Reasons to love Sydney: Thunderstorms
Did you know that in Finland there are 40 different words for snow. There's words to describe slushy snow, snow downpours, sleety snow, light fluffy snow... To be honest I kind of love it. It has a kind of romantic quality to it. In the UK, the same seems to stand for rain. I didn't understand how many types of water falling to the ground there could be until I embarked on the adventure of marrying a foreigner (apparently I'm the foreigner here... go figure). On the first mention of wet air, I was both amused and depressed. On moving here, I realised the necessity of so many descriptions of rain. My personal favourite is the aforementioned wet air, that seems to not be visible to the naked eye when glancing out the window but sneaks through every slightly loose weave in your clothes and permeates your very essence with WETNESS. Pleasant.
In Australia there seems to be two types of rain: rain and THUNDERSTORM. Rain is rain, but thunderstorms? They are the epitome of awesome. First, there's the dramatic entrance of a thunderstorm. What usually starts as a rather lovely, sunny day is marred by a big, rolling black mass of cloud, occasionally showing off like a 4 year old toddler with barely concealed flashes of lightning. It darkens the sky and bodes doom. DOOOOOM.
Yes, thunderstorms are drama queens.
Next comes the electricity in the air. The kind that makes you think that every hair on your body is standing on end, when in fact, it's doing no such thing. But hey, it feels exciting. Then comes the smell... The smell of a thunderstorm is what I miss the most. You can keep your poxy roses. I pah at your fields of flowers. The smell of a freshly mown lawn? PAH I SAY! The smell of heavy rain on hot ground is one of the best smells in the world. Period. It fills your nostrils with awesomeness. Yes, awesomeness. It's that good.
Then the sky falls down on you in the form of sheets of heavy, heavy droplets of water.
In short, thunderstorms are awesome. I know I've used awesome a lot in this post, but there are no other words to describe it.
Awesome, awesome, awesome.
Awesome.
Image lovingly stolen from here
