Deszcz. Polish for “rain.” If you don’t speak consonants, say “desh” and add a little soft “ch” that trails off at the end. It’s like the cycle of a shower. Heavy, then steady, then soft at the end, so to speak.

I sit here in the dark of my fifth floor flat with the French (or perhaps they should be called Polish) doors wide open but fitted between the slats in the blinds, listening to the sound of deszcz and the occasional barking pies (dog) while I read Facebook updates.

Before now, I had assumed Poland was a little like home in the summertime where winters are cold and summers are hot. The rain comes in the spring and fall and sometimes, on a hot summer day, brings relief for a brief moment. But it’s not the same. This year anyway, it’s raining every day, and sometimes all day.

I had been almost cursing the heat, 30c and more, when I arrived in June. My blood had thickened or something during my time on the Ice and I can’t tolerate heat without breaking into a heavy sweat. You know how hard it is to look cool when you’re literally dripping just walking around. Thailand was like that and Cambodia, too. But there it was nearly 40c some days with high humidity and everybody who isn’t Thai or a freak sweats profusely. Once I discovered shirts cost a dollar, I treated them like disposable napkins. I’d wear one for half a day and sometimes literally peel it off my body in strips, partly because it was cheaply made and partly because my sweat acted like glue.

Krakow isn’t that kind of hot. It’s just unpleasantly hot for me. The hordes of tourists, many of them from other parts of Europe, find it enjoyable and look great. Polish women, who may already be the most beautiful per capita, don’t sweat. Some in the clubs out on the dance floor are even wearing scarves (of which the newest novelty are those sporting Palestinian designs from the Dunkin’ Donuts commercials). Me — I’m a fountain of sweat even before the amped up version of “Thriller” has started and I have to get on the floor. God made me for Antarctica, I think.

At South Pole, I could walk around for two hours, then take off my glove and put the flesh of my hand against my nose and cheek to warm them up. My feet sweat in the blue thermal boots. Yes, I sweat in Antarctica. In 36 months on Ice at McMurdo and the South Pole it didn’t rain. It’s too cold. It barely snows at the Pole. After Antarctica, I knew I loved rain. I love light rain, especially when it’s warm and I can walk around and my shirt gets wet and I feel cool and comfortable. I spent a summer in Modesto, Calif., and it didn’t rain even one minute that I ever felt. I thought that was impressive and Antarctica was even more so. But here in Poland, it turns out July is the rainy season.

I try to watch the state news to improve my meager Polish and I haven’t seen any reports of floods. There have been a few road accidents but nothing major. Rain is normal here. The rivers are contained and development is set well back from it or high up on reinforced and walled banks — probably the result of hundreds of years of experience.

My friends here work. Those that don’t are in Montenegro or otherwise unavailable. I have a lot of free time. But I’ve found deszcz makes free time troublesome. For one thing I don’t have an umbrella. I don’t want to buy one either because it’s just one more thing I would have to drag around. So I wear a raincoat. But deszcz has found a way to make that “skomplikavana” or complicated. It’s good for all the obvious reasons: it’s cooler, the trees and grass are vibrant and green and the streets and buildings appear washed and not dusty. But the deszcz also keeps me thinking about it too much.

For example, I’m outside walking when it arrives suddenly, so I duck into a doorway like the other umbrella-less people and wait. And wait. And wait. Finally, I decide to put on my raincoat then start walking again. And the deszcz … stops. I leave it on assuming it will return but in 20 minutes I’m sweating — and now you know that’s not my idea of happiness, so off comes the raincoat. I stow it in the bag and walk about five blocks and the deszcz returns teasing at first as droplets. Then the wind comes in and it pours. And this goes on and on and on. Fortunately I rarely have to be anywhere and can enjoy watching the rain and the people that have to be in it from the safety of some awning or doorway. But it also means I don’t go very far but take hours doing it. While I very much want to love deszcz, I’m beginning to lose faith in the future of this relationship. I’ve been back in Krakow for a little over a week now after a trip to the coast in the north. Deszcz followed me here and won’t leave.

I was in Gydnia at the Baltic Sea for a music festival. For three glorious days of beautiful music and camaraderie with my friends and nearly a hundred-thousand other people, it only rained in the mornings when I was sleeping. By the time I had stirred and made it back to the festival from my apartment in the Akademia Morska (maritime academy), the grass was cool and the ground had dried.

After the festival, my friends made plans to drop me off in Gdansk, just 30km away. Between Gydnia and Gdansk there is Sopot, a very touristy beach city, sort of like Ocean City, Maryland. After a tour of the famously long pier, a couple scoops of lody ( ice cream) and rybs (fish filets), we took an intercity train to Gdansk. Deszcz caught us on the train.

When we got off at the center, there was a nice, light drizzle, so we walked through the town ducking under eaves and made our way to the store to buy some chocolates for my friend’s aunt. Soon we had flowers, chocolates and fresh cherries. Now to find the aunt’s house. We wandered this way and that way until we neared her house. It began then to rain — hard.

We saw my friend’s father smoking in an open window and he called out to us where we could find the entrance to the house. We came around the corner to the stairway to the apartment and there was a convention of kots — cats. The dozen felines had taken positions all over the place. Just then my friend’s dad opened the door and stomped his foot on the hollow, wooden stairway and yelled. Kots jumped everywhere and ran past us in a hurry to get away from the man but stay out of the pouring rain. We started to scurry up the stairs when all of a sudden — Crash! Boom! Bang! — sounds like thunder right over my head put us all in a general ducking position. From nowhere, and about two inches above my head, I saw a flash of black fur. It wasn’t lightning. It was a kot. My heart nearly stopped over a damn kot.

Everybody was catching their breaths and thankful it wasn’t lightning or something falling down off the side of the brick building or roof onto our heads, when my friend spoke with a grin.

“It’s raining kots and pies! Well kots, anyway.”

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here’s a simple song about deszcz