Okay, so there's a deep freeze happening across the UK and Europe right now and from what I'm seeing on the news and on social media, people are getting snowed in, board games are being pulled out and played on the table, the Dutch are ice skating on their frozen canals and both Rome and Bologna have found themselves unusually- and magically- blanketed under a layer of snow.
Over here on our sunny shores we're not getting no deep freeze whatsoever.
Of which, I'm really glad, because snowy winters and below freezing conditions are not, have never been and likely never will be, a part of this equatorial climate.
But what does have a part here, and which we haven't been getting very often for quite a long while now, are inland gusty winds chilled by natural forestation and canopies of trees, and cool, spacious seaward winds blustering in from the open seas.
We used to be a very windy country. We used to be so windy and so cool in places that it was practically balmy at some points, chilly at other points and both sunny and chilly at other points still. But save for a couple of pockets here and there in the far-flung places of the island, we're not getting as much winds as we once used to.
Instead we've been remarkably, overhwhelmingly hot, humid, hot, humid, hot, humid and dry, and we're so hot and so humid that the heat irritates us, affects us and throws our daily processes into grumpy disarray. Let's admit it. How many of us can say that we enjoy the heat that envelopes us and clogs our pores as we go about our day? How many of us can say that the heat plays no part in influencing our fashion, our choice of makeup and how we choose to move about? Few, I should say! No matter how hard we try to hide in airconditioned places, walk in the shade or wear as casual as possible, we're still bathed in our own sweat, and we're still mussed up, annoyed, stinky and generally pissed off with the world.
It is a real pity, I'm telling you, because it wasn't like this always. I know, because I remember days when spacious winds would blow in through the windows on one side of my home in the middle of the year (I didn't count the months then) and chilly winds- with lots and lots of rains-would blow in through the windows on the other side of my home from November onwards till at least early March. It wouldn't be sporadic, mind you, not one pathetic breeze every couple of hours sort of thing, but it would be consistent- very, very consistent.
That's all changed now.
We're so frigging' warm.
And whilst global warming and climate change would have something to do with it all, but hey, this is the Earth we're talking about, and befuddle the smartest of us humankind she certainly can. Why, we don't have to look too far. Right now, even as Europe is experiencing the Beasty Siberian winds, the Arctic is logging in its warmest temperatures ever and scientists are wondering if all this global warming isn't heating up the earth as they supposed, but freezing it up instead.
It's definitely not all about the global warming, I think. It's something else. What it is, I don't know, but it definitely wasn't there during the early, early, early days of colonialization on our island. If not, there would have been no countryside, there would have been no gambier and pepper and nutmeg and rubber and there would have been no durian and pineapple and palm.
Heck, there wouldn't even have that many coolies, cos the ships wouldn't have been able to sail down over the South China Sea during the months of October to March, because no northeast monsoon winds, see, and they wouldn't have been able to sail back up the same sea during the southeast wind months of April through September with their cargoes of nutmeg, pepper and everything else either.
Neither would Raffles have built his home on top of Fort Canning Hill for the balmy, ten-degree climate if that spot had been as hot as it is right now.
I'm all for the winds. :) I'm all for the winds that used to once exist on this island, and which I think have a place of belonging here. It doesn't matter how concrete we get. It doesn't matter whether we have glistening towers of glass and steel. Some things don't get erased because you want them to. Some things don't disappear because you think they should. I'm all for the winds because I think they make us happier, greater at ease, more comfortable and better able to cope with living and with life.
Really.
Blue skies and all-round hot, humid, angry, dry weather don't mean we're in the mood for ice cream, beach vacays, sundresses, tank tops, shorts and flip flops, No, it is not an associated mood. It don't mean that we feel more free and more pumped up than we would be compared to having to huddle under thick coats of fleece and fur and cope with the snow and the skids. We face the same s***. We face the same pressures. We face the same d*** friggin' bill. We face the same emotional and mental turmoils. For, if 1 in 15 people on this island do get depressed in one way or another (or so the statistics say!), then hey, the blue skies and warm sun on our skin apparently don't make us any happier than icy winds and permafrost temperatures anyway.
