Brown then cloudy water from the taps after some plumbing work — do I flush it or worry?

The two things you saw usually have different causes — one's nothing, one's worth watching.

Brown/rusty right after the valve job: almost always disturbed sediment. Any work (or a mains cut, or the building flushing its lines) stirs up the fine rust and mineral sediment that settles in pipes and the storage tank, and it travels to your tap for a few minutes. Run the *nearest cold tap fed straight from the mains/tank* — usually the kitchen — on full for 2-5 minutes and it should clear. Do it on a cold tap so you don't pull the sediment through your water heater.

Cloudy/milky this morning: if it clears from the bottom of the glass upward after a few seconds, that's just trapped air — very common after any pipework or a supply interruption, and completely harmless.

When to actually worry — if the discolouration is: - persistent (doesn't clear after a good flush) or keeps coming back day after day → could be a corroding steel pipe/fittings, or a storage tank that needs cleaning; - only on the hot side → it's your water heater or the tank feeding it (sediment/scale) and it's due a drain-and-flush; - smells (metallic, rotten-egg, musty) or feels gritty → stop drinking it and get it checked.

While it's visibly discoloured, don't drink or cook with it and don't run white laundry. In most Dubai homes recurring discolouration traces back to the rooftop or underground storage tank, so if a flush doesn't hold, the usual fix is a proper water tank cleaning in Dubai plus a check of the pipe material. A one-off after works, though, is almost certainly fine once it flushes clear.