There were only two dubious moments on our OU Adventure, when the outcome unquestionably failed to meet the expectation. One of these you already know about (assuming you have been reading these articles all along), the decision to do our morning prayers on the top deck of a small boat in the Arabian Sea. The second one also seemed like a good idea at the time, but it turned out to be the absolute low point of our trip. Unfortunately it came the day after the high point, our visit to the former-Christian community in Erode, sort of like going from the sublime to the abysmal.

The original plan had been to drive to the Coimbatore airport and take a charter flight to Cochin, one hour away. But… by the time we would ride to the airport, go through security, wait to board the plane, disembark at the other end, find our luggage, get back on another bus, and ride to our hotel, we might as well just stay on the first bus and head up the new highway to Cochin – about a four hour journey. If we were to do that, we could stop along the way at a place with elephants. As I said, sounded like a reasonable plan, better than going through the rigmarole at the airport any more than was absolutely necessary. Plus, elephants being such a big feature of the Indian landscape, it sort of fit into the scheme of things. Continue reading →

Imagine this happening to you: You’re standing in a throng of people, and suddenly they are all giving you a Standing “O.” “Wait a cotton-picking minute,” you think, “What have I done deserve this? The guy on my left, and the lady on my right, maybe they’ve done something special. But me, I haven’t done diddley-squat.” Continue reading →