Lottie Nevin – The Red House Diaries

The Tropical Monsoons have arrived. Their imminent approach each afternoon is palpable as the skies begin to blacken angrily and the stagnant, humid air is stirred up by the sudden wind. The tall palms rustle and shake like girls in grass skirts as the first rain drops start to fall. Fat, heavy drops, slowly at first, lento, lento. Then, like an orchestra obeying the conductor’s baton, the tempo quickens from a crescendo, to a full-blown allegro con brio as mighty claps of thunder crash like giant cymbals directly above, shaking the windows and rattling the doors until, suddenly, like a great dam bursting, the heavens open wide and down comes the torrential, relentless rain. Thick, warm stair rods of it. Big rain, the biggest, wettest, rain that you have ever seen. Sheet lightening flashes across the sky making an illuminated backdrop behind the Jakartan skyline…