You can always tell when rain decides to commit in Crete. It doesn’t build up slowly, it doesn’t flirt. It just arrives, uninvited, unapologetic, like everyone’s least favorite cousin.
The locals gasp as if they’ve never seen water fall from the sky before. Tourists squeal. Everyone runs for cover that doesn’t exist. I stand at the window, coffee in hand, watching the performance.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned here, it’s that Cretans can handle earthquakes, political scandals, and scooter traffic with the calm of monks, but one good rain turns them into philosophers and fools.
The Flood and the Foolish
The street outside fills in minutes. It doesn’t flood gracefully — it fills like someone forgot to turn off the tap of God. Cars become boats. Scooters become memories. People start improvising umbrellas from supermarket bags.
I swear one man was using a cardboard pizza box.
They shout into the storm, as if rain speaks Greek. I’ve never seen so many people yell at weather.
My neighbor, a retired sailor, comes out with a broom, pushing water uphill like it’s a personal vendetta. He’s been doing this for twenty years. He’s never won.
I sip my coffee and think about how the rain doesn’t care. It’s honest that way — it just falls.
Enter Mojito
There’s only one living creature in this house who likes the rain less than I do, and that’s Mojito. He’s a hound with opinions, and none of them include getting wet.
The look he gives me when I grab the leash says everything: traitor.
Outside, the rain hits us sideways. The first step off the porch feels like diving into a cold soup made of regret and exhaust fumes. Mojito sniffs the air, unimpressed.
“Go on,” I tell him. “You wanted this walk as much as I did.”
He looks at me with the weary soul of a philosopher forced into reincarnation as a dog. We trudge on.
The street is a river now. Water gushes around our feet, dragging cigarette butts and olive leaves past our shoes. A plastic chair floats by, heroic and pointless.
We pass a tourist couple trying to share a single umbrella. They’re soaked. The woman is laughing, the man looks like he’s questioning every decision he’s ever made.
Mojito sneezes. I take it as applause.
The People Problem
I don’t hate rain. I hate what people do in it.
They drive worse. They talk louder. They suddenly believe they’re part of a natural disaster documentary.
There’s always that one driver who insists on speeding through puddles, baptizing pedestrians. Somewhere, Poseidon applauds.
Every café becomes Noah’s Ark. The same wet people, the same conversations: “Oh, you think this is bad? You should’ve seen 2017.” They order raki like it’s medicine.
I sit near the window, watching their reflections shiver in the glass. Everyone complains, but secretly, they love it — the drama, the shared discomfort. It gives them something to talk about besides politics.
Rain makes Greeks sentimental. It makes me want to move to the Sahara.
Still, I’ll admit something — the sound of it has rhythm.
Crete has dry air most of the year; when rain hits the old stone, it sings. It patters, it hisses, it runs down gutters like a drunk bouzouki player trying to remember his melody.
Even Mojito pauses sometimes, ears flicking. Maybe he hears the same thing I do — the island sighing, as if relieved that something finally fell from the sky other than tourists.
Back home, I hang the leash, towel the dog, and stand by the open door for a minute. The smell of wet soil and car exhaust mixes with jasmine from the neighbor’s yard. It’s awful and beautiful at once.
The Love I Won’t Admit
I’ve lived long enough to know I only rant about what I secretly love. If I truly hated people, I wouldn’t watch them this closely.
Rain brings out something raw in everyone. The polished ones look confused. The lazy ones get moving. The loud ones go silent for once. You can see their real faces in the reflection of puddles.
Even I’m not immune. Somewhere between the irritation and the coffee refills, I start noticing how the island glows differently under rain — the way the sea turns from blue to steel, the way old houses gleam as if freshly built, the way palm fronds drip like they’re crying slowly.
And there’s Mojito, stretched on the floor, asleep, smelling faintly of wet dog and grace.
The Second Round
By afternoon, the rain stops pretending it’s over. It comes back harder. The street that was a river becomes a sea. Someone loses a shoe. Someone else gains a story.
A scooter, defiant as ever, cuts through the water. Its driver yells “Ela re!” at nothing. Heroic idiocy.
I’m halfway tempted to go back outside — not for the walk, but just to see the madness up close. Instead, I open another window, let the wind in, and listen.
Rain against metal roofs, thunder rolling over the hills, far-off laughter echoing through the narrow streets — it’s chaos turned into music.
Philosophy, Dog, and Drizzle
By evening, the storm softens. I pour a small glass of whisky — a personal weather report.
Mojito curls at my feet, content. I scratch behind his ear, and he groans the way old men do when they finally accept comfort.
Outside, the sky clears just enough to let in a ribbon of orange light. The puddles reflect it like cheap mirrors. Everything is cleaner and messier at the same time.
I step out onto the porch. The air is heavy, sweet, and full of the smell of wet stone. For once, there’s no shouting, no scooters, no barking. Just the island catching its breath.
“Alright,” I mutter to the rain, “you win.”
The rain doesn’t answer. It never does.
But I can tell it’s listening.
The Morning After
By the next day, the world has forgotten the flood. The sun’s back, the tourists are back, and everyone pretends nothing happened.
The streets shine like new coins. The puddles have vanished. The stray cats look smug again.
At the café, the same men who cursed the rain now call it “a blessing.” They say it made the olives happier. They say the air smells purer. They always find a moral once the danger’s gone.
I just nod and sip my coffee. Mojito sits under the table, sniffing for crumbs, his fur finally dry.
Someone says, “Did you hear? There’s another storm coming next week.”
I grin. “Of course there is.”
Because in Crete, weather, like people, never really changes. It just takes short breaks to come back louder.
Epilogue
Later that night, I hear the first drop again — that same determined tap on the pavement.
Mojito sighs from his corner. I pour another drink. The neighbor starts cursing the forecast.
And me? I do what I always do. I listen.
Rain has a way of washing everything but your thoughts. And mine, stubborn as ever, are still muttering about people who forget umbrellas and gods who never learn moderation.
Still, I can’t help but think — if paradise must have weather, let it be this: loud, unpredictable, and stupidly alive.
