Temporary White-Out

This morning I woke up to see a few white things floating in the air.

Could it be? Snow in mid-February?

It had just started snowing before 7am and by the time I was at the bus stop waiting to catch the 101 to get to work, the flakes were big chunks and falling fast.

I examined a few that fell on my jacket and indeed the individual flakes could be made out and for a moment wondered what fantastic geometric patterns they'd reveal under a microscope.

Traffic just continued as if snow wasn't falling -- was it arrogance on the part of the drivers? Or was the snow that dry that it didn't matter? It turned out it was the latter as no one slipped or slid on the roads.

However the snow practically disappeared by lunchtime -- and there was hardly any evidence of it having existed, as sidewalks were dry.

But in the evening the white flakes have made their entrance into Beijing again and might still be there tomorrow morning.

Although it's only a few millimetres, this is the most snow I've seen in the capital since I moved here almost two years ago. How strange! My colleagues had told me stories of the roads snarled with traffic once snow fell and how it would take hours to get home...