Seasons

Before I landed in Dubai, I had not been further south than the Canary Isles, nor closer to the desert than a Greek beach. Plenty of preconceptions about what lay in store, but not the faintest real idea. I spent the night before my flight watching the Dubai Gold Cup on television, trying to figure out what people were wearing as an indication of what the climate might hold for me. Anoraks and flowery hats, apparently.

And on the morning of my first day, our company driver came to pick me up from the hotel. It was raining, which seemed to make him inordinately pleased and upset at the same time. Little did I know then that the next rain we would see would be eight months later.

But on those regular morning drives, I did come to understand some of the layout of Dubai, the changing landscape, the flux of the traffic. And the most surprising scent, the air full of the most unexpected tang of new-mown grass, an aroma from childhood, and all the more evocative for being encountered in such a strange context. This was a city built on sand, or so I thought.

Fast forward, and I now measure the seasons by changes in shirts. As we approach the end of April, the days are getting sporadically hotter, though recent wind has been dry, bearing improbably fine dust from Iran and furth of the Gulf. Being from that quarter, it is also relatively dry, though last night my suspicion was that the air was unseasonalbly cool. Confirmation this morning, in a blanket of fog.
And so, a slow commute to work, through steadily lifting fog, and the scent of fresh grass clippings filling the air at the end of the Creek. It is a pleasure to watch the seasons advance in a series of small changes, to see the landscape greening and then retreat again in summer's onslaught, to relish the shamals and the sand sprites driven across the road like drifting snow.

Time to dig out the cover for the barbeque...

Summer's coming!

Summer

Yesterday, some time around 3.30 in the afternoon, summer returned to Dubai.

For weeks, the weather has be growing steadily more idyllic, hot, dry days softening into balmy nights, perfect for sitting under the stars with a cold beer in hand, for gathering friends old and new around a table and a barbecue.

Yesterday started little different, already warm at 6.30 when I took the dog out for her morning ablutions. Still, dry air, portending a glorious day to come.

Even the drive to work seemed easier, the usual blanket of smog largely absent, and all of Dubai’s burgeoning skyline glistening in the early sun.

No change at lunchtime, a hot day, the car temperature indicator surging to 43C and reminding me I really, really must get the A/C serviced…

And then it all changed.

This was the first wave of tropical ocean air of the year to come rolling across the Emirate, fitful gusts of steamy damp, making shirts and jeans cling like wet rags, and the wearer want for breath.

Everything is clammy and slick, clothes no longer dry on the line, but the garden thrives. There will be another couple of months of this, getting progressively hotter and more humid, before the full force of summer arrives and we all retreat into the temperature controlled lifestyle that is our annual inversion.