When Ali Habib can no longer stand the heat outside, when the temperature reaches a sweltering 50 degrees Celsius, he stands up from his chair below a parasol on a street corner and heads to his car.
He turns on the air conditioning and cools down for a while.
Habib, who spends 12 hours a day selling sunflower seeds to drivers, knows all too well what it feels like to spend a summer in extreme heat.
The hot air blowing across Kuwait feels like an oven, making it stifling and hard to breathe. Your skin and hair grow hot in minutes. No one goes outside unless they have to during the day.
Kuwait, between Saudi Arabia and Iraq, may be a harbinger of life as the climate changes in other places and as hot regions become uninhabitable and daily life mainly takes place indoors.
Rising temperatures over the next 50 to 75 years could make large parts of the country unsuitable for human habitation, says the Kuwait Times, citing figures from the environmental authority.
A Harvard study, 13 out of 100 deaths may then be attributable to climate change.
'As if the outdoors doesn't exist'
Many of the wealthiest people in Kuwait only leave their air-conditioned homes and offices in summer to drive to air-conditioned shopping centres or shops and restaurants in air-conditioned cars.
"It's almost as if the outdoors doesn't exist," Kuwait-based architect Sharifa Alshalfan told the Guardian newspaper.
At 53.9 degrees, Mitribah outside Kuwait City recorded the third-highest temperature in the world in 2016, as verified by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).
Only Death Valley in California (56.7 degrees in 1913) and Kebili in Tunisia (55.0 degrees in 1931) were hotter.
In Kuwait, temperatures passed the 50-degree mark in May, the earliest point in the year in decades.
Some malls have dedicated lanes for walking and jogging on the upper floors.
"I come every day around half past six or seven," says a 50-year-old man wearing green trainers and a cap who has come to the Avenues, a kind of air-conditioned village for shopping and eating.
Cold air streams in from wall pipes, you shiver and your nose gets blocked. Birds fly under the glass roof.
"It feels like you're walking outside," says one New Zealander enthusiastically.
Dead fish wash up, palm trees die off
Outside, the sun shines unrelentingly and plants and animals have long since wilted in the heat.
Stray cats are being brought into vets' surgeries in summer after suffering from heat exhaustion, a local journalist reports. Birds lie dead on the roofs of houses unable to find shade or water.
Dead fish repeatedly wash up on the shore, struggling to get sufficient oxygen in the water in the sweltering bay.
On Kuwait's waterfront promenade, pigeons jostle in the shade of a palm tree. City trees are dying on pavements and even the heat-resistant palm trees wither by the roadside, their light brown leaves hanging limply.
Doctor: Heat over 40 degrees for several hours can be fatal
With the very high humidity level found on the coast of Kuwait, people's bodies are no longer able to cool down by sweating, says doctor Andrea Nakoinz of the German Alliance on Climate Change and Health.
Sweat no longer evaporates on the skin, which would otherwise provide a cooling effect. "Then being in heat of over 40 degrees for several hours can be fatal."
High-energy air-conditioned buildings are not the solution. The air from the air conditioning systems dries out the airways and makes them more susceptible to germs, says Nakoinz.
And, she adds, "If I'm always sitting in air-conditioned rooms, I can't adapt to the heat. Stepping out from 18 to 40 degrees can lead to circulatory collapse in people who are already ill."
Kuwait's dilemma lies in its vast oil reserves, discovered in 1938, which are among the largest in the world. With them has come prosperity, skyscrapers and 12-lane motorways.
The country aims to have 15% renewable energies by 2030 but for electricity generation, this was recently just 0.2%, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA).
Few countries consume as much electricity as Kuwait and consumption is rising.
Petrol is cheaper than cola
"Oil and gas keep us moving" and "fuel our world," says a museum near the largest oil field, Burgan.
Here, oil is seen as representing progress, it is a source of national pride rather than being seen as a harmful source of energy as it is by environmental activists in other parts of the world.
In the museum shop in Kuwait, the mascot is a laughing oil drum with a helmet. You can buy blue oil worker overalls in children's sizes.
Kuwait has the cheapest petrol in the Gulf, says the owner of a tourism company. The state subsidizes petrol so that a litre of gas costs around $0.34 - less than a litre of Coca-Cola.
When he parks and gets out of the car for about 15 minutes, the man leaves the engine running to keep his SUV nice and cool. His fuel consumption is between 14 and 20 litres per 100 kilometres.
Some of the few pedestrians you see at crossroads carry scarves and umbrellas to protect themselves from the sun and exhaust fumes.
Most of the beaches are deserted, with only a few people toughing out the searing midday heat or dipping their feet in the water.
The heat mainly affects the poorest
As in other regions of the world, the impacts of climate change hit the poorest first.
On building sites in the suburb of Chaitan, you can meet men from India or Sri Lanka mixing cement, laying water pipes and cladding ceilings. Outdoor work is forbidden between 11 am and 4 pm in summer.
The migrant workers, who make up around two thirds of Kuwait's population, are particularly at risk of health problems in the heat and "bear the brunt," says the World Health Organization.
Egyptians bring their catch ashore at the fish market even as the temperature hits 48 degrees. "What am I supposed to do?" says Hamid Mohammed Issa, who has been working in Kuwait for 42 years. Sweat runs down his forehead like water.
"I have to earn my living."
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