Hot Days Ahead
Posted March 1, 2007Cairo is heating up again.
The winter is now over, and its last gasps were cold gusts of wind, blowing sand and dust into places no army could breach. I took saran wrap and tape to my windows' railings and edges, and that has prevented further growth of the small sand dunes beginning to form on my floor. I wish I were kidding.
Right now, this moment, the weather is wonderfully temperate. The ten-day forecast predicts truly Mediterranean numbers, highs in the mid-70s and lows in the mid-50s. I will relish this week, because the mercury will continue to climb, and climb, and climb. Spring proper will only last a week or so. Egyptians have a saying: fall is Egypt's spring. Now, I was here in the fall, and if that was spring, I definitely do not want to be here when summer comes.
There's a Far Side cartoon with the caption "Inside the sun." In it, a man in coveralls sits and reads a magazine, and on the wall is a lever that reads Hot at the bottom and Hotter at the top. About now, that guy is edging the lever upwards, a little bit every day. What he doesn't realize is that as the temperature rises in Cairo, the pollution takes to the air. The past week has been exceptionally bad, as the cool air that pressed the airborn pollutants to earth is replaced by ever-warmer air, allowing those pollutants to suspend themselves in the atmosphere. Mornings are the worst time to breathe, since the sun's rays heat up the air and you can watch in horror as the particulate pollution begins to swirl in the convection currents.
The 8:30 a.m. view of pollution from my bedroom.
Looking northeast. This isn't what I had in mind when I named my website Urban Glows.
As the day wears on, the pollution rises ever higher over the city, and those of us who are used to it by now consider the afternoons' air a mild reprieve, which goes to show that humans can get used to anything given enough time.
I am off to the White Desert this weekend, to sleep for two nights under the stars. Now is the best time to go, since the heat will make the deserts unbearable within the month. But the coming week should be great, and I'll make the most of it.
