NYC = cold

It's summer here and it's hot and muggy. Most of Japan is pretty muggy but I'm in the south so it's akin to Louisiana or Geogia in the states. Let me put it another way: a friend of mine who was born in this city but now lives in the States on a recent visit to Japan said she couldn't wait to get back to Las Vegas because she couldn't take the heat here in Kochi.

Anyway, it's been hot in the east coast of the USA recently too. So I mentioned it to people I know. New York has been 34C which (I've actually forgotten fahrenheit) is the high 90's I beleieve.

Everyone is shocked. They make the shocked noise: "Ehhhhhhhhhh?" (gradually rising intonation. Then some people think they understand. "Oh, they use a different system in Amrica. He means Fahrenheit." Of course no one can pronounce "Fahrenheit" so bedlam breaks out with a half dozen people blurting out syllables of broken German words.

"No no no," I say pointing to the big letter "C" next to the numbers 3 and 4 on the board. "It's celsius."

So everyone goes "But New York is cold!"

Ok, an important point: the issue here isn't so much that people aren't familiar with New York's climate. I'm sure most Americans have no idea what the weather is like in Tokyo for example. But the people I'm talking about who are surprised by New York's weather are people I've known for years. And every summer they are surprised that it's warm enough to take a jacket off in New York City. We go through the same routine every summer. Like if I show them a photo of me swimming at the beach in summer when I was a kid. It's steaming hot, sunburned fatsos are eating ice cream, sitting under umbrellas, but one look at the photo and they go "Looks cold." because we all know that New York Is Cold.

Oh, and in the above story, after everyone has settled down and accepted (for the time being) that it gets above "chilly" in the new York area, there inevitably will be one person who mutters "I don't get it. I don't know Fahrenheit."