@jasmine: Also, in the Russian translation of Narnia, Calormen is refered to as "Tarkhinstan", mostly likely in refrence to "Tarkaan".

Jasmine, it is nice to meet you. Have you been using a Russian translation of the Narnian Chronicles? I was intrigued that Calormen would be Tarkhinistan in Russian when other languages would most likely stick to some version of Calormen. But I think Russian would not have any trouble using "loan" terms from Turkish, where Aslan means lion, Tash does mean a stone, & I found this Wikipedia entry  which may very well explain Tarkaans as well. I've actually been to Istanbul, as well as to Troy, Efes, (Ephesus), old Pergamum & Gelibolu (Gallipoli), in 2015, where the WW1 ANZAC Centenary of 1915 was staged.  Once Istanbul was Constantinople, the capital of what used to be the Eastern Roman, or Byzantine Empire, and which was originally called Byzantium. I suppose Turkic languages, related to others spoken in the once Russian "Stans", where there were once exotic, & little-known places like Soghdiana & Khorasam would also be related to Turkish, itself. 

Yes, calormenwarrior, (nice to meet you, too), I can well believe that Calormen comes from the Latin term for "heat" The old imperial term for Kilojoules was calories after all. Latin is the stem language for all "Romance" languages, like Spanish, Portuguese, French, Italian, Romanian, etc. 

But that does not explain Caledonia, which is the Latin term for Scotland, just as Hispania was the Latin term for Spain, & Lusitania was an area now called Portugal. The Romans called the original inhabitants of Scotland, Picts or the Painted people, who liked to daub their bodies with woad, just as the Maoris are famous for wearing tattoos. There was an actual tribe there called the Caledonii, also related to the Picts, but I suspect those Romans sent to Hadrian's Wall and the more Northern Antonine Wall, might have only called it a "hot" place, rather sarcastically. As an Aussie, Scotland is not really my idea of "hot".  

So far since Christmas, it is back to summer down here, but very muggy. We had quite cold weather in Spring even compared to last year, let alone in 2019. But there is a La Niña effect in the South Pacific, & there is a monsoon effect in Queensland most likely, since they have been getting flooding around Maryborough.

How is summer treating Brazil?

Posted by: @waggawerewolf27

Jasmine, it is nice to meet you. Have you been using a Russian translation of the Narnian Chronicles? I was intrigued that Calormen would be Tarkhinistan in Russian when other languages would most likely stick to some version of Calormen. But I think Russian would not have any trouble using "loan" terms from Turkish, where Aslan means lion, Tash does mean a stone, & I found this Wikipedia entry  which may very well explain Tarkaans as well.

No, I haven't. I read trivia online. And I've read the Wikipedia entry about "Tarkhan", which is spelled differently than Tarkaan. "Khan" is actually a hindu word for "king". Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book has a tiger named Shere Khan, and his name actually means, "Tiger King". How does the "tar" come into play in the word, I honestly don't know. I guess it's no wondered that the upper class society in Calormen, the Tarkaans and Tarkheenas, tended to be self-indulgent people (you can see it throughout The Horse And His Boy with Anradin and Lasaraleen and even Aravis comes from a family of Tarkaans and Tarkheenas. And Rishda was no different in The Last Battle. And Emeth comes from a family of Tarkaans, being the seventh son of Harpha Tarkaan, though I don't know if he and is his brothers were ever referred to as Tarkaans.

Anyhow, we are having cold weather in the Northern Hemisphere. It's been freezing some, but not raining. We even had to keep our faucets running at night to keep the pipes from freezing.

Mod note: Wow, what a conversation! Regarding this, however, we need to stick to Weather in this topic. Maybe there is a thread in one of the Narnia sections where you can continue the discussion. Or, there is always the good ol' Town Square in Ditto Town. Thanks, all!

After plenty of cool weather of late, today's high was a balmy 38F/3C, with plenty of melting. That was not far off the daily record of 44F/7C.

@waggawerewolf27 Nice to meet you too. I forgot to talk about the La Niña! This phenomenon is also affecting Brazil. It rained a lot in the past few weeks and, unfortunately, some cities suffered floods because of it last week 🙁 Now the situation is getting well-handled, but it caused a considerable amount of damages to houses... people of different states are helping with donations. This week in my city it didn't rain, but it's still raining a lot in the Southern states. 

  Nice question about "Caledonia", I didn't know Scotland had this Latin name. I searched about it and I found that "Caledonii" comes from Celtic roots and was originated from kal ("hard)" and φēdo ("feet"), once this tribe was referred as "people with hard feet" for being resistant; other source suggests that it comes from caled, a word from the Welsh language (a Celtic language from Wales) that means "hard", because of the rocky land. 

Posted by: @calormenwarrior

I myself prefer the winter,

You are not alone here!

Posted by: @calormenwarrior

Fun fact: "heat" in Spanish and Portuguese (which is the language we speak here in Brazil) is "calor", just like the "Calormen" Lewis used in Narnia!

Now, that is cool (figuratively-speaking )!

And welcome to the Weather thread, @calormenwarrior! Sorry to hear of the floods in some Brazilian cities. Are these mostly in low-lying areas, I'm thinking?

