Between a sunny yesterday and a rainy today

Rasha Almaqaleh

During our childhood, teenage years and adult life, we had our fair share of sunlight. That’s because in Yemen it is sunny most of the year and you can catch up a 

Anis and Adham in Yemen,Sunny the whole year , no need for heavy clothing

lot of sunshine every day. Living now in Northern Germany, where the sky is usually leaden with overcast most of the year, we still want to avoid the direct sunlight! When my husband and I go out in those few sunny days, we still search for shades as we would do in Yemen. What adds to our confusion is that the weather in Germany is so unpredictable.  It’s perfectly normal here, and wittily bewildering for us, to find ourselves wearing sunglasses and summer shirts and holding a jacket with one hand and an umbrella with the other one!

Hamburg

  It frequently rains here and the rain comes in different forms, from drizzles to downpours. As a result, Germans are very well prepared for the rainy weather; they have umbrellas, rain jackets, rain pants and rain shoes. They also have rainproof covers nearly for everything such as for backpacks, baby strollers, carts, etc. Moreover, the roofs of their houses are usually very sloped which indicates the expected large amount of rainfall and snowfall.

Houses with sloped roofs

Consequently, people here are fed up with the rainy and cloudy weather and they wish for more sun! A sunny day in Germany is a happy day and whenever it’s sunny, Germans will go out to enjoy the sunlight and soak up the sun. They will turn into sunflowers tracking the sun all day. 

Germans usually feel disappointed and a bit depressed if it’s cloudy and if you ask someone here: “Do you think it’s going to rain today?” they will pull a face and say: “Hopefully NOT!”

On the other hand, in Yemen if it’s cloudy and you ask someone the same question, they will answer with a delightful smile: “Oh, let’s hope so!!” And if it does rain,

google image

Yemenis literally cheer up and celebrate. They gather in front of the windows to watch the rain fall and to take pictures! Then, they post those pictures on Facebook praising the ‘magical’ weather and amusingly the cloudier the better! Some may even go outside to get wet and play under the rain! Yemenis are fed up with the sun and they want more overcast and rainy spells!! In other words, a rainy day in Yemen is a happy day, while a sunny day is NOT! It's also impressive how Yemenis still manage to enjoy the smallest things despite the war and the unfair blockade. I guess that's because life goes on and it has to, no matter what!

 

 google image

While Germans consider the rain just a ‘bad weather’, Yemenis think of it as a blessing and a sign of mercy. Based on religious beliefs, they consider the time of the rain as

Social Media :Yemeni people enjoying the rain in Sana'a

one of the best times to pray to God and they believe that prayers are more likely to be accepted during the rain. That’s why when it rains, people in Yemen and in some other Arabic countries pray to God for what they desire or need; they pray for guidance, forgiveness, help or whatsoever. There is even a joke about women and rain in our culture. It says that when it rains in America for example, an American woman would make herself a cup of coffee and would sit calmly on a chair to read a book while a Yemeni woman would ‘furiously’ take advantage of the rainy time to pray to God to cause harm to all those who have done her wrong!

 It’s interesting to watch how the sun and rain are variably received by different cultures. It’s also remarkable how the weather shapes the moods and emotions of people. However, living today under daily overcast and watching Germans celebrating the sunny days and Yemenis celebrating the rainy ones, we feel a bit emotionally confused. We find ourselves stuck between a very sunny yesterday and a very cloudy today.