Daylight Saving Time cancelled indefinitely

As mentioned yesterday, Egypt will not be turning its clocks forward by an hour this month. I wasn’t sure yesterday what the motive for that was, but thought it might just be a one-off measure since things are already sufficiently in flux in this country.

But according to this morning’s newspaper, which I read over breakfast, the cancellation is indefinite and for ostensibly democratic reasons: polls simply show that most Egyptians don’t like it.

A few dissenters were quoted, but the most poignant quote was the final one in the article from a day-laborer named Mahmoud, which went roughly like this: “Who cares? We work hard all day, then come home exhausted to catch a few hours of sleep. Clocks make no difference.” It is a large class of people in this country whose needs must be addressed.

It’s usually pretty sunny here due to lack of clouds (today is an exception). But since Egypt is located in Africa and is largely desert, it’s easy to make the mistake of thinking of it as a tropical country. The Tropic of Cancer does barely pass through the far South of Egypt, but Cairo itself is at the same latitude as New Orleans and Austin, TX. Warm, but not tropical.