| In a nation with less than one percent land
and over 99 percent sea, the weather obviously
plays a significant role in day-to-day life.
For a long time Maldivians have organized
their lives based on a system on nakaiy. Each
nakaiy is 13 or 14 days long and is divided
into two seasons; iruvai northest monsoon
and hulhangu south west monsoon. The nakaiy
calendar is still used to determine such things
as the best time for fishing, travel or planting
crops.
The Maldives has a tropical climate with
warm temperatures year round and a great
deal of sunshine. The warm tropical climate
results in relatively minor variations in
daily temperature throughout the year. The
hottest month on average is April and the
coolest, December. The weather is determined
largely by the monsoons.
There is a significant variation in the
monthly rainfall levels. February is the
driest with January to April being relatively
dry, May and October records the highest
average monthly rainfall. The southwest
monsoon or hulhangu from May to September
is the wet season. Rough seas and strong
winds are common during this period. The
northeast monsoon iruvai falls between December
to April. This is a period of clear skies,
lower humidity and very little rain. The
Maldives is in the equatorial belt and therefore
severe storms and cyclones are extremely
rare events. However the Nationality is
affected whenever cyclones form in the Bay
of Bengal or the Arabian Sea. The spiraling
clouds of the weather systems appear over
the Maldives causing spells of rain.
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