Nothing new to report. We are officially in the "rainy season," meaning it will rain..at some point..everyday. Not so much fun, but the end of rainy season brings the official start of summer and the season of festivals. If you're like me you've never heard of such a thing, so here is how Wikipedia defines a rainy season:
"The East Asian rainy season (Chinese: 梅雨, méiyǔ; Japanese: 梅雨, tsuyu, baiu) is the frontal precipitation caused by the meiyu or baiu front, a persistent east-west zone of disturbed weather during spring which is quasi-stationary and stretches from the east China coast, across Taiwan, and eastward into the Pacific south of Japan.[1] The characters literally mean "plum rains", referring to the season when the Japanese plum (ume) ripens. The rainy season usually lasts from June to July in Japan and from July to August in the Chang Jiang and Huai He region of China.
The meiyu front forms when the moist air over the Pacific meets the cooler continental air mass. The front and the formation of frontal depressions along it bring rain to Japan, Korea, and eastern China. As the front moves back and forth depending on the strength of cool and warm air masses, there is often prolonged precipitation and sometimes flooding in eastern China. However, in the years that it does not rain as much as usual, a drought might result. The rainy season ends when the warm air mass associated with the subtropical ridge is strong enough to push the front north and away. In June, Tokyo experiences an average of 176 mm of rain[2], more than any month other than September. (Even though more rain falls in September, those rain totals are caused by typhoons, which are nowhere nearly as regular and predictable as the rains in June.) The islands of Okinawa in Japan are the first to receive rain, though all islands are eventually affected. However, the rain front normally does not bring much rain to Hokkaidō as it weakens on its way north.
When the Pacific warm air mass weakens in autumn, the front comes back from the north and it rains for several weeks in Japan. The autumnal rain is called "akisame" (秋雨)."
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