Comforters out of place

My wife, Verne, and I took a tour to Egypt and Jordan in November ’08, staying in a number of excellent hotels. In each hotel as well as on our Nile riverboat, the beds were fitted with thick comforters. We were not comforted. We found it difficult to maintain an adequate temperature during the night, being either too hot with it on or too cold with it off.

Comforters must be more difficult to maintain than sheets and blankets, yet they now seem to be widely used in Southeast Asia, South America, the Middle East and even at many hotels in the United States.

Can anyone tell us why this Northern European innovation has become standard bedding in warm climates?

ROBERT EDWARDS

Smithfield, VA