Bountiful Sandstorms

One of the things that I've missed the most since I have been here (you know...other than the obvious things like friends and family and sonic) is thunderstorms...and rain in general I suppose...but I really miss thunderstorms. We've had one week of rain since I got here (the kind of rain that actually forms a few puddles that last more than five minutes), including one or two "torrential downpours" (the kind of downpour that we would actually call a pretty good rain back home), and then a few other random spurts of "sprinkles" (the kind of sprinkles that leave just enough proof in the dust caked on car windows to keep people from thinking you've been smoking "too much shisha*" and are telling crazy stories...I'm not kidding...about 15 minutes passed from the first few tiny drops until all signs of moisture had completely evaporated!!!) Also, the closest thing we have to thunder over here is the occasional round of fireworks that someone sets off near one of the big buildings in town (hmm...that was a very southern country-girl way to word that...too tired to "citify" it, though...), or when the dump trucks rumble past our house. :( 

So that's the rain/thunderstorm situation. For any of you who have lived anywhere in east Texas (which is where I've been for the past five and a half years), you know how much rain falls there...we get a good storm about every week or two (on average)...sometimes a whole week of storms!!!...and I dearly love storms. We are not, however, completely without storms on this side of the world. In east Texas, there is an abundance of moisture (therefore, we have rainstorms); in Dubai...there is an abundance of sand...so we have sandstorms! Since I have been here, there have been several standstorms...a few of them lasting a couple of days. Usually they bring in cooler weather with them, although one of them blew in on some very hot winds (that was dismal!). 

The closest thing I can relate a sandstorm to (at least with what I have experienced in the states), is probably a pretty thick fog. However, instead of your hair curling as soon as you step into the drenched air...you feel like you've been standing too close to the fire for a few months in the winter (that is, the air sucks the moisture right out of you! or at least that's what it feels like). Just like a thick fog, though, sandstorms create an atmosphere of solitude...landmarks are blocked out, even neighbors houses down the road are barely perceivable. (Please note: the pictures really don't do it justice.)

View of the front gate from inside the villa wall...sandy sky on the top, clear sky on the bottom.

View from our "apartment"...sandy sky on the top, clear sky on the bottom.

The wind is usually very gusty during sandstorms (which I do like), but it blows the sand EVERYWHERE (go figure...)! During my first ever sandstorm (before the sand had really taken over the sky), I had the windows open to let in the lovely wind and glorious cool air, but I kept noticing that dust was building up on things a lot faster than usual. When I went outside a while later I realized we couldn't see any of our usual skyscraper landmarks!!! Holy cow! During our second lengthy sandstorm, I really should have known better, but the cool air was just a little too tempting, so after a few hours of having the window open, our kitchen countertop yielded a pile of sand comparable to the pile on the floor! Sheesh! The most amazing sandstorm, in my opinion, was the one that blew in SUPER fast (in February I think), and we were sitting outside and got to see it coming! It looked like a couple of the skyscrapers near us were on fire with smoke billowing out the top (it was just sand blowing off their roofs!)...about the time the wind hit us (blowing things off the outside tables where we were eating), we realized what was going on...kinda. I thought it was a rain storm and got REALLY excited. Only after things had died down a bit and we drove home did I realize that there was no hint of moisture anywhere. Then when we got home and I found little piles of sand on our porch and blown in under the door did reality fully sink in. Fortunately, we haven't had any other storms blow in with quite that much vehemence!

View of our front porch...post-sandstorm on the top, freshly swept on the bottom.

 

View of back steps...post-sandstorm on the left, freshly swept on the right.

So there you have it...the storms of the desert...not as near and dear to my heart as the Texas storms I grew up with...but still quite impressive in their own right! :)

*Shisha--refers to fruit-flavored tobacco smoked in a hookah and very common here in the UAE. Please note that this is a joking reference...I have not, nor do I intend to ever try shisha.