We are yoyo-ing into January. For awhile it was very cold, which is nice, because when moisture leaves the air, colder temps do not feel as bone-chilling as does around freezing. If that makes sense. It feels so much raw-er with precipitation around 0°C than at a dry -15 or -20. These past couple of days have been hovering around freezing. We still have snow most places, which is always very picturesque. Tomorrow we are heading into a deep freeze again, with clear skies for Saturday and Sunday, then potentially a fair bit of snow falling Sunday night overnight into Monday.  

Posted by: @waggawerewolf27

Istanbul was Constantinople

... now it's Istanbul, not Constantinople... (those who know the song will get it)

I've been intrigued over whether the weather here in the North of England is any different from the South, where I lived for nearly 10 years before I moved to Cheshire last July. So far, no hugely noticeable differences. It's been coldish but not exceptionally so for the past few weeks — down to freezing some nights, but only two short spates of snow, one late last year and one at the start of this week, not lasting more than a day in either case. Quite a lot of rain (typical for the UK!), but the last couple of days we've had beautiful winter sunshine. I'm looking forward to spring — my favourite season, especially when the bluebells start flowering.  

@jo Thank you! And yeah, low-lying areas and mainly neighborhoods with bad urban planning 🙁 

  Today it rained a bit in the morning. It's afternoon at the moment, and the temperature went down a little; the winds are sort of cold and the sky is cloudy. A good relief because yesterday it was very hot! 

I get that reference, @Courtenay. 😉

It's snowing here in the Twin Cities; we're right on the edge of a rather large system that's dropping snow at high rates (over 1 inch/25mm per hour) just a few hours southwest of here. Those areas could exceed 10 inches (255mm) of total accumulation, while we're expecting 2-6 inches (50-150mm)  around here (the variation is due to the rapid drop off of storm strength; western Wisconsin may only get a dusting).

This is due to a powerful high pressure system over southwest Ontario and Lake Superior, pushing the storm to the south. It'll move down toward the Gulf of Mexico rather than moving west to east as these storms usually do.

Typical January cold will follow, with temps dropping well below 0F/-17C north of here over the next few days.

Posted by: @stargazer

Typical January cold will follow, with temps dropping well below 0F/-17C north of here over the next few days.

In other words, it's cold beyond what this Aussie-turned-adopted-Brit can imagine. Where I grew up, a day that doesn't go as high as 12C is considered "freezing". And it really DOES feel cold when you're used to much higher temperatures than that. Since I moved to the UK 10 years ago, I've only once been back to Australia in winter, one time in August when I went for my grandmother's 100th birthday — and coming straight from a genuinely quite hot British summer into the midst of lashing rain and howling winds, I realised I'd forgotten how (comparatively) cold and downright miserable Melbourne winters can get. Normally when I go back, I go early in the year, when it's summer!! (And then I'm reminded that the British summers that feel so genuinely hot after a cold(ish) British winter aren't REALLY hot after all... )

@calormenwarrior, my parents visited Brazil about 10 years ago, and they talked about how the heat wasn't as bad as they thought it would be, but the humidity was pretty brutal. Brazil is a pretty big country, so I have no idea if that's how it is where you live or not? 

I know I prefer the warmer weather to the colder weather, but the older I get, the less and less I'm tolerating the extreme heat well.  

We just had a cold front blow in about an hour ago or so. My kiddos were out playing earlier today, but it's not at all pleasant outside now. We may get up to an inch of snow by the end of tomorrow. I hear this storm is being referred to as a Saskatchewan Screamer?  

@fantasia I live in the Northeast region of Brazil, which naturally has a drier climate; however, in the rest of the country there's really much humidity (mainly in the North, because of the Amazon forest).

  Saskatchewan Screamer is a pretty creative name  

  Today it rained during dawn, and the temperature throughout the day has been pleasant. At the moment, it's reaching 28°C/82°F.

There is a tsaumni warning at the Oregon coast in Florence. One year, my dad actually said "tsaumni" wrong. My mom explained it is the same how "czar" is spelled.

@courtenay I was in Manchester 4 years ago, when the winter was cold, but the storm known as the Beast fron the East really froze the North in ? early March? Snow closed rail and travel for days in some places.

@Courtenay, while it's cold here, I imagine the summer heat Down Under would be more than this old polar bear could handle. 🙂

And having spent some winter time in Seattle, I can certainly agree that damp, windy cold is more unpleasant than the (usually) dry cold we get here, even if the air temperature is significantly higher there than it is here.

@fantasia, I had to google "Saskatchewan Screamer." I'm familiar with Alberta Clippers, and apparently they are a similar type of storm, with the name indicating the Canadian province they come from. (Alberta Clippers tend to be fast-moving, fairly dry storms, only dropping a few inches of snow, followed by a blast of Arctic air).

Have you seen the satellite pictures of this morning's Pacific volcano eruption? Astonishing! There's also a video of the tsunami washing into the Tonga capital of Nuku'alofa, but fortunately at that time no casualties were reported.

And amazingly enough, the eruption was strong enough to be measured (by minute variations in barometric pressure) at weather reporting stations here in the US - even here in the Twin Cities, over 6700 miles (10,780km) from the site. It's possible its pressure wave may travel around the world.