Our Home in Bangalore (#2)

We have another nice home here in Bangalore and thought we would show you our latest digs. It's a two story house and from the outside it looks pretty plain, but the inside is more than enough to provide comfort and space to entertain and have company so come to visit us! Below is a picture of three of the guys (about eight students in total helped) who helped us lug and load our belongings. The truck was fairly small but we were able to make our move in just two loads which was a tribute to Marie's good packing and the fellow's good loading. The only damage we had during our move was a result of Marie's 'careful' packing. She thought she would take the glass doors out of the TV cabinet to keep it them from breaking during the move and in the process she dropped one of them and broke it. Our hats are off the fellows who took great care to help us and smiled throughout the process and to the girls who mopped floors in both the old and the new house and went home very tired as a result.

The living room and dining area all run together...all one open space which gives the downstairs area a much larger look.

Our kitchen...
And, of course our bedroom.

The amazing thing is that we also have another bedroom with bath and two large rooms that are currently empty because we don't have furniture for them. There's a lot of potential but we're waiting to see what God has in mind. Asyou can see, God has once again provided over and above what we could have thought to ask.

We are very thankful to be closer to the seminary and the stores. We can now take a brisk walk in the mornings to get our exercise in the cool of the day instead of walking in the heat with loads of groceries to carry.

Christmas Trip to Kerala
During our December break we spent a week in Kerala with friends from Bangalore. It was great to get out of the big city and see a little more of life in India. The first two or three days was spent at weddings. Our friend has a LOT of friends and it seems like every year around Christmas time his friends kids are getting married. So off we went to a couple of Muslim weddings. We were warmly welcomed everywhere we went and we ate and ate and ate. The family time, food and dancing are the main attractions at these special events.

The pictures included here are of Cheriyan and Asha (our friends and traveling companions) and ourselves with the bride and her parents, the men making the marriage agreement and the all-male audience witnessing the agreements made. The women were not allowed inside (including the bride) and were outside the tent looking over the walls. Then the bride and groom were presented and people made sure to have their pictures taken with them so they would be on record as having been there.




















After the festivities we drove about an hour to "Malampuzha Dam " and stopped at a lovely place where we spent three days. It was absolutely wonderful to relax, take early morning walks and eat good Indian food and we had serious thoughts of staying just one more day. But we would have had to switch rooms because the rooms we were in were already scheduled so we decided that since we had to pack anyway we should probably just return home, which was a good decision because Sam had lots of work to do to prepare for classes.


With all these unique experiences and the great fellowship with our friends, our Christmas flew by.

I'll close this blog with pictures of the beautiful Kerala scenery and a sunrise and sunset. This is just a meager taste of the beauty we observed on our morning and evening walks. What a delightful gift from God!