Monday, October 24, 2005

Here Comes The Rain Again...

If there's one thing that I really haven't gotten used to, it's the erratic weather patterns in West Africa. While the dry season will be upon us in about a month (i.e. it will be hot, dry and sunny for months on end), we're still getting all kinds of strange weather. I list today as an example:

This morning the sun was on at full blast and it was bloody hot. In fact, one of my favourite things to say on a daily basis is, "It's so damned HOT in this country!" On the upside, that is the best time to do laundry, since clothes dry in a snap. So I did a giant load before going to school to do some errands.

By 1pm, the clouds rolled in and it came down in buckets for about half an hour, with some terrific thunder to boot. Everything started flooding and it was quite mucky on campus after that. I came back to the hostel to find that my then-dry clothes had become soaked again and that the power had gone out. Jolly good.

I had one other important meeting to go back to campus for and while walking there, the black clouds rolled in, followed by showers. Thank goodness I wore a hoodie...

The one redeeming part of the day was the walk home at around 5PM, when the already obscured sky was beginning to get dark. Seeing the dark grey sky, wet leaves and smelling the post-rain atmosphere honestly reminded me of a cold, rainy October evening walking home down Sunnyside Ave in Ottawa. I felt strangely at home walking home in this weather, as my iPod played the Smiths' "There Is A Light That Never Goes Out".

And you know what? It rained today in Ottawa. Eerie.

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