Wednesday, May 27, 2009

The 'Whether' Report


The above illustration was made two years ago in MS Paint. For more of my art on display do go to http://70plusandstillkicking.blogspot.com/2009/05/virtual-art-exhibition-your-invitation.html - thanks to June Saville)


The weather has kept us guessing. We have had the worst summer ever. Unrelenting heat day after day. And living in the topmost apartment of the building does not help. As we walk into the closed apartment in the evening after work, heat waves radiate from the house . The weather man has been most unhelpful. Almost 40 days ago, we had a forecast that said - State reeling under heat. Heat wave to continue for two more days - I guess it was to give us some hope. Two days went by but the heat continued. A week later there was another report - High temperatures to continue for a week - We had suffered a fortnight and were in for another hot week. The forecast now is for an early monsoon. We did have some showers, but the temperatures have not dropped significantly yet!

Blame it all on Global Warming. You can't go wrong on that!
Weather in our side of the world was so predictable when I was younger - that the weather report was never wrong. We did not need one either. Two days of high temperatures ( which never went beyond 38 degrees centigrade) and by evening of the third day, dark clouds would loom on the horizon, followed by a crash of thunder and welcome rain that instantly lowered temperatures. We had at least one hail storm, that had us running out to collect the tiny pieces of ice , that looked so pretty , strewn all over the garden. We would rue that the mango crop would be affected by the hailstorm. Mangoes, watermelon, a juicy fruit of the palm which we knew as Munjal ( with a fancy botanical name Borassus flabellifer).... made the summer bearable. And it is surprising too that despite the heat, we had a burst of colours, with the blazing red flowers of the gulmohar tree ( May Flower) and the yellow Laburnum. Summer was not bad at all..... until now.

Summer was followed by the onset of monsoons. The advent of rains invariably coincided with the first day of school! The newly stitched uniform, polished leather shoes, freshly covered books all got soggy. At one time, the house we stayed in had a huge open area and the water would gush in from the road and form a pond. And we set off making paper boats and set them to sail . A heavy downpour meant that schools would be closed for the day.
This year however like the unpredictable summer, the rains play hide and seek. Dark clouds gather only to disappear in a trice taking away the rains. At other times, they appear without warning and we have a copious rainfall that flood the roads making it impossible to venture out.

Would it rain tomorrow? Even the meterologist wouldn't know! And I do not like such surprises.

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