Jeddah rivals Seattle in rain

Strange but true: from late December through late January Jeddah probably had more rainfall than Seattle. Even though December is often the cruelest, wettest month in Seattle, with January often not that much better, Jeddah has been more than holding its own this year. During our winter break away in Austria, Jeddah had three rainstorms, one of them big enough to flood much of the city (and, temporarily at least, portions of KAUST). Then, a few weeks after returning to KAUST, we had another huge rainfall, this one wreaking even more havoc in Jeddah and again testing KAUST's limits on drainage.

Fortunately, the engineers at KAUST did their homework after last year's also big flooding. Although we had our own temporary version of the Great Lakes on campus, the storm drains worked overtime, the water diversions held, and soon campus was pretty much back to normal. Jeddah was not so lucky; KAUST coordinated a humanitarian effort to help those most adversely affected, with even our school playing a helpful role.

While Seattle is synonymous with rain, far fewer folks would associate Saudi Arabia with the wet stuff. Given this, a few images from the past weeks might attach a bit of humor to what was otherwise a very tough week for many in these parts.

• Biking across a bridge that had the biggest puddle, a lake really, even though the bridge straddled water. Huh?
• During the worst torrents, looking over at manicured shrubs and noticing that they were receiving their pre-programmed watering. Nothing like a double dose of water! "Excuse me, sir, it's time to wake up for your sleeping pill."
• Biking to dinner in a downpour, which we hoped would end, and basically needing a kayak to get home after the rain's intensity only grew. Logan's bike at one point was below water level. And he was still riding. This prompted pulse increases in both parents. It was then that we abandoned the roads and just went for high ground.
• January is often synonymous with snow days for US school kids. Not so here, where students miss school because of heavy rain. Which makes sense when you think about it if you're receiving more than 100% of your annual rainfall in the space of a few hours.

So, amazing to say this from Saudi Arabia, but we don't need anymore rain, at least not for awhile. Fortunately, there's none forecasted. And I mean FOREcasted. Now, true to form, it could well not rain for another ten months. At all!

Thanks for reading,

David