Sunday, December 23, 2012

Double-Oh, Tea, Why?

As some of you may know, I spent 9 days total traveling across Southeast India to a small tourist community called Ooty, in the northern part of Tamil Nadu. I went there to visit my dear dear friend, Katy Stiffler, as she is in India right now on her own crazy adventure. To say that this trip was a blessing and a half would undermine it completely. It was a wonderful, beautiful, ridiculous experience that I hope to be able to put into words.

I left here, in Andhra Pradesh, Tuesday, Dec 11, to Chennai, Tamil Nadu. Chennai is kind of like the capitol of SE India, and is a major point of commerce and travel. I would be taking my overnight bus to Ooty from there. I was almost late to my due to some pretty crazy traffic, and got to it literally as it was pulling out of the station. I was all but thrown on, handing off my luggage to the guy to put it in the back of the bus, and finding my seat as we pull out onto the busy street. It was definitely a bit of relief as well, considering I made the bus and was now on my way to see a good friend in a completely different part of India! Needless to say, I was a little more than excited!

I was able to get a little bit of sleep on the bus, which was both nice and unexpected. I usually don't sleep too well on buses, and I wasn't overly tired when the trip started, but it all worked out for me. I woke up about halfway up the mountain. Ooty is something like 8,000 ft in elevation, so yes, we had to go up the mountain to get there. It's kind of tucked away in between hills, and is quite unassuming at first. I got off the bus and called Katy. I was about twenty mins earlier than expected, so of course, Katy wasn't quite ready to get me. I took an auto (a rickshaw) from the bus station up to the house they she and her roommate, Morgan, stay at, the Farley Guest House. It took a little while to find an auto driver who knew where to go, which I later found out to be interesting because almost all of them know where it is! But after a few tries, I found one, and we made our way from town up the big hill that leads to Farley. As we rounded the corner to the driveway, Morgan (Katy's roommate, a missionary from GA) met me, hopped in, and rode the rest of the way up, which is no small distance! lol I was very glad to meet Morgan because one, she seemed very nice and excited about life, and two, because she was someone who knew who I was and could help me out a ton! We got to the driveway, I got my things to my room, and we went to the kitchen when Katy finally arrived to Farley. She met us in the kitchen, and we immediately hugged for a good minute, excited to see one another, and that our visiting each other was actually happening!

The rest of the day was spent with Katy and Morgan seeing some stuff in the town, and going around with Morgan as she was leaving the next day for home! We spent a couple of hours out on the front lawn (yeah, they have lawns in Ooty...lol) playing and singing worship in the gorgeous sunshine. It was kind of breathtaking, I'll be honest. It was even more beautiful to me because I got to sing with other people for a change, as both Katy and Morgan joined me and kept spitting out requests for us to sing. Morgan, it turns out, has a beautiful voice and some amazing harmonies, which was an unexpected blessing for me. It had been quite some time since I sang with someone, let alone with someone who was a talented singer! Thanks, Morgan!

The next day, we said our goodbyes to Morgan, not without their fair share of smiles and tears, and began talking about what the rest of my trip could/would look like. It turns out, I was volunteered to help lead worship for their Sunday service, which I was more than happy to do! That day, a local Brit named Jack came to the house, and we practiced out a set that we would play on Sunday. It went really well.  Katy and I then went to dinner at Dominos (yeah, they have that too...this place is WAY different than I'm used to! lol) and just sat and talked for a couple of hours. It was awesome. We caught up on a lot of things, and shared war stories from our respective missions. It still stands as one of the major highlights.

To help me not write a novel about everything that happened, I'm going to kind of cover the rest of the highlights in a montage fashion lol- Friday night I got to share a little bit about what God has been doing in my life, and what I'm doing in India with a group of Australians who were staying at Farley at the same time. They were an all girls high school from Queensland, and they and their teachers were some pretty awesome people. Saturday I joined Katy at her horse therapy session at the place the she works the most. It was almost overwhelming how awesome it was to hold these beautiful kids as they took pony rides, and did small physical stretches to help with balance and coordination. Sunday we went to church. I helped lead worship, and it honestly went better than any of the three of us could have anticipated. I then was able to sit in church for the first time since coming to India. Since I work with a ministry that builds and support churches, generally I'm the one preaching! It was nice to sit and listen to a sermon. And then there's Monday. Monday no doubt stands as the highlight of the trip, and probably the best day outside of ministry that I've spent here in India so far. We went back up to the Malstead's house (where Katy works with the horses) for a half-day of work, and a half-day of fun. The Freedom Firm, the ministry she is working with, was having their annual Christmas party there. Since I'm not a ton of help in the way of barn chores, I was put to work in the kitchen, a place I can be of some pretty good use! ;) I made a guac, a super tasty salsa, and a spinach cheese dip, along with helping finalize the flavors on a couple other dishes. Mala, the lady who lives there and runs Leg-Up, the horse therapy part of Freedom Firm, could not stop telling me thank you for my help. That was really cool. Then the party. We ate, played games, including Viking Dragon Fire (yeah!) and a White Elephant Gift exchange, both of which I was fortunate enough to lead. It was super fun! Katy and I were the last two to leave, which seemed appropriate as we were the first two to arrive lol and made our way back to Farley. It was an incredibly breathtaking sunset, so we sat at the bottom of the driveway and just looked on in awe. We spent some time in scripture, and then prayer, and just sat there taking it all in. God was/is doing so much, and He overwhelmed us both with His love and peace at this moment. I'm not gonna lie, I definitely cried. It was too much, how could I not!? The rest of the my days there were spent enjoying time to myself, often reading and playing worship, and then hanging out with Katy. We watched movies, sat and talked, and just enjoyed hanging out. It was really great. I also got to give Katy a little cooking lesson as she made a homemade Spanish Rice, which she knocked right out of the park! So good! I then left on the bus Thursday night, not before saying a long goodbye with a hug that neither one of us seemed to want to let go of. If not for the bus driver's impatience, we might have held on to the hug all night. It was the first time either one of us had seen anyone we were familiar with, that we were good friends with, and it was just so cool for us both.

I can't thank Katy enough for having me out to Ooty to see all that she's been doing, and to enjoy a time of rest and renewal. It was something I needed, without even realizing it. I've been so busy with the incredible ministry here, that I hadn't taken that simple time to sit with Him for a little while. It was great to be able to do that in such a beautiful place as Ooty, and with some great old friends, and a couple new ones! Special thanks to Morgan and Katy for all the you did to help my trip to be what it was, nothing short of amazing.

I love you all and can't wait to share with you what else God is doing here in India! Only a couple more days until the court team, my team, gets here!! I am ridiculously excited, I'll tell you that!!!! lol Talk to you all soon! Thanks! Bye.

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