Hot, Hotter, Hottest!

Anyone who has ever lived here will tell you that Chennai has three seasons; Hot, Hotter, and Hottest!!  And then they will laugh.  My supervisor, Dr. Sathish, told me this on the first day that we met, back in Jan (Hot).  I was happy, having just come from freezing Lucknow, and even colder Michigan/Boston!  Everyone kept warning me that summer was coming and that I will hate it.  Well, it's mid April, and summer is now just beginning (Hotter), and yeah, I hate it.

I finally looked up the weather in Chennai to find that is has routinely been 38-40 C, which, to my surprise, is over 100 F!!  I should have known this already, since in the hospital 38 C constitues a low grade fever.  But I think my brain isn't working properly because I am so far away from BMC (not like my brain worked any better over there!).  Add in the 85-90% humidity and it's like a sauna over here!

Yesterday after work, Jacob was பக் பக் பக் (Tamil equivalent of yap yap yap) so I missed my bus.  While waiting at the bus stand, just standing still, in the shade, at 6pm, I was dripping sweat.  After 25 min, the bus finally came and, remembering the lessons learned from my previous bus groping, I sanwiched myself amongst the ladies in the back on the bus.  Grope free zone!  For the next hot hour, I couldn't move my feet (no room) and every inch of myself was touching someone else. I think it was one of the most crowded buses I've been on in recent memory.  I could actually feel sweat dripping down my back and my neck; there were sweat drops literally rolling down my face and off my nose.  I got off at Garden, thinking I'd rather walk the last 15 min in the heat then remain inside that bus.  I looked like I just stepped out of a swimming pool!  My hair and clothes were drenched!   

Back at my flat, which is on the 3rd floor and despite the fans, does not really offer must relief from the heat, I attempted to make dinner; dosai and leftover sambar.  Cooking dosai is kind of like cooking pancakes, involving standing over a hot pan, pouring and flipping, etc.  Perhaps this wasn't the best choice for dinner, but the dosai mix needed to be used and the sambar had to be eaten and I'm reaching my limits with rice!  The absurd amount of sweating continued to be a problem, but all the possible solutions had their snags.  Turning on the fan would blow out the flame from the stove and opening the windows not only let in the mosquitos but would also allow my neighbors to watch me cook with my shirt off -- unacceptable!  So, with the fan off and the windows closed, I cooked and ate as fast as possible, probably exacerbating the situation.    

After dinner is done, everything cleaned up and I have a quick bucket shower, I finally allow myself to retire to my room and turn on the AC.  Oh, how I love my AC!  I dont care that it costs more then a months rent, more than five times the cost of my trip to MP, almost more than my plane ticket to Bali!  At this point, I'm so happy and cool that nothing else matters.  As I peacefully drift off to sleep, I think about how glad I am that I will be gone by the time "Hottest" rolls around.