In a desert, water works great. If water is around, not so much.
And water bulges around the equator - water tables are close to the surface and humidity is high in the places that need it most.
Radiative cooling is an option, but it’s not exactly amazing on small scales… It can work, passively even, but it’d need large scales to really make a difference. But it also largely sends that heat into space, which is great
At the end of the day, we’re not currently equipped to do anything but active cooling at scale. Changing that would be a great idea… It’s generally not very practical on an individual level though