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The rain started this morning at about 4:30 AM and continued until about 3:00 PM.  And this was a serious cold rain.  Brazil, Congo, and Indonesia are the three nations with vast dense biodiverse rainforest ecosystems.  There’s a reason they put rain in the name.  In San Diego most of the time we pretend like there are four seasons when in reality it’s just a slow sway from perfect to chilly with a couple of weeks of sticky-hot.  People talk about rainy seasons and dry seasons here in Kisangani but we rarely ever go more than seven days without rain.  When we get close to seven days, it starts to feel like a drought.

These forests are so unbelievably lush and yet the greenery can’t consume all of the water.  There are hundreds of tributaries that flow into the Congo River as it flows north then east then south to the Atlantic.  When the rains slow up a bit, the dry season if you will, the river does drop.  Yesterday I noticed several taxi men washing their bicycles out on sandbars that stretch well into the riverbed.  It seems that river traffic must be nearly impossible at the moment.  I’ve heard that the Congo River is not an especially easy one to navigate and there are also as many as 20 points along the way where boats are stopped and taxed by officials and bandits of all stripes.  No doubt when the water is low, there is a significant economic impact.

Now that the rains are back in force, we can expect intense storms at least three times a week.  On days like today when the storms come during business hours, Congo’s pervasive informal economy briskly retreats.  Imagine what widespread weather closures would do to the economy in Seattle, and that’s what we’re up against.  We’re not trying to launch the next Starbucks mega-chain sensation, but just to see that communities are able to adequately shelter, clothe, feed, and educate themselves.  We may not have to worry about drought induced famine, but the weather is certainly an economic impediment.

The rains also cause transportation shut downs.  Imagine for a moment that you live in a city that has very few cars and horrible road conditions.  Very few of the roads are paved.  Paved or not, all of the roads are more pothole than anything else.  You get around by walking or riding on a slice of foam mounted over the back wheel of a bicycle.  If you are well-to-do you hire a motorcycle taxi.  If you are still wealthier you might own a car.  If you own a car it becomes very difficult not to splash everyone else when you are rolling over thousands of puddles.  Pedestrians give the dirtiest of looks to any car that rolls past at over 5 mph when there are puddles (and there are so often puddles).  Still, getting a few (hundred) dirty looks, and driving carefully of course, is far better than riding on the back of a bicycle in wet weather.

When the potholes are full it’s impossible to tell how deep they are.  This morning one of our staff members was trying to get to work in the rain.  After he was finally able to find an available bicycle taxi they set off for downtown.  Before long they hit a deep puddle and they were both thrown into the mud.  He had to walk home in the rain and start it all over again.