As much as I have enjoyed the beauty of being in “God’s on country”, and I really have. I am looking forward to getting to both Delhi, and Nepal.
I am looking forward to being somewhere I really know in Delhi and catching up with some friends. Asides from eating lots of good dosa (which I have) this is what this trip has been about for me. So I look forward to coming back to my old home, and seeing Kara, Victor and his family and Benjy. It will be nice too to show Andreana where I once lived, and how I once lived.
Then there is Nepal, and seeing Ben and his family. Ben along with Steve Bevis has been one of the key people in my ending up working for TEAR Australia. Ben seems like he is doing really exciting things with UMN in Nepal, and I am looking forward to hearing about them in more detail. It will also be great just to hang out again.
I am also excited to be introducing Andreana to the India train system this afternoon. With some of the availability issues we have ended up flying more then we had initial planned, but today we have a one remaining train leg. It will take us 14hours to reach Chennai, you can see the route here. Then we have about 12 hours to kill in Chennai before our flight onto Delhi. Any ideas on fun things to do for a few hours in Chennai?
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So here I am in Alleppey with Andreana, and I am enjoying myself. Just got off one of the famous beautiful Kerala houseboats, so am feeling fairly relaxed. The sights winding through the backwaters are most pleasant.
Things are going well, and I will blog in more detail soon. The keyboard and conditions in this Internet Cafe are not conducive to writing good blog posts.
However take a look at Andreana’s blog for more detailed insights.
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In KL this morning, fly out to Kochi in a few hours. Looking forward to getting back there.
Airasia were no worse then most of the airlines I’ve flown with. However having to buy bottled water makes you think twice about hydration which isn’t great.
KL feels quite familiar, it helps to be staying in a hotel I’ve stayed in before. Had a nice buffet breakfast this morning.
Now to try and get my global roaming working. Ah just looked at Optus’ website, apparently I had to call a number before I left. Hmmm.
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Sitting at Melbourne Airport waiting with the lovely Andreana for our flight to KL.
It’s been a long time since I was last in India, and I am looking forward to my return. Will be nice to see some prettier places this time. It will be also nice to revisit Delhi, and some old friends.
I wonder also what India has for me this time. Will I be challenged to come back and live, will I get sick and hate it, or will it just be a wonderful trip.
The other thing I am wondering is how my partner Andreana will find the experience. I am hoping it will be good, and we will travel well together.
Anyway, going to go get some bottled water (more on that soon).
Next stop KL.
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Had a TEAR event at work tonight, and the quality of the interactions I had with some of the people reminded me about how some people referred to it as a TEAR family.
In other news, I am finding Afghanistan the subject of tonight fascinating at the moment. I have had the privilege this week of provide both technical support, and be part of some strategic conversations with someone visiting from one our partners over there. It is a shame one can’t just jump on and plane and visit Kabul.
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TEAR’s partners are working in a whole bunch of areas hit by the recent set of disasters. For more read here.
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After years of resisting getting into Leonard Cohen, today I finally cracked after listening to him with someone, I decided to buy an album tonight. I got Live in London, which is sounding pretty damn good.
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I have been challenged to get more into the discipline of blogging more. So here is a little update on life.
My life is currently filled with lots of exciting things at various stages of completion.
I am very close to signing a very significant deal at work. It has been nine months work getting the project to this stage, involving quotes from numerous vendors and it’s been hard work selecting just one vendor. My excitement about starting the project is dampened by how much work I know the project will require before it is completed.
I’m excited about my trip with Sam to India and Nepal in January it will be great to go back to India and be in a country that changed me so much. Should get to go and visit some TEAR projects, as well as old friends while on our “holiday”. I am so turning into my Dad, combining work with holidays.
I’m doing a fair bit more staff training now, which I like. I’ve recently organised to spend an hour doing some extra geeky training for our web guy. It should be good. I’m pretty sure I’ll learn a lot in the process.
There are lots of other exciting things happening to, but they are in the early stages. I would like to write about a few of them, but that would risk them failing before they even got off the ground.
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Last week we had staff conference at TEAR. It was a pretty intense week, filled with good learning. I did a presentation that was well received. In fact the way I react to the praise and gratefulness I receive from staff is somewhat of a paradox to me. A mixture of pride, humility and a determination to do better are stirred within me.
Other interesting talks included a deconstruction of Mark Driscoll and his views on women, a theology of development from a Kenyan perspective, a discussion on the importance of discipleship and our role as an organisation in journeying with people. Heart breaking were some of the stories from the countries where our partners work. They are such hard places. Hope filling though was the quality of the people that were in the room, and the stories of the hard work put in by our partners overseas..
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Very tempted to buy a Google Android development board, to realise one of my geek dreams:
“Creating my own mobile phone”
Pretty sure it would be illegal to use it in Australia though…
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