Drunken Mystic

God put it on my heart to do a different missions trip this year, one more speaking and sharing ministry oriented. I wasn’t sure what that would look like, but I prayed about it and waited for God to open doors. I recieved some contacts through Alice Trammell. Many people from around the world have been blessed by Larry Trammell’s articles or ministry and desire to have a visit from him. He is gone to be with the Lord, now, but they want a visit from Alice or someone else through Ablaze Ministries. I contacted the one the Lord directed me to, which was Pastor Daniel with Voice of Gospel ministries. I was continually drawn to his ministry. After contacting him, he shared that there had been a prophecy the week before during worship that God was sending a team from another country to minister in India. This was further confirmation, and so we began to put a trip together.

I wanted to bring a few teachers and a small number of students, but also only wanted what God had planned. So even though many were interested in the trip, the team that ended up going consisted of myself, Becca and Micah Mooney, Becca Teat (ICS music teacher), Emily Wiltshire (ICS high school English), Laura Forner (ICS 4th grade) and Becky Hennessy (9th grade ICS student). Of the handful of students that I spoke with, Becky was the only one who really felt called to go. So I was the only man with five young women and a baby. God was going to do something interesting.

Alice came in March to visit me and Becca and Micah, and we used some of her time here to get her acquainted with those going on the trip who did not know her. It was a blessing to have her and for the community here to get to know her a little bit. We took one afternoon and prayed together with Alice.

We got started pretty early on Saturday, April 8. We met the bus around 4:30am. It was a chartered bus that the Thai trip put together and we tagged along. The bus pulled out around 5am and got to the airport in record time, by just after 6am.

Our flight was delayed two hours, so we had a little more ofa wait when we got to the airport. This wasn’t that big of a deal since we had a long 6hr layover in Singapore ahead of us. As an added bonus, however, Singapore Airlines gave us a voucher of 72,000 won to use at the airport to buy food (12,000 each). Since they gave it to us as one voucher, we had to use it all at one place and they don’t give change. We used the 72,000 won at Subway (about $72) for 6 people. We “bought” a couple extra drinks and some granola bars to use up the voucher. We each got a footlong sandwich and saved half for the plane, which was a blessing for me since I hate airplane food. What a blessing!

Singapore Airlines rocks! I have been on several different airlines over the years, but Singapore is the best by far. In fact, I would say the Asian airlines are better than any American airline, and Singapore is the best of those. Each seat in Economy class had their own personal screen with the choices of thirty movies, thirty or forty TV shows and fifty full albums that you could choose from or make your own playlist out of whatever you wanted. They also had arcade games. I watched Fun with Dick and Jane and Ice Harvest with John Cusack on the plane.

They also gave Micah a little stuffed animal and gave us a menu of baby food. The service was excellent, as it normally is on an Asian flight with an Asian crew.

Singapore Airport rocks, too! Its definitely the best airport I’ve ever been in, as well. There is a great variety of things to do and all pretty affordable. Its pretty well designed, although it took us a little exploration to get to the main foodcourt area. They have a really cool garden area in the main terminal area with nice shops. Upstairs there was a free movie theater and places to sleep or shower or even exercise, but those cost money. The restaurants are very diverse and not that expensive at all. There was also free internet for about 15 minutes at a time. I’ll take a layover in Singapore anytime.

Becca and I had some freshly squeezed pineapple juice. Micah enjoyed the Singapore Airport if only because he was finally free to get down and crawl around and play!

We got on our flight to Cochin, India 8:15pm Singapore time. It was about a 4hr flight from Singapore to Cochin in Southern India, and I slept about 3 of them. I was out.

We arrived in Cochin just about 10pm India time. Micah slept most of the flight, as well.

Cochin airport is small but fairly new, so it was pretty nice. We filled out some immigration paperwork and got in line to get through immigration. Just beyond immigration was a metal detector at a security checkpoint. After getting through immigration, we were the last passengers through, and the security guard was headed down the escalator, telling us to come on through as if he didn’t care anymore. It was late and he was done for the night!

We made our way downstairs to pick up our luggage, which was all there, praise the Lord, and we could see Pastor Daniel on the other side of customs, smiling and waving at us. Pastor Daniel is a middle aged Indian man with balding grey and black hair. He also has a beard and mustache. He is average height and stocky, stout. He and I embraced and I introduced the rest of the team.
Pastor Daniel had hired a large air conditioned van for the ride up to Trichur. It was fairly warm and humid as we got out of the airport. We could see palm trees and lots of vegetation through the dark night.

Driving up in the van was very interesting. Trichur is about an hour north of Cochin, and it was mostly 2-lane highways that were still very busy at night. There are lots of slower vehicles like scooters and big trucks, so passing is common, and if there was room for three vehicles wide, then you passed whether or not traffic was coming. Seeing a bus coming at you head on was a common experience. Very Asian mentality. There was lots of communication, as well, between drivers with the horn and flashing high beams. It seemed as if it were its own language.

We passed many things on the way, but the funniest were either the big advertisement for a marble manufacturer that featured Hulk Hogan or a hotel called Hotel Runs. Hotel Runs. In India. Pretty funny. We got a picture later.

I saw a hammer and sickle sign and asked about the Communist Party in India. Pastor Daniel said that the Communist Party is very supportive of the Christian community in the state of Kerala because the Christians are seen as a minority and more humanitarian towards the poor. Either way I found it rather odd.

Along the way I was told I was speaking in the morning, which I had suspected even though I had not been told. Pastor Daniel then asked, “what’s your program?” I explained I would say whatever the Spirit had on my heart, which was nothing at the moment but would be in the morning.

We arrived at our hotel, Trichur Towers, about midnight. We checked in, got to our rooms, then switched them around to accomodate everyone. We were told about the plan for the morning, and Pastor Daniel prayed for us. Becca and I set up the Pack n’ Play for Micah, Becca fed him, and we all went to bed!

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 16th, 2006 at 8:03 pm and is filed under trichur india trip series. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.