Rain

The water droplets seemed like snow when I first saw rain in Qatar.  It was the last thing I would expect from a desert, so I was naturally amused by it.  It hasn’t been a year since then and rain has come again.  The shift in weather has been so quick this time--December has just started and yet temperature has gone down to as low as 14 degrees.  My feelings toward rain turned from anticipation to dismay.  For what reasons, I don’t exactly know; maybe because it has been a pain in my ass lately.

Extreme heat is a natural occurrence here in the more arid regions of the planet, but daily downpour definitely isn’t.   Streets get flooded easily because apparently, they don’t have fucking drainage systems.  Umbrellas cannot be easily purchased here; I’m not even sure if such an invention is existent in this part of the world.

The rain here really got into my nerves one gloomy afternoon while I queued up for a cab.  I was, maybe, 10^th on the line and taxis were nowhere to be found.  It was damn freezing on the sidewalk (I learned later that day that the temperature registered at 10 degrees), and yes, you guessed it right, rain started to fall.  I was half-drenched when I finally found myself instructing the driver directions on the way to the client’s place.  I practically needed thawing that time and my head was pounding like hell.  Call it weird or whatever, I just feel like getting sick the moment raindrops fall on my bald head.  I often think that I was born with unusually large hands so that I can use it in place of an absent umbrella.

Rain became even more unappealing after that super typhoon that struck my hometown just recently.  All of a sudden, my bad rain experience became too trivial in comparison to the immense destruction that people, including my family, had to deal with because of the natural disaster.  I feel blessed, on one hand, that my loved ones were safe from the calamity but depressed, on the other, thinking of all the lives that were literally swept off by the catastrophe.

But beyond all these, I do not hate rain.  I love water so much to start with.  I still recognize the fact that without it, the water cycle won’t work.  And all would perish. 

What I just ardently hope is that rain would fall more gently on humanity; that it would keep lives and not take them away.

And that drainage systems and umbrellas would finally make it in Qatar, of course.

Comments

[Marky]

lupet tlga ni ton..write lng ng write..hehehe..para pwde na collate & gawing book..hehehe..galing..

[Ann]

I agree... write lang ng write! =)
sabihan nyo ko, pag may na publish ng book si Ton ha...
isa ako sa unang bibili...

at kung may book signing...
para makapila na din...

you'll never know...
one day will come...
more than a million's worth ang halaga ng pirma mo Ton! =)

** side comment...
here's a job you'll love...
what about being a writer - ever considered it??

[Jorelle]

Ang galing tlaga pare! Idol na kita!