Drenched (doesn't come close to describing it)!

On Saturday 31st March I went to a concert by an Argentinian group, with the youth from church. The concert was organised to promote a "Paraguay without drugs or violence", in remembrance of some youth who had lost their lives when they were fired upon at a peaceful demonstration against the government in 1999. The event was held at a football stadium. It rained the morning of the concert, which was great because it cleared the air and the temperature dropped to a bearable level. The sun came out in the afternoon and we all trotted off to the concert without a care in the world!

I felt a few drops of rain during the second song of the headline act, but didn't worry too much. However, by the beginning of the third song, we were in the middle of a full-blown tropical storm!! The rain came down at an incredible rate, accompanied by thunderclaps and lightning. The band kept playing but the audience scattered as fast as we could to escape the downpour. As we were leaving the stands, the electricity got cut so the sound and lights went out. Suddenly we were in darkness, with just the sounds of rain hitting every surface with a thud and of people calling to each other to make sure no-one was lost. Within a minute of the downpour starting, I was drenched to the skin. I couldn't see properly because the rain was coming into my eyes and stinging.

The thousands of people at the stadium were all leaving in order to make their way home. We were squeezed through the tunnel under the stands because lots of people had chosen to stand there to avoid the rain and there was a hairy moment or two as I found myself in the middle of an immense crush of people, half of them wanting to stay where they were and the other half wanting desperately to get out. Once outside the stadium gates we had to cross the road to find the car that had brought us. By this stage, the road was becoming a river and I was very grateful I was wearing flip-flops rather than trainers! It took us another 5 minutes of walking through the deepening waters to find the car. The rain just soaked right through my clothes and by the time I sat in the car, there wasn't a square millimetre of my skin that was dry. I would not have been wetter if I'd gone swimming fully dressed!!!

The water kept rising. Fortunately, we were in a pick-up truck, so the river that the road had become wasn't such a problem as for other vehicles. However, there were 16 of us altogether and, while 5 of us fitted inside the cab, the other 11 had to brave the storm on the back of the truck. And it kept raining. Some roads were impassable so we had to take the long way round to take some folks home. Asunción is a town with lots of little hills, so the roads become the drains taking the water to the river and, within an hour of the rain stopping, the roads are practically dry again! By the next morning, the only evidence of the storm were gatherings of mud at dips in the roads, where it had been carried by the water.

I do enjoy a storm but I definitely prefer to watch it from the shelter of my own home! It was a shame about the concert, a lot of people had been looking forward to it for ages. Still, not much you can do about the weather!