Over here on our sunny shores we're not getting no deep freeze whatsoever.
Of which, I'm really glad, because snowy winters and below freezing conditions are not, have never been and likely never will be, a part of this equatorial climate.
But what does have a part here, and which we haven't been getting very often for quite a long while now, are inland gusty winds chilled by natural forestation and canopies of trees, and cool, spacious seaward winds blustering in from the open seas.
We used to be a very windy country. We used to be so windy and so cool in places that it was practically balmy at some points, chilly at other points and both sunny and chilly at other points still. But save for a couple of pockets here and there in the far-flung places of the island, we're not getting as much winds as we once used to.
Instead we've been remarkably, overhwhelmingly hot, humid, hot, humid, hot, humid and dry, and we're so hot and so humid that the heat irritates us, affects us and throws our daily processes into grumpy disarray. Let's admit it. How many of us can say that we enjoy the heat that envelopes us and clogs our pores as we go about our day? How many of us can say that the heat plays no part in influencing our fashion, our choice of makeup and how we choose to move about? Few, I should say! No matter how hard we try to hide in airconditioned places, walk in the shade or wear as casual as possible, we're still bathed in our own sweat, and we're still mussed up, annoyed, stinky and generally pissed off with the world.
It is a real pity, I'm telling you, because it wasn't like this always. I know, because I remember days when spacious winds would blow in through the windows on one side of my home in the middle of the year (I didn't count the months then) and chilly winds- with lots and lots of rains-would blow in through the windows on the other side of my home from November onwards till at least early March. It wouldn't be sporadic, mind you, not one pathetic breeze every couple of hours sort of thing, but it would be consistent- very, very consistent.
That's all changed now.
We're so frigging' warm.
And whilst global warming and climate change would have something to do with it all, but hey, this is the Earth we're talking about, and befuddle the smartest of us humankind she certainly can. Why, we don't have to look too far. Right now, even as Europe is experiencing the Beasty Siberian winds, the Arctic is logging in its warmest temperatures ever and scientists are wondering if all this global warming isn't heating up the earth as they supposed, but freezing it up instead.
It's definitely not all about the global warming, I think. It's something else. What it is, I don't know, but it definitely wasn't there during the early, early, early days of colonialization on our island. If not, there would have been no countryside, there would have been no gambier and pepper and nutmeg and rubber and there would have been no durian and pineapple and palm.
Heck, there wouldn't even have that many coolies, cos the ships wouldn't have been able to sail down over the South China Sea during the months of October to March, because no northeast monsoon winds, see, and they wouldn't have been able to sail back up the same sea during the southeast wind months of April through September with their cargoes of nutmeg, pepper and everything else either.
Neither would Raffles have built his home on top of Fort Canning Hill for the balmy, ten-degree climate if that spot had been as hot as it is right now.
I'm all for the winds. :) I'm all for the winds that used to once exist on this island, and which I think have a place of belonging here. It doesn't matter how concrete we get. It doesn't matter whether we have glistening towers of glass and steel. Some things don't get erased because you want them to. Some things don't disappear because you think they should. I'm all for the winds because I think they make us happier, greater at ease, more comfortable and better able to cope with living and with life.
Really.
Blue skies and all-round hot, humid, angry, dry weather don't mean we're in the mood for ice cream, beach vacays, sundresses, tank tops, shorts and flip flops, No, it is not an associated mood. It don't mean that we feel more free and more pumped up than we would be compared to having to huddle under thick coats of fleece and fur and cope with the snow and the skids. We face the same s***. We face the same pressures. We face the same d*** friggin' bill. We face the same emotional and mental turmoils. For, if 1 in 15 people on this island do get depressed in one way or another (or so the statistics say!), then hey, the blue skies and warm sun on our skin apparently don't make us any happier than icy winds and permafrost temperatures anyway.