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For the last week in Shanghai, the weather has followed the same pattern every day. The morning starts hazy, humid, and brutally hot. As th day progresses, the sun comes out and bakes everything to a crispy 35 degrees C (about 90 degress F). And then around 4:30 or 5, the sky starts to darken to the point that you think it’s night time, when actually it’s late afternoon on the longest day of the year. It got so dark on Thursday that all of us in the office stopped working just to look outside, as if we had never seen the sun set on the world.

And then the skies open up. The wind blows and the rain pours, thunder and lightning crash and burn. Today is Saturday and Yoyo went out this afternoon to do her hair while I stayed home. I was on the computer doing some leftover work from the office (sadly) when the darkness came and thunder bellowed from the North. I went to the window to watch the storm come in, and was reminded of the power of nature. Looking down on the little people from 21 floors above, I could see them all scurrying to get home or to wherever they were headed before the madness began. Big billowing thunderheads rolled in fast over the building across from me, and I saw a man opposite the way doing the same thing I was: sticking his hand out the window to see if the rain had begun. We just stood there, watching it unfold, and were glad to be home.