It rains in the desert
By Rolo B. Cena
Arabian Diaries

For decades now, I have always believed that rains are exclusive for tropical areas such as our archipelagic Philippines in the same token that snows are for the snow-capped places of the north and south poles.

Surprisingly, the small drops of rains falling from the humid-tempered blue Arabian skies caught my moody attention one day. Lo, it rained in the desert! And behold my curiosity on the climate of this burning powder-covered, oil-rich kingdom woke up like an innocent, inquisitive mind of the first grader.

Scientifically, it seldom rains during summer or dry season in our place. Since I was a kid, rains visit our land commencing the first of May. I was even told by an elder that the first rains of May can be used as “holy water” by Catholic believers. Such naiveté registered in my skeptical mind though until I received confirmation of this thing during my restless adult days.

Anyway, back to the rains, it just does not rain with water in the Kingdom. Water rains usually downpours so heavily when December is fast-approaching, according to an Arabian elder here. The same phenomenon happens when the month of March is wearing on.

Snowfalls, which we know could only happen in cold regions, also happen here. And these are not just ordinary snowfalls, it is totally different. Big ice cubes, which are as big as a fist and the size enough to break windshields drop mercilessly from the same skies. There were even reports of casualties especially among elders during this season.

Beginning this month, one can already feel the extreme cold temperature in the kingdom. You see almost everyone wearing jackets or sweat shirts to protect their fragile bodies from cold. Imagine the place called desert has all these: rains, snowfalls, and cold weather. Unbelievable but it’s true. It is simply amazing yet imaginable.

This is the weather here. It is changing cyclically without compromising life or nature. And this is nature; this is life. One is never sure of his or her own climate; one is always uncertain of his or her own body temperature, so to speak. This is an obvious phenomenon that nobody takes up seriously. Not even our elders who have a lot to boast about life.

Yes, this is really life. Where ever you are, you can always associate life with what you see, feel, and touch. You can even always associate life with what you fail to have or with what you lose.

Lately, Obama wins the highest elective post in the Imperial American election. He brought rains both to the whites and the blacks. To the whites, the rains he brought were a downpour-attacking the traditional white-controlled American politics. To his race, the rains he brought, no matter how strong, are physically powerful yet gentle in meaning.

Life is like nature: it can exude too much heat or cast heavy downpours into our system at any time, yet unknowingly, desert heats can be gentle to life while heavy downpours favorable.

Life is a climate. You can be extremely hot or cold. But the beauty is: an oasis of wonderful and thirst-quenching waters is always found in the desert. And this proves that creation is a theory of compliment where darkness blends with light to produce life; it is the same life that translates this mixture into power; the same power that radiates the beauty of life into ethereal solution.

Yes, this is life in the desert. It also rains here. Sometimes, people don’t realize why things are happening the way they do because they lack focus. The moment we look at things straight from our naked eyes, we will realize that rains, whether it falls in the desert or in the tropical isles, are for everybody.

Be careful of rains!

Published, Dumaguete Star Informer, 16 November 2008, Sunday Issue