Rain, go away

Winter has begun again in the Land of Eternal Spring.

For all those fans of geography, you are not mistaken. Guatemala does sit in the Northern Hemisphere, but it is winter here now. Instead of four distinct seasons like in the states, Guatemala has two: winter and summer. Ironic for a country nicknamed the Land of Eternal Spring.

Winter is the raining season that lasts from May to October, while summer is the dry season from November to April. But since I live in Alta Verapaz were it rains “13 months out of the year,” it pretty much always feels like winter to me. Our summer consists of the months of March and April when it rains less, meaning not every day.

While the rest of the country hadn’t seen a drop of rain for the past six months, there was no reprieve here in Tactic. Towards the middle of the dry season, volunteers in the Western Highlands begin to complain of the dust, but what I wouldn’t give to see some freely moving dirt instead of mud.

Just as I had gotten used to Alta’s version of the dry season, winter has started again and the rain has intensified. And now it’s not possible to go to other parts of the country to escape the rain. It is not a question of if it is going to rain during the day. That is a given. The relevant questions are: How many times? How long? How hard?

I think I am going to live in the desert after I leave Guatemala.