Have you ever named the rain?

I'm getting ready to go pluck a dusty orphan umbrella out of the office stand and head out again into the rain. It's been coming down on and off all week. I hate carrying an umbrella and then ending up not needing it, so I have gambled and gotten wet a lot.

Anyway, to end this damp, chilly week, I am reprinting here something I put in the comments of Havi Brooks' Fluent Self blog a while back, an exercise in naming the rains. I thought it was goofy, but then I did it and it was fun.
Naming the rain, Japan edition.


Bottom Pedal Rain, or I can’t believe they are making me ride to work on a borrowed old bicycle in a typhoon even though it is only my third day on the job and my second week in the country and how can I sit in an office all day when I am wetter than I have ever been in clothes in my life, and is it even remotely safe to ride a bike with my feet splashing through flowing water on every down stroke?


Travelers' Stories Rain that makes everyone whip out the most exotic locale in which they were ever rained upon, except for one level-headed friend who remains unimpressed and points out that they have some pretty heavy rain in Virginia, too, and would everyone please just get over themselves.

Glaze Rain that makes the rocks in the gardens and the cobblestones and inlaid tiles in the streets of Kyoto glisten like maybe they aren't actually meant to be seen any other way.
Mass Hysteria Non-Rain Rain is barely a mist or maybe a few little drops that don't add up to anything, but somehow everyone is hunched under their umbrellas as if it were actually raining because everyone else is. Carrying a rolled umbrella will cause everyone to look at you confused and you will feel a bit smug about being able to judge for yourself whether or not it is actually raining.

The Rain of Subway Stair Traffic Jams and Reproach makes each person stop at the top of the crowded steps to put up his or her umbrella, and it makes you hate each one of them and mutter things like “would the %&#* world really end if you stepped out from under the awning first and then put up your %&#* umbrella?!” and then when it's finally your turn, you stride past and put up your own umbrella while walking as an example and then feel guilty for being like that and not just waiting patiently like everyone else.

Plum Rain is what rainy season rain is actually called in Japanese and there is no way to improve upon it.
 
Tourist Obligation Absolution Rain is a gift on weekends that removes any traces of guilt from staying home and reading a novel or watching a movie (in English) and not looking for new places and cultural experiences to explore.