This weekend saw Guangdong province flung into an apocalyptic, hoary frost, the likes of which had never… Okay that’s a bit dramatic. But as we so often like to brag to our northern neighbors that South China is a land of balmy breezes and swaying palm trees, the cold weather over the weekend really did come as quite a shock to some of us.
If you also find yourself feeling a little caught off guard by the sudden cold snap, there’s a good reason for that. Temperatures in Guangzhou dropped to a teeth-chattering 6 degrees Celsius early Monday, with authorities issuing 100 (gasp!) ‘yellow level’ cold weather warnings across the province.
To give you a sense of how unusual this weather is for this time year, average Guangzhou temps for December hover around the 15-degree mark.
Snow and frost in Qingyuan’s Lian county produced striking images of icicles and snowmen more reminiscent of a midwinter Manchurian forest than hillside in rural Guangdong. But hey, such is life. Stereotypes are shattered. Climates are chaotic. Cantonese men pose shirtless amid frozen pines. Life goes on.
The cold weather looks poised to stick around in Guangzhou throughout the week, with overnight lows of 7 and 8 degrees forecasted into Thursday night. The weekend will bring relief with temperatures climbing mercifully back into the relatively humane 13 to 20-degree Celsius range.
Shenzhen, meanwhile, will miss the worst of the cold, with overnight lows of 9 throughout the week rising to downright tropical highs (for December, anyway) of 24 degrees over the weekend.
[Images via QQ’s 粤行记]
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