Bahrain/Saudi Arabia: Rain Rain Go Away!  · Global Voices
Amira Al Hussaini

Yesterday afternoon brought with it some rain, gusts and dust to the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia and neighbouring Bahrain, spurring a buzz on Twitter and other social networking platforms.
To give some context to those not from the region, rain is a rare occurrence and freak storms get people edgy as the infrastructure is not geared to deal with the extra water. After a severe downpour, our roads become “rivers” and “lakes” form in neighbourhoods, thanks to bad drainage.
From Bahrain, where the storm was less severe, Ahmed Zainal admits in a tweet:
Never got so confused at a roundabout. Had a ton of sand around me and I couldn't see the exits!
For those of you not so familiar with roundabouts, here‘s some more information.
Moe Zainal, actionscripter on Twitter, is also confused. He tweets:
I don't understand our confused weather… Mskeeeeeeeeeen…. (poor thing)
And Eyade quips:
the weather outside reminds of this line from King Pin “run for the hill everybody! there is a giant shit cloud coming”
Thankfully, it was a false alarm, and the storm quickly passed Bahrain with very little damage.
Meanwhile, across the 25km causeway linking Bahrain to Saudi Arabia, in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia, a new Twitter hashtag was born as the sky turned black and the gusts picked up. Twitter users there quickly adopted the hash tag #ShargiahRain to inform each other about traffic jams, storm damage and other updates. Shargiah means Eastern in Arabic, and is what we call the Eastern Province in our daily lives.
Once again, like with the Riyadh Rains a few days ago, Twitter users take the opportunity to express their dissatisfaction with mainstream media.
Turki 2 notes:
Hasan Almustafa uploads this picture on twitpic, which shows a damaged billboard leaning into the water in Qatif:
Hasan Almustafa's twitpic on the storm
And in nearby Khobar, Ali Al Ohali shares this photograph on twitpic:
Khobar storm
On YouTube, sebinsaifsebinsa, from Dammam, uploads this video of the storm:
And finally Horames has good news:
Stay tuned for more updates as climate change wreaks havoc around the world!