Second Day of Blogging

Paul's family and much of Kerala is Catholic. There are many churches, seminaries and Catholic schools in the area. The people are very religious, and since it is currently Lent, the ceremony was fairly somber. It seems that everyone is related! The priest who performed the ceremony is a cousin, as was nearly everyone we met. We are just proud to call these warm people "family."

Kumbalanghi is primarily an island, with a small attachment to the land that adjoins the Arabian Sea. It is surrounded by the 'backwaters of Kerala,' hence the proximity to the houseboats that ply these waters. Among the wildlife, we saw parakeets, beautiful teal-winged Kingfishers, cormorants (or sea crows, as they are called,) small eagles, cows, goats, monkeys and elephants. The climate is tropical with beautiful palm trees everywhere. I had never seen so many from an airplane and the canopy was just gorgeous as we were landing in Cochin. The temperature was mainly in the 90s while we were there, which makes our winter feel that much colder since we returned home!