Sydney Weather

I’m not usually one to complain about the weather – its natural, its life, it can’t be changed.  No amount of complaining will do anything.  However, with the end of el nino this year (or was it last year?) we’ve been plunged from virtual drought into constant rain.

I feel sun dprived, cold, wet, cranky … everything is soggy, I always seem to have a wet umbrella, and I was REALLY looking forward to getting sun before I went and immersed myself into the Siberian winter.  It is summer though – full blown, more than a week into summer.  Even if its raining, it should be warm.

I keep thinking back to something which happened earlier this year.  I took a class called Attitudes to the Environment, which was an environmental ethics and morality subject.  It was moving and I would recommend it to anyone at studying at Macquarie Uni.  One week, two elders from the Sydney based Aboriginal tribe, the Darug (Dharruk) came and spoke to us about everything – the environment, what it means to them and how it influences the way they think and how it features in traditional stories.  It was easily the most fascinating educational experience of my life and I would love to know more.  I don’t know how just yet, but I hope to find out.

One of the key aspects of this class was that they spoke about the weather and the climate.  The Darug people have three or four weather/climate cycles which work together, and with which they predict the conditions.  In about March this year, they told my class it would be a colder and wetter summer than we have seen for many years.  It would affect the time of year the flowers bloomed and the migration of whales along the east coast.

And here we are: a cold and wet summer so far.  I knew it was coming but I’ll complain all I want!