When It Rains, It Pours

This morning I was chased out of the swimming pool by deep rumbles of thunder, with a dark bank of ominous cloud swelling on the horizon. It seems that the rainy season has started, right on schedule. Every day we wake up to nice sunny weather, but by about 11am it’s clouding over, and by 1 pm we’ve had the first rumble of thunder heralding the torrent that’s coming our way. When the rainstorm finally arrives it’s usually accompanied by a huge CRACK of lightening and incredibly loud thunder, enough to shake the fillings out of your teeth. Mum is over here visiting us at the moment and the force of the storms makes her quite nervous. That and all the stories of people being struck by lightening.
My friendly Kiwi hairdresser, who has lived here for six years, knows countless tales of death-by-lightening-bolt in Singapore. One of the most dramatic was five tourists who were enjoying a round at the exclusive Singapore golf course. The rules clearly state that you are not allowed to wear metal cleats on your shoes, yet they ignored not only that rule, but also the one about immediately leaving the course when the rain alarm sounds. As the first drops fell they chose instead to take shelter under a handy tree, no doubt clutching their metal golf clubs, standing there in their metal-cleated shoes…well you can guess the rest. None was directly hit but the charge travelled through each and they were killed where they stood. My friend has also witnessed the swimming pool at her condo being struck by lightening, just moments after her kids and everyone else had climbed out. She said that although the weather was fine to begin with, dark clouds started to roll over so she told the kids to leave the pool. Suddenly, while she was drying the kids off and without a drop of rain having fallen, a huge bolt of lightening struck the pool right in front of them. All of the hair on her youngest boy’s head stood straight on end, the pool completely lit up and she said they could all feel the charge as there was an ear-splitting crack-boom. Unbelievable that no-one was killed, considering they were all dripping wet and standing so close. Needless to say she is very, very paranoid about her kids swimming if there is a cloud in the sky and it’s certainly changed the way I think about it too.
Storms start up so quickly here, one minute it’s hot and humid, the next there is a gust of cooler wind, the palms start to bend and flutter then WHOOSH, down comes the rain and the thunder and lightening starts. The monsoon drains fill up, the world darkens for quarter of on hour, then often, as quickly as it started the rain stops, although the cloud cover lingers until evening. The good news is that it has cleared away the haze caused by the forest fires in Indonesia, so I guess every cloud really does have a silver lining.