AP has seen significant groups of people become Christians. The original group in the Godavari river delta came as the result of humanitarian measures taken during a period of famine.

The Church on the Rock (COTR) Seminary is the initiative of an Indian settled in Texas in the USA who heard God speak to him about returning to his homeland and beginning a ministry. They purchased 60 acres in a rural setting outside the city of Visakapatnam and now have the Seminary with 100 or so students a day school for 800 children in grades 1-12 and a small hospital. His wife Mary has a real heart for children. Apostle Titus was a strongly charismatic figure who passed on in 1993.

Many have been trained here and gone into difficult areas like those of Orissa where the recent bout of persecution has taken place. Today there are around 140 students in B.Th, M. Div and M.Th classes. Colin is taking a class on Cultural Anthropology at the M.Th level. Many of these students will go on to be Pastors and teachers in other Bible Schools throughout India.

Accommodation is a single room an ensuite attached. Food is taken with the lead family in their home being a mix of the local Andhra Telegu curry and rice along with food from the friends homeland of Kerala in the South.

The classes are not large being at M.Th level but those training are potential leadership people for the future. In this group of 5 there are 3 men from the more local area where Telegu speakers predominate. The other two are from NE India one from Nagaland and the other from Manipur. The classroom is very basic concrete floor, a fan, black and white boards. Power cuts often take place for short or longer intervals. The classes begin at 09.00 and go on through until 13.00 with a coffee break at 10.30.

Colin is working through his experimental on line, distance learning course seeking to find out how it communicates by showing the material to the 5 students in the class. This is a very new approach for them so it will take time to adjust as well as to move on from their traditional rote learning methods to a more dynamic interactive approach evaluated by project type assignments rather than classic examination feed back practices.

In addition to the lectures 4 hours in the morning each day from 09.00 – 13.00 he has been asked to speak at the morning Church service on Sunday and the Prayer and Fasting service on the Friday evening.

Life in these semi rural locations is marked by visits to the Big City. The nearest place is a village like location Bhimily home to a fishing community but little can be got there. Bhimly is reached by sharing a licensed 4 seater scooter rickshaw with up to 8 others for Rs. 5 or 12c for the journey. It is necessary to make the one hour journey by local bus to Vizakapatnam. Slowly, they are updating the buses but many are rickety, old, time worn vehicles.

The State Transport Corporation founded in the socialist era is pervaded with the idea that Transport is a public service so should be ideally free. Presently the fare is Rs. 10 or about 25c C$. Raising fares is a no no and leads to strikes and bus burning etc. The way around this is to introduce New Buses which are said to offer improved service for which higher fares can be charged. Similarly any change is the methods used to run the service, collect fares etc is strongly resisted by the transport Unions who see this as forms of creeping privatization. Things may not be ideal but they are running favorably in the way of the labor for the moment. There is nothing yet like air conditioned service for this 30 + C heat but maybe that will come as it is appearing in big cities like Bangalore for 50c - $1 per ride.