How do you define the start of summer in the UAE? Is it when you have to turn on the air conditioning rather than opening the window? When you have to do so at night, long after you’ve had to do that during the day? Is it when you sweat while standing still in the shade?
The truth is there’s a list, checked off one after the other and further complicated by the varying degrees of denial in which one hopes to put off the return of the summer heat. Give us just another couple of weeks – or, later, even a few more days – of perfect spring conditions, we plead, with pleasant temperatures and clear blue skies. Ultimately, even the most hopeful has to finally admit summer is here.
A few hot days back in March reminded us all that the heat is returning, prompting the internal cry of: “No! Not yet!”.
Those new to the UAE might have been tempted to think that it meant the heat would inescapably rise to its August crescendo. But those who grew up here or have been in the UAE for a while know there’s a phase when the weather vacillates between the (relative) chills of winter and the furnace blasts of summer.
And so it proved last month, when that early blast of heat was followed by a series of thunderstorms and downpours that sent the thermometer back down to more reasonable levels.
But last week, after too many days in which I bathed in the sweat pools of denial, I finally concluded that the weather was no longer still in its vacillation stage.
I closed my windows at home and turned on the air conditioning, with the expectation that it will remain in that state until October.
My first experience of Abu Dhabi had been in midsummer, landing at midnight in late August and wondering why the air conditioning on the skybridge between the plane and the terminal was so poor.
Walking out of the terminal a short time later revealed the truth: the air conditioning on the skybridge had actually been pretty good, moderating the wall of humidity that now enervated me as I stepped outside.
The inevitable process of adjustment followed, especially since only a few days before I’d been standing in snow in New Zealand.
The South Island has a maritime climate in which the direction the wind is coming from is a much better predictor of the prevailing conditions outside than the calendar. If it’s blowing gently nor’west, the day will be balmy and warm but within an hour, it could be replaced by a southerly blast from Antarctica.
In my last year in New Zealand, the first day of summer was colder than the first day of winter. This explains why all Kiwis unconsciously look out the window each morning, assess the wind direction from the clouds and decide how to dress.
In Abu Dhabi in late summer, I continued to do this, looking out the window of my hotel room and thinking: “Oh, it’s hot and sunny.” It took two weeks before my unconscious mind finally caught up with the reality that it’s always hot and sunny in September.
I was invited to a barbecue held by some Etihad pilots a few weeks later. I recognise the time now as that moment in September when those who have been here all summer decide it’s feasible – not comfortable and certainly not pleasant and definitely not sensible, but physically viable – to be outside.
We sat there, sweat pouring down our faces. For the first time in months, they basked in delight of sitting in air that wasn’t conditioned and I sat there in the disbelief that my flesh wasn’t actually melting off my bones.
Within a year, of course, I was just like them.
Those who stick around to endure the Arabian Gulf summer get to carry that achievement like a badge of honour as they work their way through the equivalent checklist with which we mark the end of summer. After that first chance to sit outside, the start of October usually marks the moment when it’s once again possible to stand outside without sweating.
The final item on my checklist is one all wearers of glasses will recognise: that moment when you step out of the air conditioning and your glasses don’t instantly fog. That is the day for me when summer is definitely over. And that moment is only about five months away from now.
JHenzell@thenational.ae
