In Delhi

It's Friday afternoon and I've arrived in Delhi. Today has been a good day of travel, being met by Arvind, and getting settled in his home. It's good to finally be here. We've already had plenty to talk about . . . I'm sure he's going to get tired of my millions of questions. It's the way I always enter a new area. I'm so curious to learn about everything. So, pray that I'll ask all the right questions and the Lord will direct our conversations.

Though today was uneventful, yesterday was quite a different story. Typically the flight from Kunming, China, to Bangkok was uneventful and quite routine. Yesterday was anything but typical. I arrived at the airport for my 3:20 flight to discover the time had been changed to 5:00. We boarded the plane, got settled in. And sat. And sat. And sat. Finally we were told that we would have to wait for the wind to change directions before we could take off. That was a new one to me. So we sat on the tarmac for more than 2 hours. We finally took off. En route to Bangkok, the pilot announced we would be making an unscheduled landing in Chiangmai, Thailand, to drop off the 100 or so passengers who would otherwise miss their connecting flight to Chiangmai out of Bangkok. We all had to disembark, go through immigration, get back on the plane and continue on to Bangkok. We finally landed just after 10:00 and were put on a bus to take us to the terminal. The bus dropped us off at the international terminal, and we followed all their instructions and wound up at immigration. That's where things got really messy. We had already cleard immigration, so the officials didn't know what to do with us. The airline personnel were confused. The passengers were all very tired, impatient, and getting very testy. Anyone who spoke Thai was yelling by now (which is very unusual in Thailand---you NEVER raise your voice). After a half hour or so, they finally figured out where our luggage was and what to do with us. We passed through a special screening area, and out into the baggage claim. Just after I left the holding area, I heard very loud yelling. Lots of it. It sounded like a riot. The next thing I knew, Thai police were charging past me and heading into the holding area. I could only think, "Great, I made it out before the riot started." I grabbed my bag and got out as quickly as possible. Normally, my curiosity would have gotten the better of me and I would have watched. Not this time. I finally got to the hotel, checked into my and looked at the clock. 11:20. I was supposed to have been here 7 hours ago. I had a 4:30 wake up call . . . just five hours away.

So, an uneventful day of travel was wonderful in a virtually empty plane. I'm looking forward to getting to know Delhi, seeing some of India, meeting other people around here, and seeking the Lord's plan and purpose for us as a church and for the people here. Keep praying. I'm grateful to be here and ready for all the Lord brings my way.