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My encounter with a dust storm

When I managed to open my eyes again, the visibility was almost zero. It seemed like I was in an imaginary world where everything was grey.

I could just make out the silhouettes of buildings but I dared not cross the windswept roads. Then something gently touched my neck. It was not there when I turned. It must have been a leaf from a swaying branch of the tree that I was under for shelter. Then a horrible feeling engulfed me. With the wind travelling at 50 km per hour, what if the tree fell and crushed me to death? The branches were already complaining with the leaves and the twigs making a circle around me. To keep morbid thoughts away from my mind, I thought of the birds who probably had nests perched somewhere on the tree.

Then I heard a siren in the distance and it grew louder as it approached my way. The powerful lights of the ambulance broke through the dust storm and the vehicle made its way slowly to probably a victim who needed urgent attention. Some foolish driver, probably a teenager behind the wheel, thought of defying danger by driving very fast. The car tried to overtake the ambulance and for a minute, they were two phantoms in the misty dust, challenging each other for the right of the way. The ambulance driver had more sense and stopped to let the mad driver pass.

About forty minutes passed before it was visible enough for me to cross the road to my sand covered car. I was faced with another challenge. The wipers, after I had splashed water on the windshield, had a torrid time clearing away the heavy dust. It managed to turn it into sandy coloured dough that reminded me the way my mother used to make homemade bread many years ago. I did something that I thought I would never do. I used the sleeves of my dishdasha to wipe the windshield. I then rolled them up so as not to mess up the interior of my car and made my way home.

In Europe, they would have snow covered roads but in the dust storm we had last week, our roads had nothing but sand and all cars that sped past me were brown coloured. It was ideal time to wish for rain but here in the Gulf the weather has its own course to take. I reached home by six in the evening when strangely enough my wife did not think it was excuse enough to be two hours later than my usual time. It turned out she was watching her favourite programmes the entire time while I had a dangerous encounter with the freak weather. So instead of wasting words to explain my delay, I decided to unroll my sleeves. Her eyes widened and enquired if I had a fall, or worse, she added, a fight!

With women, words are always needed. They are not content with chivalry alone. I told her how I battled a 50-km per hour wind, flying sands and six inches of dust that had settled on my car. She rolled her eyes and continued to watch television. As luck would not have it, the next day she complained that my dishdasha clogged up the washing machine and she wondered why. It was my time to roll my eyes but the lady of the house was not amused by the revenge gesture.

Akif Abdulamir is an Oman based writer