where Toto, de temps en temps, captures exactly the sentiment:
"I bless the rains down in Africa."and other times childhood songs describe exactly how you feel (if not a little under-emphatically):
"Rain, rain, go away, come again another day."Being nearer to the equator, it gets and stays a little hot... but there is a reprieve to this heat...
RAIN!!!
With the right conditions rain can make a very uncomfortably sweaty, sticky, thickly humid, and hot day down right comfortable and sometimes even, dare I say it, chilly!
I BLESS THE RAINS DOWN IN AAAAFFRRICAAAAAA!!!
With these descents in temperature, maybe I can last two years here without becoming a PCVP (Peace Corps Volunteer Puddle), or somehow homogenizing with the thick humid air.
However, with great power comes a way to really screw things up.
The rain here (especially in the Basse Cote - pres de la mer) come and comes in hard! It is currently rainy season here - started around June and ends around December (rough aprx) - and so it rains presqu'every day. This makes it hard for such activities as doing (specifically drying) laundry, keeping your belongings dry, keeping yourself dry, walking, running, biking, have dry things ever, not growing mold on everything, having electronic items, leaving your room to go to the squat latrine in the middle of the night, driving (or riding) in a taxi on a not goudron road, going through the market, keeping your food you bought at the market dry, etc etc etc...
And this is for how many months of the year....
Rainecdotes (Warning, some stories discuss bowel movements):
- A couple of weeks ago I bought an umbrella.
- Prior to #1, I realized the insufficiencies of the rain coat... When it rains, it rains partout! - not just on the upper half of your body... also the rain that hits your jacket has to go somewhere... When it rains and all you have is a rain coat, your upper half stays relatively protected against wetness due to rain - interior sweat is a battle most often lost, however - but the lower half of your body specifically your upper thighs become the target of every rain drop that has hit your impermeable. This does happen to be the exact same spot that most people keep their phones, wallets, and occasionally cameras (i.e. pockets). Fine, fine, whatever, I'll deal with wet pants. Worse things could happen: I could be the cause of my wet pants for example - worse (and fortunately something I've avoided thus far - *knock knock*). The really unfortunate case though, that led to the realization that I needed a parapluie was a combo blow. A couple days previous, I had done a demonstration with the composition of white light as visible in a soap bubble, so I had had a bottle of soap in my messenger bag. Unfortunately, despite being in a Ziploc back, it opened and leaked all over the inside of my bag... I worked hard to clean this mess, and got it to a satisfactory condition (I thought). As the rainy season would have it though, it rained shortly there after, and with no way to protect my messenger bag - doesn't fit under my jacket - it and presqu'everything in it got soaked + a little washing. There was still soap inside my bag, like IN it. The rain then released it and gave the items inside my bag (including my ipod and solar charger) and my pants where the bag met my leg a good bath... When I went to change into the shorts I had brought for running after training, I realized soap had run all the way down my right leg...eh guinee!! To ease concerns, everything worked out alright - ipod is even in good working condition!!! <- this was about as equally exciting as finally pooping after a long spurt of constipation (oddly enough, the realization of these two things happened within hours of each other despite commencing at very different times). Side note: having constipation while so many around you have diarrhea is very frustrating, and confusing. When you become envious of diarrhea, that's when you know you're in a messed up situation.
- Pendant site visit, Richard (my PC cousin = closest volunteer), who lives 15km away, and I decided to run to each other, starting at the same time and meeting roughly half way. We did and it was delightful- a bit of a challenging run with hills and rockiness- but delightful! After we chatted about each other's sites we started running back in the opposite direction. Just after a quick poop break in the brush and leaves to wipe, I started the run back. Shortly thereafter it began to rain. It was hot this day so my first instinct was to start singing Toto. Shortly the rain became quite heavy, as did all of my clothes - all still very manageable. The trouble came when the rain caused the road to be a river, and small puddles became unpredictably deep pools. One unavoidable, new river cutting across the road put me in up to my knee. The shower after this experience was not much different than what I had just gone through, but was still very relaxing. Also, it turns out that I actually ran about 10-11km of the distance and thus the same en retour, ie longest run to date!
- Last rainecdote, for now: Yesterday morning, in Conakry. We went out to the market to get breakfast supplies (bread, peanut butter, nescafe, etc.), and comme d'habitude, it was raining. However this was, for most of us, our first time out to the market in Conakry. The market we went to is... kind of in doors? I really am not sure how to describe it. Each vendor is in an alcove perhaps and one walks in between. This in between section doesn't have a rough, but instead has a bunch of (broken) tarps. Hence right where one needs to walk all the water that has been collected from the rough is funneled down. These market path ways, however, are too narrow to open an umbrella... Result, you get soaked. Unfortunately, this isn't the only issue that arises due to this faulty roofing structure. The walkway also quickly floods and becomes a high currant river up to about mid-shin with all sorts of trash for fish - upside: this could result in you catching some money in your sandal!
Peace,
M. Geoffrey
