In the Middle East, extreme heat is becoming the new normal. Here’s what it looks like for one journalist in Damascus.
6 am
I wake up, completely soaked in sweat. It is the middle of August, and where I live in Damascus that means we are in the hottest days of summer. Temperatures easily reach 40 degrees Celsius here, and even higher in other parts of the country.
I have a battery-powered fan, but when it is this hot and humid, it doesn’t help me get a good night’s sleep. For that, you really need air conditioning, but without electricity the luxury of owning the device is useless. In this part of the capital, which is relatively well-off, we have power for around six hours a day.
After more than 13 years of brutal war in Syria, the country’s power infrastructure is severely damaged. On top of the destruction, economic collapse and Western sanctions make it harder to import fuel. Altogether, this means long power outages: Many parts of the country that are controlled by the government regularly go 22 hours without electricity from the state’s grid.
Before I start my daily routine, I take a cold shower as a temporary solution to the heat. On the official page of Syria’s meteorology department, I read the forecast: Temperatures continue to rise higher than average by about 2-4 degrees Celsius. The weather is summery, relatively hot, and generally clear. We advise avoiding direct exposure to sunlight during peak hours.”
“Higher than average” is an expression I have come across a lot this summer, in which people across the world are experiencing some of the hottest days ever recorded.
10 am
I drive out into the Damascus streets, and the sun feels so close. I hear the sounds of generators everywhere. Most shops have them installed in the nearby streets, so they have enough electricity to keep the lights on or do other basic tasks.
I think to myself how lucky I am that I don’t have to work outside, and that I have a car and I can sometimes afford to buy petrol. In my job as a journalist I can often work in a café, or at home. But many people’s jobs involve spending long hours outside, without any protection from the hot sun. They depend on crowded and unreliable public transportation.
Sometimes, I take a taxi to work, and a few days ago a driver told me that his job has become increasingly unbearable because of the heat. He can’t afford to put the air conditioner on, as that takes a lot of fuel. Each person only has access to a limited amount of state-subsidised petrol, and prices on the black market are almost double. “Life has become so hard here,” he said to me. “What can we do? How can we fix it all?” I didn’t have a good answer.
Life in Syria is drastically different depending on where you live and how much money you have, but across the entire country, 90% of the population of 23.5 million now lives under the poverty line. With millions of people struggling to find work or afford basics like enough food or fuel – not to mention the fact that there is still an active war elsewhere in the country (although not where I live) – dealing with the heat is just another thing in a long list that is out of reach for so many.
On the drive in, I stop on the side of the road to speak to a man who sells delicious-looking nuts off a cart. He tells me that every hour or so he moves a little bit to follow the shade provided by a nearby tree. He has been working in the same spot for more than 20 years, he tells me, from 8 in the morning until 8 at night.
The nut seller, who goes by Abu Omar, is 45 and has no other source of income. So even though he says this is the hottest summer he’s ever worked, he has to keep going. “I go to the public park nearby to wash my face with cold water every hour or so,” he says, explaining how he copes with the heat.
In the park, some kids are playing in the water running from an open tap, easing the heat. I wish I could do the same, and think about last week when I was further north, in Hama. Children were swimming in the Orontes River as an escape from the heat, even if just for a few minutes.
For many people in the Middle East and North Africa, getting out of the heat is about more than light relief. It’s a matter of life and death, either now or in the future. There are so many studies about how increasing heat waves threaten the daily lives of people in the region, especially the most vulnerable: women, children, and day labourers. One study suggests that by the end of the century, about half of the region’s population could be exposed to annual recurring “super and ultra extreme heat waves”, meaning temperatures of 56 degrees Celsius or higher, for weeks at a time.
While those levels haven’t been reached yet, this summer has seen local news across Syria reporting hundreds of cases of people seeking help for heat stroke in hospitals. People have drowned while trying to get a break from severe heat waves. Last year, in the northwest, temperatures reached 46 degrees Celsius for several days.
