Spring time? This does not exist over here in Qatar. Not in the way Europeans are likely to know it. Ok, temperatures reach above 30 centigrades a day, still falling to 22 at night. Maybe this is what is called spring over here.

One small disadvantage of the area is the availability of sand around the city. Although big spaces are solid ground, dried out surface and rock hard, the nearby deserts carry a lot of dust, fine sand, blown up by the mostly north-western winds. This dust keeps covering everything, cars, buildings, it enters even sealed buildings like most of the towers in West Bay area.



So when I have a look in the morning out of my hotel room and I see something like in the picture above, I know that the coughing period will start again. This dust is so minute, you don't feel it in between your teeth, you just notice it when you wipe your desk. Or the windscreen of the car. It enters your lungs and causes a dry feeling in your throat, causing you to repeatedly cough.

I am here now only for a short time, but I will see how the weather is going to improve. I've already been warned that in summer it will be up to 50 centigrades with a humidity up to 80 per cent. Hopefully the dust will be absent then.