Monsoon Season

Thunderstorms are commonplace nowadays -- What!? you say, Rain in the desert?! The monsoons were all I heard about from the locals when I moved here and I'm finally experiencing them first hand.

The pre-storm show gives you a nice intro. You watch the clouds build up in the distance and grow a menacing, dark blue-gray. It's full of suspense: will it hit me? Will it not?? Is the bus going to come first or will I be wishing for my galoshes? The white cumulous clouds build like tall marshmallow giants, devouring the blue sky. Behind them darkness rolls in and covers the mountains. Lightning bolts illuminate the sky every few minutes, revealing how far the storm stretches in the distance ...and how close it is to you.

Sometimes they never touch you - one part of the city might get rain while another doesn't. This can be antagonizing: you see the clouds and you know they're there...but they just mess with you. Other times, however, they don't play. They simply crash down on you with full force - with or without warning. It could be a hot sunny afternoon and you hear thunder. Did I imagine that? BOOM. Did a truck hit something? Then down comes the thick curtain of rain. Twice I was at work in the evening when the storms started, and the maintenance man gave me a ride home so I wouldn't have to stay at the office all night. The rain was so thick that I was drenched in water in less than thirty seconds - the time it took me to jump out of a truck and run inside. For a while, we had a storm every day for several days...sometimes twice a day. I spent a lot of time inside.

The funny thing is that within 2-3 hours it all dries up. You go outside and evidence of any rain is gone.

Then the post-storm show comes. When everything passes and you see the sun setting, the sky is a magnificient array of blues, reds, oranges, and yellows. Long bolts of lightning flash silently over the mountains in the distance. All the cacti, trees, and grasses turn a rich green color...so unlike the dry, light green you see in the winter. Everything looks very alive. The air is also much cooler and city comes alive again. The whole ordeal is a neat to experience - much different from the rain and tornados of the midwest.

Below is some footage of one thunderstorm: