So, it’s rainy season again. I won’t lie, it’s pretty miserable. I have friends who are volunteers in other parts of the country say to me, “But you’re from Seattle. You must be used to rain?”
Actually, NO, the rain here is not at all like rain in Seattle. My hometown gets a bad rap for raining all the time. This reputation is not quite deserved, but Seattleites don’t always refute it – it helps to weed out all the Californians who have moved to Seattle and can’t stand the rain. Kidding (sort of)! Anyway, I admit that in the winter, Seattle can be pretty gray and drizzly. And occasionally, it will pour for an hour or two.
But drizzle is nothing compared to the torrential downpour that is rainy season in the tropics (or whatever southern Ecuador is considered). I’m talking about it pouring every single day, days on end, for months. Rain leaks through the roof. Clothes don’t dry on the line. An hour or two after lunch, the fog starts settling in. By late afternoon, my town is so enshrouded in fog that you can’t see from one end of the central plaza to the other. Then the rain begins. We’re talking about massive quantities of rain. At times when it rains it sounds as if someone opened up a hatch in the sky and let the rain pour. It sounds like the universe is taking a shower, for hours at a time. Last year, rainy season lasted until the end of May. Feo is right.
Admittedly, I do enjoy lying in bed listening to the sound of rain outside. But that only lasts so long. Rainy season washes out the roads and makes it near impossible to get to the communities where we work. Rainy season means I can only go running if I’m lucky enough to catch a few dry hours. Rainy season means I sleep in long johns and have to mop up water outside my apartment every single day. Rainy season makes me wish I could hibernate like a polar bear.
Rainy season also means that I’ve gotten pretty creative in the kitchen. I recently decided to try my hand at making apple pie from scratch. Not that I had any other choice, it’s not as if they sell pre-made pie crusts or anything in my town. A confession: I’ve never been a huge fan of apple pie (shhhh…I know how un-American that sounds) but over the holidays I became a convert. Delicious! What took me so long?
