No Stupid Questions

Have a look at the map here, and also at the satellite view. Zoom in: 37,0593067, 15,2976834

It is a >2000 year old town, still alive and inhabited (mostly by tourists nowadays). People had no air condition back then.

The buildings are made of natural stone. The walls are as heavy as possible. The streets are as narrow as possible (some can be used with a car, some cannot).

I have been there on vacation for two weeks and the effect of this way of building a city is huge! The sun barely reaches the ground in these narrow streets. The heavy walls do not heat up much in the lower floors. They keep some the ground's coolness - and today, some of the air condition's coolness as well, but the local people told me that they use their air condition only in the 3-4 hottest month's of the year.

Mental conditioning and altered behavior.

If you're not used to it the heat can feel oppressive. Some kind of lizard-brain response telling you that the heat is a threat that must be mitigated immediately. Once you get used to it you realise that it's just mild discomfort and that it's not harmful (except for sun burn, heat stroke, et cetera).

You also alter your behavior in simple ways that may not occur to you if you're not used to a hot climate. Like... make mid-day the least active part of your day. You're not going to just duck down to the shops for a bite at 1pm.

Expose yourself to moderate heat as much as possible. Your body adapts and then you can handle the extreme heat better.

A lot of people hide inside with AC all the time and then it’s a shock to the system when they go outside.

Also, body composition and fitness can make a huge difference.

Grew up in death valley (50+°C in summer)

Moved to northern Canada (-45°C in winter)

Sometimes humanity is just stubborn. You just a acclimate over time

Sgp here: you do social activities at night when it's cool.

During the day you stay hydrated, electrolytes, avoid the sun, if you must be in the sun cover yourself with a hat and long sleeves.

Acclimatization takes about 3 months, then you are more or less used to it.

Slightly different from your question, but in Egypt we get through it by not having a wet season. The Egyptian summer is very dry and rain only falls in the winter, so we just... Exist I guess. People who grew up in a certain temperature range tend to be a lot better at dealing with temperatures in that range.

I was born and raised in Las Vegas. It's a dry heat so water helps. I soak my shirt or hat and I can be outdoors for a while. Loose fitting light colored clothes and a wide brimmed hat go a long way. Stay in the shade or go out at night. Drink plenty of water, this is the biggest thing.

Indoors, a fan can help. An evaporative cooler is very effective in the dry heat. We're spoiled so most places are air conditioned, so I try to go places that are free to be in like the mall, library, grocery store.

Malaysia:

You wake up early for outdoor stuff, like jogging or longer dog walks. I do that between 5.30 and about 7.30 (=sunrise).

Other activities throughout the day are indoors mostly, shops, malls, gyms etc. are all airconditioned.

Most homes that have a garden come with a roofed porch area with a ceiling fan, so that keeps sitting outdoors manageable except for maybe the most intense mid-day heat.

Houses here are also solid brick & concrete constructions, and retain cold air better than the wooden constructs you see in the US and Canada, so you can actually keep homes at bearable temperatures without racking up electricity bills.

I live at the equator and it's always ~28 degrees celsius where I live. You can get almost any temperature at the equator so that really isn't a test of heat. Here in Colombia if you go down the mountains towards the coast or jungle it gets hotter. There the houses are built with lots of natural wind tunnel effects to keep them passively cool. When you're outside in the heat you just get used to it. When I was in Iraq it took us a few weeks to really get used to it but even at 50 degrees celsius you eventually build a tolerance.

That's the neat part, you don't

If not for clocks and all that industrial-corporate time management shit, people in the hotter parts of the world would probably be starting work ~5am, stopping around 12-15 (hottest time of the day) for lunch + a nap, then returning to their stuff and probably going to sleep at 23

Where I live (West Central Florida) we get (weather -wise) a winter and a summer, summer is longer and hot and wet.

The hot I grew up in, so am adapted I suppose, didn't have air conditioning till I was 23. So I can be still in the shade and pretty comfortable. If I have to exercise or work in the yard I do it in the morning, early, because afternoon is the rainy time, and if it doesn't rain it is too hot to be safe. All swim lessons and summer weddings are in the morning, nobody tries to schedule outdoor stuff in the afternoons if they live here. Stupid government refused to give workers heat protection protection. Kids have to do heat safety training for sports in school, learn what heat exhaustion looks like and how to hydrate safely.

I LOVE our rainy summers though. It is beautiful in its own way, the morning getting hotter then the storms, all the lightning and rain to cool it off, then the most beautiful heat lightning in the nights, whole sky flashing far away, and the bolts as well.

And I guess I'd ask how do people survive in places where it freezes for months on end? You can't grow anything in the winter, and don't the pipes freeze and burst? Is it bad for the roads and bridges? Do the homeless freeze to death? The squirrels? What about reptiles, snakes and lizards?

Australian Northern Territory, we have hot humid days every day.

We just sweat and be miserable.

There's no getting used to it unfortunately just do your best to not get sick from working outside in it

I wonder the same thing about people who live in cold environments. I've never seen snow, and I know I won't handle it, because I can't handle single digit (Celsius) temperatures, let alone below 0...

By pretending it isn't happening by being distracted by video games

Water, inside and out. Dune (the book) had a great quote about the best place for water is inside you.

Humans evolved to deal with heat, and yes, later cold, but our roots are in Africa. So many ways to cool with water, you find strategies that work. Misting is a great example. Low power and water use, works outdoors, they use it in the NFL.

I use gaiters year round, dry for cold, wet for heat. They can make a dramatic difference. Wrap an ice cube in one, put it at the base of your neck, fool your brain stem into thinking you're cooler.

Staying small is huge (heh). The square cube law is a thing. If you took my skinny hide and spread it out on top of a tall fat man, it would be fairly close. But our volume would be drastically different.

AC, fans, water, and shade.

It's actually not that bad on the equator. Here in Malaysia out temperatures fluctuate between 26-34C during the year. The bits slightly off center are the dangerous ones, with temps in the middle east reaching 50C sometimes.

I just suffer through any mandatory outdoor events (mostly in silence, but sometimes wailing and profanities are included) and limit myself to activities after sunset, I always keep a bottle of water with me, and I have an hourly reminder to drink when I'm on the computer.

I am an anomaly and love the heat. I am known for wearing jeans and a hoody in 100°f heat.

That said I get cold at like 70°f and often have to add a layer.