Longest walk

I was invited to join 3 members of the German team for a walk this afternoon and we went further than I had been before which took us through a little village just around the corner. 

These girls were filling their water buckets and carrying them off on their shoulders.  They are obviously heavy, but I was still surprised the physically smaller one had to put her pot down to help the other girl. 

As we walked through the village there was an auto rickshaw left unattended with bags of rice or grain of some kind stacked in the back that the chickens decided to help themselves to.

I  really like the way this wall looked!  It feels kind of like it belongs in the Secret Garden or something.

We had an entourage through the village that wanted to know our names and where we were from.  As we made it through the village, reentered and left again they were yelling "Hi America!" and "Bye America!" even though the majority of our walking group was German!!! 

We walked until we could better see the huge temple that is on a mountain back there, but I was told we were still quite a ways from it. 

We enjoyed a nice little shower as we started back and this was the way the sky looked about halfway home.

What a great way to spend a Sunday afternoon!!!

Holiday

Since today was a holiday from school and Prabhudas got called to Vijayawada for a meeting, he invited me along for the ride.  After his meeting, during which I got to sit in a side room to read and listen to music, we went to a great little coffee shop for a drink and I enjoyed a great cup of hot chocolate while he had tea.  We picked up "How to Train Your Dragon" for the kids at the Children's Home and headed off on an errand.  He and I sat in the car and talked while the driver and office guy had a piece of equipment repaired at an electronics shop.  We went to lunch at the Spice Inn again, but Prabhudas specifically gave instructions for it to not be spicy - and it wasn't even a little bit...so he ordered some sauce with a little spice to it!  Because it is a holiday, we stopped to pick up fireworks for the kids to enjoy tonight and again, had a great conversation as we sat in the car (the price of anything automatically goes up if I'm around so it's best if I stay out of sight). 

Tonight was a lot of fun and craziness as the children enjoyed sparklers and noise makers with a few fireworks that shot up into the air.  The smoke and noise was pretty intense so I didn't stay out the whole time, but I did get some pretty good pictures. 

In the beginning...

Today was our first day to do Bible class!!!  We had agreed to do Bible on Fridays, but for many weeks, it just never worked out.  So FINALLY, I checked at the beginning of the week to make sure this Friday would work out and was informed that Friday was a holiday and we were going to be closed!  Incredibly thankful I'd asked, we were able to make plans to have Bible today!  We joined the classes together after the break and started at the beginning with creation.  I picked up the Children's Bible in Hyderabad last month and think it will be a great tool to help communicate to these precious little ones!  Next week, we'll introduce sin and then focus on Jesus my last several weeks here. 

Women's meeting

I went to the women's meeting today with Ruth and the two ladies from Germany.  I shared greetings and then they each spoke.  After we left, we were told there were 50 women crammed into the little room and 20 more sitting outside.  It started raining right at the end and some of the ladies outside made their way in to the already crowded room while many others went running for cover!  This was the second week in a row that women in this particular group decided to stay home from working in the fields in order to come for the meeting!!!  I also found out today that there is usually a large women's meeting at the church the first Wednesday of every month so there were a few ladies that came for that not realizing it had been cancelled due to the pastor's conference that is going on this week with the pastors from Germany teaching.

Rain, rain...

I have been completely enjoying all the rain we've been having!!!  It has kept the temperatures quite comfortable in my opinion, though I have seen a few sweat shirts, a pair of ear muffs and the fans had to be turned off in church yesterday so I don't think I'd get much agreement around here.  The clouds have been absolutely beautiful the last several days even when it wasn't raining.  I have made sure to step out every time the rain has started to fall - at least for a minute or two!!! 

However, I just recently learned that it is not good for the people of India, and find I must begin praying for it to stop!  It is ruining crops (though not in our area as the fields were planted later here) and has destroyed houses in the region.  There are cyclones that keep hitting the coast which is causing the abundance of rain and is really making a mess of things for many people.  So I will gladly say good-bye to these rainy days and pray for those already effected by this weather.

Just because...

Pictures from the last couple days as I've enjoyed being out in the cooler weather! 

Sunset



Sunrise on a cloudy morning



Sunrise on a cloudy morning



Ruth's rose



Ruth's rose

 

Ruth's rose after some rain

Storm clouds



Grace - in every sense of the word!

We had an awesome afternoon rain that I just had to be in the middle of so I went to the roof as the storm was coming in! It was incredible!!! Beautiful clouds! The rain started and intensified at just the right moments as I was worshipping! Perfect!!!!

Then I had to go down the stairs...

These cement steps get really slick when wet and my shoes have NO traction on them! So I was taking it slow and stopped to talk to Ruth for a minute (she was on her way up to their house as I was on my way down to my room so we paused a moment just a few steps below their level). We said our good-byes and she headed into the house. I started down, again being careful, but it was no use. My feet went sliding right out from under me!!!

Thankfully, I managed to get both hands on the railing with a strong enough grip to keep from hitting the stairs and sliding to the next landing down. I sat on the step for a split second thinking first, "did that really just happen?" followed quickly by, "did anyone see that?" before continuing my way down, this time making it down without incident.