Darren is on his way over from Australia and a BBQ in his name is planned well in advance.
There is drama brewing though as the weather at the moment here in Japan is in the rainy season!!
In the mean time, a week before Dazza's BBQ the Street Beer crew are having a session in Shibuya after work on the Friday night. Suddenly 2 faces appear next to our group and one of the guys is happy to hear us all speaking English and starts to ask us a few questions. We find out that these guys are from Norway and have just arrived that day in Tokyo. They are here for 10 days of exploring and partying.
After a couple of hours of drinking together they are about to leave for their hotel, we invite them to the BBQ. Contact details are exchanged and goodbyes are said.
It's now Monday, the weekend is over and it's countdown time for this Saturday, for ... Dazza's BBQ.
The rain is constant everyday!!!
I get on to my trusty web site called JMA. It's the meteorological agency for Japan. All kinds of information can be found here. Actually, I'm using this site to find out interesting information about the Tohoku Earthquake, earthquakes that happen in updated time, weekly weather forecasts and of course ... my new study every night ... weather for this coming Saturday!!
The satellite weather chart comes up and I'm studying the weather systems from India, Northern Russia, Indonesia and most importantly right now, China.
Japan, fortunately or unfortunately is in a position on the globe that constantly has 3 weather patterns emerging right on it. Up from South East Asia, across from China and Korea and the over from the Pacific Ocean. The amount of rain we have here in the rainy season would make the Australian farmers extremely envious!! ;)) Our winter comes from Siberia and dumps so much snow in the northern parts of Japan that you need to dig out a path before heading off to the office, or school in my case when I lived in Niigata.
But back to my new study. There are 26 confirmed people going to Dazza's BBQ this coming Saturday. It's going to be one heck of a party by the river. By Wednesday the rain is still pelting down and by Wednesday afternoon my mobile phone is inundated with mail from at least half of the people that plan to go.
On Wednesday night a break through appears in the cloud system in the south eastern coast of China and after 10 or so minutes of checking the weather patterns from various other directions a smile cracks on my face. I say cracks because it was stressing me out that this freakin' rain wasn't letting up!! And I really didn't want to cancel the BBQ because a lot of organising had been done!! AND, Darren was bringing heaps of Aussie Beef Sausages and a stack of Aussie Lamb for the BBQ!! All the way from Australia for this event!!
That evening I sent messages out to all that by Friday afternoon I would give them the ''YAY'' or ''NAY''. Now a ''YAY'' means the BBQ is ''ON'' and a ''NAY'' means the BBQ is cancelled!!
I explained that there was a break in the weather coming our way and we should give it a go.
I think I said to them all ... ''Trust me!!'' ... mmmmm!! ;))
Friday is here and Darren arrives in Japan. Later that afternoon I anxiously get on the web to do my last weather check.
Satellite pictures load up on the screen!!
Start viewing the NE quadrant with a 12 hour time sequence, .... and yes!! The break has arrived!! The BBQ is on!!
I mail all involved and say the ''YAY''!!
That night the Street Beer crew meet up for ... the O-Lounge ( the O-Lounge is 2nd home to most of us ) version of Street Beer ... because ... it's bleedin' raining outside!! ;))
Some of the guys ''umm'' and ''ahh'' about tomorrow but I say that it's on and understand if they don't go. There'll be a bunch of us there partying on because we like to live on the edge and take chances!! :)
On Saturday morning ... wait for it!! ... it's raining!!! ... again!!
But I'm more confident with my forecast now because the system is extremely close to us and will stop raining by mid morning ... as we catch the train out of Tokyo ... the rain stops!!
We get to our BBQ spot, buy some dry wood from the store close by, find heaps of other wood from around the area and start a fire to get that dry. Actually it's obvious that the rain had stopped earlier in this area as the wood was only slightly damp and didn't take long to dry. There was heaps of food to cook for the BBQ as we had bought too much expecting a few more revellers!! First time in my BBQ history that I have had food left over!!
So from lunch time we had really nice weather and an intermittent blue sky, include the humidity and it was a great day for a BBQ. Swimming in the river was even done!!
There ended up being 9 of us there, even Jey -J. was there!! ... a nice cool surprise as the guys from Norway made it all the way up for the BBQ too. Those guys are legends and hope to see them soon that's for sure!!
At around 8-30pm, well after the sun had gone down we slowly started to pack up, there was a sprinkle of rain falling but not enough to dampen our spirits. 30 minutes later the mountains disappeared in cloud and it poured down with rain!! Carlos jumps into his tent as he and the missus are staying the night by the river and the rest of us huddle in the toilet block and finish our beer!!
At the train station we had another 30 minutes to wait for our next train. More time to drink with a good bunch of mates and the new mates we had made from Norway!!
The weather gods were on our side that day and we had one hell of a BBQ for Dazza ... cheers guys!! :))
No comments:
Post a Comment