The Rainy Season

As an Australian I am used to dealing with the heat.  In fact, I like hot weather and summer is my favourite month.  In my opinion, there's nothing better than slipping into a summer dress and spending the day by the water, in the sunshine, sipping a cold alcoholic beverage.  So naturally, after the frigid winters, I look forward to the warmth in Japan.  But a Japanese 'summer' is entirely unlike the Aussie summers I've experienced in Western Australia and Melbourne.  This is probably because first of all you have to get through rainy season!

Rainy season is the term used to refer to the roughly month-long period across June and July when it gets ridiculously humid and often rains without warning in Japan.  And I'm not talking sun showers here, oh no.  I'm talking torrential downpours that start just as quickly as they stop.  Or other bouts of rain that continue for 24 solid hours, threatening to flood everything in sight.  Rain so heavy that you cannot see out of your car windscreen and are drenched through within 5 seconds of daring to brave any uncovered distances on foot.

But all that rain is good for the environment and the crops and whatnot, right?  And it must cool the place down and provide a welcome relief from the heat, right?

Yeah, it's probably good for the farmers and rice crops particularly.  But it does cause wide-spread flooding actually and can be quite dangerous.  The Japan Meteorological Agency often issues severe flood warnings as a result of these downpours and people die getting caught in the waters every year.  On top of that, it wreaks havoc with car batteries for some reason too, so getting stranded in the shitty weather is a real possibility!

And no, it doesn't cool the place down.  It makes it even more humid.  It makes it feel as though you're walking through a cloud.  Before you even dry off from your shower, you're slick with sweat and it just gets worse throughout the day.  You sweat even if you're not doing anything, your clothes need washing the instant you peel them off and it sometimes becomes so humid it's actually hard to breathe!  Lately in Tokushima temperatures have been soaring beyond the mid-30's (celsius) and let me tell you, the rain does NOTHING to cool the place down!

And though sunshine and warmth is sunshine and warmth anywhere you go, you can give me a hot dry Aussie summer over a Japanese rainy season any day!