And the big news right now is... the rain.

I mentioned in my last Ngoto dispatch that the weather was on the change. Well, the rains are now back with a vengeance...

This is the first time we've experienced the beginning of the Central Java rainy season, and it turns out that such beginnings are really very rainy indeed... Not only BIG, thundery downpours, but also sustained periods of steady precipitation (think New Zealand or England).

And colleagues tell me that December is when it really all happens!

At the moment the rain is bringing:

-- A constant round of on and off with the bright blue plastic trousers and jacket that constitute my Rufus-riding "rain suit".

-- Lots of winged termites. It seems (based solely on our observation and a quick Google expedition) that especially heavy rains trigger the emergence of clouds of these things. They flutter for a while, then land, and then shrug themselves out of their flying equipment, leaving thousands of wings, weirdly, everywhere. If they manage to avoid getting instantly eaten by the big toad who has taken up residence by our dustbin, or by one of the kittens down the road, who think termites are really fantastic fun, they trug around in pairs for a while, one behind the other, like miniature trains. I guess this has something to do with creating a new generation of weird winged things...

-- The mass blossoming of a particularly fragrant tree, whose tiny petals were carpeting the ground in various places on our morning walk the other day.

-- The return of the mountain. Sometimes.

-- Some wonderfully atmospheric misty mornings.

-- And leaks. Yes, we have a few wet patches on the ceilings upstairs, and a couple of bucket-requiring drips. Takes us back to our Dorchester days. And our Auckland days... The world over, it seems, it's pretty hard to build a house that's water-tight...

All in all, it's great weather -- if you're a duck...