The weather - part II

The British weather has changed rather substantially over the past 10 years. I just wonder how much it will change over the next 10.

When my father studied in the UK in 1981, he used to observe cloudy, slightly rainy weather with little sunshine. He used to remark that when the sun finally came out in May, the lecture halls and libraries were empty, and students and professors alike headed towards Hyde Park to secure a deck chair. Sunshine was a rare commodity.

The first few years in the UK, I found much the same phenomenon. Not a lot of sunshine, and even less warmth. During the study leave period in the midst of A Level exams, fellow housemates in the boarding school would revise under sunshine with a bathing towel. Sometimes what they defined as sunshine was nothing more than a glimpse of the sun amid thick clouds, and the temperature was not hospitable. I opted to stay by the radiator.

During university, the weather started to change. By 2006, when I worked as an intern in London, sunshine was blazing and grass dried up to the colour of hay. People thought it was going to be a vintage year of sunshine, once every decade or so, and so everyone enjoyed as much as they can - reading on the lawn, weekend barbecue, beer in the beer garden.

Since then, sunshine was remembered as a norm for summers. It has by now become an expectation than a wish. Short sleeves and sandals become natural in summer, and people are accustomed to sweating. Nonetheless, people still enjoy sunshine and beg for more of it.

I used to joke that the British were so obsessed with sunshine that they would be more than happy to emigrate to the deserts. This still holds true and never fails to amuse people.