the same time.
Lee Hutchinson
I wound up purchasing the
Rohto Z Pro
drops, which promise "maximum strength freshness." They arrived in a thoroughly Japanese-covered box. On reflection, it might have been wiser to have purchased a version with instructions and an active ingredient list printed in a language I can read—after all, I am putting this stuff
into my eyes
—but by the time I actually had the drops in hand, I didn't want to wait any longer. I uncapped, tipped my head back, and went for it.
This is basically what happened.
Warner Bros. / MGM
At first, it burned. Not as much as getting soap in my eye, but there was definitely an unpleasant burning—enough to make my eye snap shut and stay that way for at least half a minute. After I could relax enough to open it again, the sensation was like someone was pressing an ice-cube against my cornea—it was refreshing in the same way that being blasted full in the face by an icy wind is refreshing. And the sensation went on for some time—I felt like David Bowman hurtling down the stargate at the end of
2001
.
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The feeling of my eyeball being submerged in fast-moving ice water passed after a minute or so, draining away and leaving behind a pleasant coolness. Tear production definitely spiked in the minutes after the drops, but it settled down over the course of 5-10 minutes; as I write this, about an hour later, my eyes feel like slick orbs of solid ice, gliding smoothly around in their sockets. It's not at all unpleasant—in fact, I kind of want to do some more eyedrops. Unfortunately, the warning label is in Japanese, so I have no idea how long I'm supposed to wait before resubmerging my eyes in that arctic river.
Customer reviews on the Rohto Z Pro drops seem to say that they provide the
feeling
of relief without actually getting rid of any redness; a quick check in the mirror shows that my eyes seem pretty normal-looking.
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The aftermath in EXTREME CLOSE UP.
Lee Hutchinson
Unsurprisingly, some of the biggest Rohto fans on the Internet appear to be
weed users
. A product that promises to reduce eye irritation is certainly going to be popular with people who have a regular need to mitigate some of the physical effects of marijuana use—eye drops are a regular tool in the stoner's kit, and Rohto drops have been adopted by that segment pretty heavily. The "kick" provides a physiological "proof" that the drops are doing
something
. Unlike Visine or some other standard eye drops, you definitely know it when you're dropping Rohto onto your corneas, like tiny little freezing atomic bombs.
A little research reveals that active ingredients in the different Rohto drops vary; most use either tetrahydrozoline HCl or naphazoline hydrochloride as a redness reliever, though some add an additional small shot of zinc sulfate as an astringent. There's also a lubricating component, either polysorbate 80, hydroxyethyl cellulose, or hypromellose. The list of active ingredients for the Z Pro version that I ordered is a little harder to come by in English, but some Googling reveals a
whole crazy recipe of stuff
that
I can't believe I just squirted into my eye
.
Even knowing what's in the stuff, I'm strangely excited about getting to use them again. It's almost like eating hot chilis—the burning makes the relief afterward feel even better.
Listing image by Lee Hutchinson
