I love rain.
More than just a little.
As soon as it starts to fall, my spirits lift for no particular reason.
Just watching the drops fall outside the window makes me happy, and when I hear the rain, I find myself putting down whatever I'm doing to look out.
Sometimes I wonder if I'm a little mad about it.
When it rains, I want to go somewhere.
I want to drive through it, or sit in a café with big windows, drinking coffee and watching the rain fall.
I also like opening a book and passing the time to the sound of rain.
On rainy days, I feel as though I've stepped into a world different from the usual one.
When did I come to love rain so much?
Tracing the memory back, I arrive at a rainy season in my earliest childhood.
I must have been about six.
I lived with my grandfather and grandmother in a rural village in Yangju, Gyeonggi Province.
I attended a nursery run by Dokbawi Church. From home, it was a little over an hour away on a child's feet.
I walked there and back alone.
During the rainy season, I wore a yellow raincoat.
In the newly planted paddies, young rice grew green and fresh.
The rain had filled the paddies to the brim, and a road just wide enough for one car wound between them.
I trotted along that road.
The yellow raincoat had a hood. At the front was a small, clear plastic window so I could see where I was going with the hood up.
Raindrops gathered on the window.
Some clung there; others slipped down the plastic.
Tap, patter, tap.
Above my head, the rain drummed on my coat.
Water ran through the little channels between the paddies.
Its gentle trickle mingled with the rain tapping on my coat.
The rainy-season sky was a little dark.
But I liked the air that day.
Raindrops touched the backs of my hands and my face, where they were uncovered by the coat.
The little drops landed on my skin and ran down.
Soon another drop would follow the same path.
It tickled.
It was a little chilly, but I wasn't cold.
If anything, it felt cool and refreshing.
I liked walking in the rain like that.
Though I walked alone, I was neither lonely nor afraid.
It was fun following the winding road, and I liked knowing my friends and teacher were waiting at the end of it.
I don't remember arriving at the nursery.
All that remains in my memory is a small child in a yellow raincoat, trotting between the rice paddies.
I loved rain through elementary school, middle school, and high school, too.
On rainy days, even when I had an umbrella, I deliberately left it closed.
I didn't mind the drops wetting my face, hair, and shoulders, or soaking my clothes.
More than damp or uncomfortable, I felt cool and refreshed.
Taking shelter from the rain felt like taking shelter from the world.
I loved the feeling of stepping, with my whole body, into a world of rain.
It had begun simply because I loved rain, but somewhere along the way, being out in it had become a pleasure all my own.
Years passed.
Now, when it rains, I no longer refuse an umbrella as I once did.
Sometimes I buy a raincoat, thinking of days when the rain will be heavy.
Once, I never even got to wear a new one. I threw it away while sorting my things before leaving for India.
It's a little funny, when I think about it.
For all my love of rain, I never managed to wear that new raincoat even once.
Has that part of me worn away a little with adulthood?
These days, when it rains, I want to find a café with big windows, drink coffee, and listen. Sometimes I still want to go outside and stand in it.
At those moments, I remember my younger self in a yellow raincoat, trotting between the rice paddies.
I still love rain.
Only the way I enjoy it, the way I play with it, has changed.
I preserve the days gone by in words and photographs.
Words by Yeowoon
© 2026 Yeowoon. All rights reserved.