Rain

One thing that I was not quite expecting here, was such a large amount of rain. So far, almost every day we’ve had at least one torrential downpour. Admittedly, it is the rainy season, but this wet season goes on for 4 months or so, slap bang during my first few months here. At least it will put out the flames of my baptism of fire (har har). However, for all my complaining, the worst I can say the rain has done to me is give me frizzy(er) hair and periodically wet feet. For the inhabitants of some of the villages around my town, the rain has meant they have lost almost everything. On Saturday we visited the flooded area with some of the people who I’m renting my annexe off, and we saw for ourselves the extent of the devastation. I was in awe of the road turned into a river, the 2-storey houses with the bottom floor utterly submerged, and the nobility and stoicism of the people so severely affected by nature’s worst. We came bearing water and bread, basics which they were in need of, but what I really wanted to bring them was dry land, the comfort of sleep – for they have to constantly be on alert in case of sudden rises in water level - and hope that the rains in Oaxaca, which have caused the river here to swell to grotesque proportions, will cease. I suddenly felt enormously guilty for having celebrated school being off for the week due to these same floods which have brought misery to so many. The authorities say they are helping all of these people by bringing them aid and setting up refuges, but the real picture is very different from the one of President Calderón wading through the waters to give chocolate to babies. Here’s hoping that the rain really does go away.