Bearing Up Under Melting Point

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I was transported back in time and geography, and started to panic!

Exasperated commuters in sweat soaked exotic outfits spreading limbs and invading your private space, usually impeccably-mannered colleagues laying flat on their desk chairs the way your average drudge would crash on a sofa, bonus-winning workaholics deserting their sweltering offices for the nearby park, freshly hired graduates chattering their shifts out in the air-conditioned break-out areas, unkempt security officers renouncing their bravado for a ‘whatever’ expression… I could go on and on describing the lengthy cigarette breaks, the reckless driving, the rampant rudeness and the moody attitude.. There was something utterly non-British about this town and its people, something sticky and stealthy, all too familiar.

A friend suggested in a FB post that Londoners have to adopt a languishing attitude and easy-going mind to survive in the heatwave, that the frenetic pace of rush hour when the mercury hits the mid-thirties will get you killed. I could paraphrase this as: give up your London ways as long as the alien weather lasts. Or otherwise: when under Sahara airflow conditions, do as Sahrans do.

That was it! And everything started to make sense. I began to wonder whether the weather was to be blamed for the laid-back behaviour of warm zones nations? Was it the eternal sizzling afternoons to be held accountable for the Mediterranean relaxed-style (nothing to do with the Greek ordeal, just a calendar coincidence)? Should we attribute the Arabic notorious difficulties with time-keeping to Arabia’s Simum winds? Could it be that simple?

Think about it: a couple of days moderately hot weather (according to MENA region standards) were enough to subdue a honest, hardworking population, and subject large swathes of the public to steady metamorphosis. Yet, I did not mention the outdoors eating and drinking, the late night partying, the piles of empty bottles and goblets, the vaporous organic waste…

The same postcode was somehow enchanted into some godforsaken Levantine outpost. And the quickly expanding patches of dry lawn added to the illusion.

What happened to my fellow co-workers motivated sense of duty? How did the community members decide to depart from their self-inflicted reserved nature? I even come to be warmly greeted by unsociable neighbours, people I am bound to encounter every morning when rushing to the bus! It was THAT critical.

I should actually fit in perfectly, being born and bred in a throbbing North-African city, where people hug, kiss and shake hand unceremoniously. Instead, I was starting to realise that public keep-it-to-yourself attitude is not bad after all, that the ‘ignore thy neighbour’ code of conduct can bring salvation to a socially fed-up soul, that the unwritten mandatory ban on emotional expansion is sweetly addictive.

I would never have pictured myself longing for the comforting general restraint, but there I was waiting for the legendary insular phlegm to prevail. Then, in late evening, an unforeseen storm worthy of a British weather fluctuation.. complete with lightening strikes, loud thunder and all. And rain, torrents of soothing rain pouring down from the dark heavens by the buckets, sweeping away the tropical nonchalance.