Elsewhere in the region, it’s even hotter. More than 1,300 people died in Mecca earlier this summer, performing the hajj pilgrimage through temperatures of 46-49 degrees Celsius.
11 am
I park my car, and walk towards the small café where I often sit with my laptop and write. On the street, some people are holding pieces of paper or cardboard over their heads. Others are cooling themselves down with cups of cold fresh juice, sold on the street. I keep thinking about the old covered markets that the region is famous for, a clever piece of protection against the elements. Could the people that built them have ever imagined it would get this hot?
Inside the café, it’s reaching the hottest part of the day – 12 pm to 3 pm. Dozens of freelancers who have jobs like graphic designers, translators, and content creators are sitting around, taking advantage of the reliable electricity to finish their work for local and international clients. Not everyone can charge their phones or laptops at home.
But the high cost of fuel means that the café’s owners can’t keep the air conditioning on. They have just a few fans that move the hot heavy air. I sit and work for a few hours, but my phone and laptop heat up. Everything around me is hot, and after a few hours I’m exhausted.
3 pm
I head towards home. While walking to my car, I come across ads pasted on walls that give a number to call to subscribe to private generators. Over the past few months, these generators have begun to pop up all around central Damascus, although they were already widespread in other parts of government-held areas such as rural Damascus and Aleppo. We refer to the generators as “the amperes”, and they feel like a magical solution to many of summer’s problems.
They are spread around the city, and residents or shop owners can sign up for a certain amount of electricity – like one or 2 amperes – that runs into their homes. They pay the equivalent of around 6 to 25 US dollars each week, depending on how much electricity they consume.
Considering that many people in Syria still make less than 100 dollars a month, this kind of subscription can be a massive financial burden. It’s even higher for people who need to run restaurants, bakeries, or any business where heat could ruin them.
While the generators are new to Damascus, the heat isn’t, and I’m always pleasantly surprised by the ways people have adapted. For example, you can now buy all sorts of battery-powered fans. They are everywhere on a street in the city centre that everyone calls “electricity market”.
One shop owner there recently told me that sales of battery-powered fans have doubled since last year, because every single home needs one as it gets hotter. A small fan costs 500,000 Syrian pounds ($35), and you can get a better one for $60. Some wealthier families in Damascus have solar panels so they don’t need battery-powered fans or generators, but installing just one costs at least $2,000, and this is out of reach for the vast majority of Syrians.
Another solution is “ice trading”. Since fridges don’t have electricity for most of the day, people are buying ice to put in their freezers and fridges, or in a box to keep drinks cool for a few hours. Bags or chunks of ice are now being sold on streets and in grocery stores. I spoke to a woman from rural Damascus who told me she heads out early in the morning to look for ice, because it sells quickly. It costs between 5,000 and 15,000 Syrian pounds (around $.30 to $1) a day, so she said some people can only afford to buy ice on days when they are expecting guests.
In parts of Syria not controlled by the government, power comes from different sources, but it’s not necessarily more reliable. In opposition-held parts of the northwest, electricity often comes from Turkish companies, as well as from some renewable sources like solar power.
But like in Damascus, it is becoming increasingly expensive. Paying for private electricity is particularly out of reach for the two million people in northwest Syria who live in camps or other informal settlements, many of whom depend on aid to get by.
And in the northeast, where Kurdish forces control much of the territory, infrastructure has been destroyed, leading to long power outages and a reliance on expensive generators.
4 pm
By the time I get home, I am exhausted from the heat and by the loud noises of generators everywhere. I take a second cold shower, then try to carry on with the rest of my day inside a house that feels like a big oven. I think about how lucky I am to have a fan, some cold water, and a battery to charge my phone. I think about all the people in this country who don’t have that, or who really struggle in this heat: the elderly, the sick, day labourers, street vendors, taxi drivers, and people in tents.
9 pm
It feels better after the sun sets. In the evening, I sit on the balcony and enjoy some fresh air. I watch other people leave their hot homes for nearby gardens, and kids playing in the streets. I wonder to myself: Will life ever be normal here in Syria?
Edited by Annie Slemrod.
