Water Falling From The Sky – Wednesday 6 December 2006

Last night as we were driving home it started to rain. We were teasing Essam (our driver man) saying ‘what’s going on?’ and he said ‘yes I know, water falling from the sky!’.

We said we didn’t think it ever rained in Cairo and he said it didn’t rain much, just a shower now and then during winter then within a few hours it will be like summer again.

This morning when we got up the air was clear, the clearest we’ve ever seen it. The streets weren’t clean (I think it’d take a solid downpour for at least 4 weeks to clean the streets), but at least the air was nice and the fields looked extra green.

Essam said that the air is always clearer after the rain and that the whole day would be beautifully clear. He was a little keen with this pronouncement. It rained from about lunchtime onwards… not really heavy. More than a shower, but less than a total down pour… just steady rain.

By the time we were driving home the roads were all flooded. They have some drainage, but generally the few drains they have are blocked with sand and rubbish so the water has no where to go.

We were going along the freeway and at one point the road we asked Essam if he had a felucca license – we thought we were going to end up rowing home! (felucca’s are the boats they sail up the Nile). The cars were driving really slow, but even so I was sure they were going to end up aquaplaning.

By the time we got back to Mohandiseen the rain had stopped, it was just the water pooling everywhere that was the problem. Then, there were guys on the street with the squeegee’s they use to ‘mop’ the floors – they were pushing the water to the drains! There were loads of them squeegeeing the streets!

I guess with no natural (or man made drainage) they have to do something to get rid of the water… it’d get manky pretty quick with all the rubbish that’s laying around.