The Fog

Okay, I just have to tell you about the weather today. And not because there are awkward silences, or because there's nothing else to talk about, or because I'm Canadian and it's what we do, but because it was truly like nothing I've ever seen before. Which is saying a lot as I've lived in Canada for 20 years.

To start, I woke up and looked out the window this morning and couldn't see a single thing. It was the densest fog ever. I wanted to take a picture, but this is literally what it would have looked like:

Seriously, I couldn't see the grass on either side of the walkway. I couldn't see the six-storey building I needed to get to until I practically walked into the wall. I was nearly decapitated by a flag post that had bent out at an awkward angle across the walkway.

And of course, people were being insane and attempting to drive through this. What do you do when you can't see? You begin to rely on your other sense, hence why there was a steady soundtrack of car horns on my walk across campus. It was literally Marco Polo for cars.

I spent my lunch break in my room with the curtains drawn and when I opened them 45 minutes later, there was the sun, unexpectedly blinding me. The weird thing is, it looked like it was just the school grounds that had any sun. When I looked into the distance it was just that same fog.

And now, 5 hours later, it's beginning to get foggy again.

Reading this, you'd think I'd never seen fog before. But this was extreme fog.





Update: I just went for my normal evening walk. Usually I go for 6-12 laps around the track. Tonight when I started out, the fog was like a normal spring morning back home: still OK for driving conditions. After one and a half laps though, the fog began to get so thick I couldn't see more than 2 metres in front of me. I had to go in because I actually started feeling claustrophobic.

When I got to the sidewalk in front of my building, I could hear someone (or something) walking around, but I didn't see him until we were both standing directly underneath a lamp and about 4 feet away from each other. Of course, just to freak out my overactive imagination, this dude had his hood up and was wearing all dark clothes.

But the surreal thing is, when I looked up there was the moon and the stars, clearer than I'd ever seen them in China.

A tree in the fog, with the flash on. Taken about 1 metre away.

Update #2: There are currently fireworks going off just down the street - or I assume it's just down the street as it's incredibly loud. And even though these fireworks are going off within such a close proximity, I actually cannot see them. Anywhere. That's how foggy it is. And no, I have no clue why they're setting off fireworks on a random Wednesday at 9 o'clock at night when a person can't see 1 foot in front of them.