The amusing thing about this ancient civilisation in which I now reside and is responsible for things such as paper, paper money, credit banking, the compass, woodblock printing and technologies involving mechanics, hydraulics, and mathematics applied to horology, metallurgy, astronomy, agriculture, engineering, music theory, craftsmanship, nautics and other gargantuan feats of genius (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Chinese_inventions), is that they have no effing clue about drainage.
When the rain falls here, it takes around two hours for the roads to transform into rivers. I am not being dramatic or spouting (excuse the pun) orotund talk - the roads actually transform into rivers on account of there being no discernible drainage system.
On Saturday evening I walked into a birthday party at 8:15. When I emerged at around 9:15 I got on my e-bike, headed in the direction of my apartment and navigated the pavements, roads, junctions and turnings with nothing more than guesswork as they were all submerged under at least two feet of water. Not only were they submerged but the traffic which carries on regardless creates an interesting wave effect much as you get at the seaside, where you expect to be up to your knees in lapping waves, as opposed to biking home in your work clothes in the middle of a city. I was soaked cubed; 1. from the ever present total-body leaking-sweat that a humid climate creates, 2. from the bottom up by the river-roads and 3. entirely drenched from above by the intemperate precipitation, despite donning my useless but nonetheless optimistic Chinese style e-bike pac-a-mac, that not only covers me but also covers my bike, in a feeble attempt to both stay dry and look like a human tent on castors (The hood has a peak for crying out loud. There is no way to look good in this thing, but everyone seems to wear them, so when in Rome...).
Had I not been sailing home whilst simultaneously comedy-blinking my way through sloppy wet blindness, as my pac-a-mac slipped over my face to cover one eye, making it almost impossible to see anything and making me look more like a person who eats crayons than ever before, I would have taken some photos to prove my point. Next time. I did however, upon my return to the safety of my apartment, capture the tail end of the lightening storm through which I navigated on my little bike-boat, with more than one or two passing thoughts of how efficiently water conducts electricity. Enjoy the beautiful light show :)
And just for a bit of extra fun, here are a few Google pictures of how the Chinese deal with said rain; a whole array of inventive barriers including the
