Sunday, July 1, 2012

We have arrived in India and finally got internet access yesterday (Saturday for us). We are currently 10 1/2 hours ahead of Texas. The trip was really quite uneventful - thank goodness. We flew from SLC to Chicago, had approximately a 2 hour layover and then on to London on British Air, then 4 hours later on to New Delhi. We must confess that we upgraded (at our expense) to business class for the overseas portion of the trip. The configuration of BA's business class is that every other seat faces the back of the plane. We got the two center seats, which both face backwards. When you are in the air, you really can't tell the difference, but on take-off, without the seat belts, we would have been on the floor.

We arrived in India around midnight, and got through both immigration and customs with no difficulties (no questions, no checking our luggage, maybe a few ugly stares, but that might be normal), and met President and Sister Jackson outside the luggage claim area. I think they were really surprised that we got out so quickly. They were even more surprised by the 8 pieces of luggage we had. We had luggage stuffed in every available spot in the car with two on top, but we got all the doors to close and then off to our new apartment.

We are staying temporarily in the second floor of a building that will eventually become the new meeting house/Mission Office/Mission Home for New Delhi. The Church acquired this building, the Columbian Embassy next door, and the lot next to it (affectionally called the 'hole in the ground') that will eventually be a multi-stake/ward building down the road. Similar to the concept used in Hong Kong, because of the significant cost of land and property, especially in New Delhi, all of the wards in the area will eventually (5-10 years) meet in this location. For now the near-term plans are to remodel the building we are in to be the Ward meeting house and Mission Home/Office Church, and for our apartment to be the classrooms. In the next month, we will move next door and live in one of the 3 2-bedroom apartments above the embassy (which has decided to move sometime soon)

1 comment:

  1. Now the fun begins! Can't wait to hear about your first day at Church. So glad that you made it safely and in piece. We love you!

    The Neuders

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