El Andalous - Windy Season

Dust Gathering as I Type!

At some point between winter and summer, there’s the windy season in Hurghada. I think it’s usually in March. However, we’ve been having quite a bit of wind here, recently.

Coming from Europe, it actually feels quite strange. At night, if it’s gusty, I can hear the palm trees swaying outside. But, since I’m from Europe, my first thought when I’m lying in bed and listening to it is that the rustling of the palms is rain. It sounds just like the incessant insidious rain that you get in Europe. I leap out of bed and look outside the window to take a look at it (since rain is a rare occurrence over here, and I feel obliged to watch it) and then realize that of course, it’s silly of me to think it’s raining, it’s only the trees. I wonder whether when Egyptians come over to Europe, they hear rain at night and think it’s the palm trees?

I am basically living in the desert, so when it’s windy, it’s also very dusty. The mountains rising up across the bay become invisible (despite the blue sky, which also seems odd). Sometimes the sky clouds over, sometimes the clouds are even a bit dark, and then the wind starts to get stronger. It’s hard to kick the habit of thinking that this is a sure sign of rain. But this is Egypt. Generally, it doesn’t rain. It’s just cloudy and windy.

The sense that it’s going to rain is also heightened by the fact that sometimes the sound of the wind can become a bit like a “boom”; at one point I thought it was thunder, but it was just the wind rumbling and reverberating round the complex. Ignoring your expectations built up over years of past experience of approaching storms and rain is quite difficult.

And the dust means it’s impossible to keep my balcony clean. Within a couple of hours, everything is covered and there’s no point in cleaning because it’s just going to get dusty again straight away. You don’t really notice the dust in the air (or at least, I don’t), so it’s not unpleasant to sit outside; also my balcony is fairly protected (although the dust still settles). But I do start to feel as if I look like I’ve been too lazy to clean for weeks on end, whereas in reality all that dust has just arrived in the last hour or so.

It’s not entirely possible to escape the wind even when you’re inside. The wind whistles through the corridors and your door can slam shut if you’re not careful as you come in. In the summer, a breeze coming through the flat is very pleasant if you leave your door open, but at this time of year, when the wind is so strong, it’s like something out of a horror film (although, thankfully, without the horror, just the sound track!).