‘Climate change has made winter come later to the Philippines; while it used to be freezing by November, now we have to wait till December. I hope to live long enough to see winter weather in September!’
HOW is winter in the Philippines?” a colleague of mine asked when I was still working at Coke and had this meeting in Atlanta. I smiled, but my tongue just said, “You won’t believe how freezing it is.”
Well, it’s wintry weather now, worthy of a December. Though the wintry weather has come late this year — a sign of the global warming times? — the days and especially nights are more than pleasant, sometimes even biting. And they will help someone reduce the utility bills for this month.
I am not speaking of Canada, where my older brother lives and where they “enjoy” sub-zero temperatures. I really don’t understand how you could “enjoy” sub-zero temperatures when all you do is wrap yourself in three or four layers of clothing, walk the streets or drive the thoroughfares as carefully as you can, if necessary shovel snow from the driveway at least once a day, and then deal with the muck that comes with the melting snow.
Plus, it can be gloomy even at lunch time when the sun is supposed to be at its shiniest best. That’s not enjoyable for me.
So much so that I only celebrated one Christmas (I’m not sure I even lasted till New Year) in Canada. And then one year, when my brothers and I voted where to celebrate the holidays together, I was outvoted 2-1 with Montreal beating Bali. Well, they did go to Montreal and had pictures where you could not make out who was who because they were so covered up and only their eyes were visible, while I had a grand time in exotic Bali.
But now I am enjoying wintry weather here in Alaminos, Laguna, where the temperature is dropping to a freezing 20 degrees at night, maybe even lower, not counting windchill. I keep the windows open (but the screens closed) and enjoy the breeze wafting through the house while I gorge on Netflix. I have more than just a tee on, and wear lounge pants from Uniqlo (they sell for P990 only and have a drawstring and are so comfortable even for casual outings to the mall) but yes, I am not weighed down by a ton of sweaters and scarves and mittens to keep the biting cold out.
Even a 10-degree Baguio weather is good enough for me. Anything colder than that where you need to wear layer upon layer of stuff isn’t fun anymore. Which is why I suspect Santa isn’t really a jolly guy given his weight and the weight of his clothes and the weight of the gifts and weight of the sled, not to mention the weight of the reindeer. I will bet he’d rather lounge on a beach in Bali with one hand around Mrs. Claus and another clutching a beer.
Climate change has made winter come later to the Philippines; while it used to be freezing by November, now we have to wait till December. I hope to live long enough to see winter weather in September!
