In the time I have spent with missionaries, I noticed an interesting phenomenon: New missionaries often feel disoriented until a newer group of missionaries show up. The older group often surprise themselves realizing how much they have learned and adapted. Such was the case when our professor from the U.S. came to visit.
We flew to Hyderabad to meet him and landed after circling the city a few times. We met him at the Quality Inn and had plenty of chances to share stories, vent our frustrations, and try to answer his questions.
The next morning Mr. Madu came and picked us up in a taxi. We headed towards Nagarjunakonda, an island Buddhist museum about 150 km away. The ride there was awesome, the country side of Andrah Pradesh looked a lot like Arizona for a while, but would change as we made our way. It took us a while to get Madu out of tape recorder mode, but once we did, we asked questions about all the stuff we wanted to know. He managed to answer all our questions very diplomatically (he's a government licensed tour guide). We came back to our hotel that night exhausted and salty from all the sweating. Turns out that everywhere but Bangalore is really hot.
Sunday, we found a branch and listened to a very uplifting testimony meeting. It is amazing how similar church is when outside is like another world. We ate that evening at a place called 'Paradise', which had some fabulous Indian food.
Monday we went to see some of the local sights including the Salar Jung Museum, Charminar, and Golkonda Fort. We flew back to Bangalore Monday night feeling like we had a great Hyderabad experience.
The next few days our professor had a lot of business to do. He visited us at work and met with our supervisors, he met with other companies and universities, and most importantly, he helped stabilize my food situation by taking us out to some nice restaurants.
By the time he left I felt assured that all things considered, things are going well out here.
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