HOME FRONT How to care for the home during harmattan

The harmattan season is here again. It is usually a dry and dusty period associated with low humidity.

During harmattan, dry and dusty wind blows southwards from the Sahara across the country, it occurs between the end of November and March each year.

As the wind passes over the desert, it picks up large amounts of dust particles which it transports to the south.

It is that period when it is almost inevitable to have dust in our homes because it can be carried into one’s home from outside on shoes or blown in through windows and doors or any opening.

For the next couple of months, proper dusting and cleaning must be ensured to keep the home clean and prevent respiratory illnesses that could be caused by dust, just as suggested by some housewives in Abuja.

Fatima Adamu, a banker and mother of two says she does thorough cleaning of the whole house at the weekend with partial cleaning during the week days.

“The Kitchen has to be attended to every day, so pay most attention to it. I ensure I keep my kitchen clean; keep all utensils that may gather dust properly covered and prevent food items also from the dust.” she said.

“But during the weekends I clean the other parts of the house which include the sitting room, bedrooms and the toilets. These get most of my attention during the weekends,” she added.

“It is usually stressful and tiring but I can’t afford to leave it for two weeks before cleaning it because the dust will pile up and make the house uncomfortable to live in,” she said.

Doyin Shittu, a teacher in Abuja, says she does the bit she can in cleaning the house on a daily basis.

Doyin, who is newly married, explains that she starts with the kitchen and sitting rooms in the mornings on week days, cleaning the furniture and mopping the floors, and ends with other parts of the house that need attention in the evening.

Halima Gambo, a housewife, told our reporter that she does the cleaning on a daily basis although she adds that there are days when she is not in the mood to do house chores, and so just wipes off the dust from the surface of the furniture.

“I deliberately ignore the furniture sometimes, because it gets pretty frustrating when you clean the house in the morning and by evening, everything becomes dusty again,” she said.

Halima said the cleaning must be planned to control the dust as it accumulates pretty fast, and when it is not cleaned on a regular basis, it becomes difficult to manage.

“My husband has a room full of books and it is usually overwhelming when I am helping him clean it. And because the books are too many for the shelf, most of them are left on the floor gathering dust. Anytime I help him in cleaning the room, I come down with catarrh and cough,” she said.

Halima, who suggests that the cleaning could be done by sections, said the parlour, kitchen and bathrooms may be attended to every other day while the bedrooms, and other sections in the house can be attended to once a month and then the last weekend of the month may be reserved for general sanitation of the entire house.

“I give particular attention to the kitchen and bathrooms because they are the sensitive parts of the house and must be cleaned regularly because infections could easily be contracted from these places, if left dirty,” she said.

She further notes that cleaning the house regularly reduces exposure to dust which can cause many respiratory illnesses such as asthma, sore throat, cold and catarrh.

Another housewife, Samira Sheriff told Home Front that she engages the services of house helps to assist in cleaning the house.

“How am I going to survive cleaning a big house with two sitting rooms, dinning, kitchen and five bedrooms each of which has its toilets, and then take care of my four children? It is simply too much for me to handle,” she said.

“I have two maids, one helps with the kitchen chores and the other with the general cleaning of the house which leaves me with taking care of the children,” she added.

Samira also noted that she keeps the doors and windows shut most of the time to prevent dust from piling up in the house though, according to her, one cannot totally prevent dust from creeping into the house, it will minimise the extent to which it comes in.

She added that she makes sure that the rugs at home are vacuumed once a week to prevent the buildup of dust while the tiles are mopped regularly.