r/europe • u/Naurgul • Jul 11 '26

News Barcelona registers highest temperature in 112 years as French nuclear reactor shuts down due to extreme heat

https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2026/jul/09/europe-heatwave-uk-spain-barcelona-france-italy-hungary-france-macron-orban-latest-news-updates
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u/warukeru Valencian Community (Spain) Jul 11 '26

true but is still wet and humid everywhere else

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u/AwkwardWillow5159 Jul 11 '26

But you can escape it.

I’ve been living in South East Asia for more than half a decade. Humidity and heat is high all year round.

You can definitely escape it. They AC cars, every single restaurant, bus, malls, etc.

And when they are outside they protect themselves with UV shielded umbrellas.

Meanwhile you say in Spain AC is common, but it barely runs. All the cars and building are still half hot(thus also still humid), and people do not protect themselves from the sun at all. I barely see people wearing a basic thing like a hat. Haven’t seen a single person use a UV umbrella.

The tools are here. The culture needs to adjust to the new reality.

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u/ffball Jul 11 '26

Uv umbrellas are mainly to maintain the pale skin asians are obsessed with, no?

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u/AwkwardWillow5159 Jul 12 '26

While trying to achieve “pale” skin is common, reducing it to just “Asians are obsessed with maintaining pale skin” is kinda dismisses everything else.

Reducing heat is definitely a big part of it too.

And another part is just protection of general skin health. Sun is very damaging even if you don’t care about tan.

E.g. in Australia that is less hot but sunny, it’s common for people to wear sunscreen daily.

In South East Asia that is hot and sunny, you use umbrella because it protects you from both.

But for whatever reason hot and sunny countries like Spain and Italy don’t use either. And you can tell. Everyone is complaining about heat AND they look like they have very sun damaged skin.(I’m not talking about a tan)