Taking the Important Things Into the New Year

Podanur, India (Part 3 of 3)

Putting aside our disappointing freight and revenues in 2015 — and the fact that our tractor and trailer repairs cost as much as a small BMW  sports coupe — we finished the year with true wealth.

The wealth a person feels when they do something for no return.

The three Rs are important at FFC, but there’s a healthy component of exercise and play.

Our 2015 highlight  was the three days we spent volunteering at the Families For Children orphanage in India.

Unusual Recipe Created India’s Most Envied State

Fort Cochin, India (Part 2 of 3)

Four years since its narrow defeat, the Communist Party of India-Marxist’s red and white flags flap wildly in the Keralan wind. Out of power in the state that proclaims itself “God’s own country”, but very much alive.

Tea plantations everywhere one looks in Munnar.

We arrived in Kerala from dusty, hot Tamil Nadu. Driving out of the grasslands into the clear, cool air of the hill stations above Munnar, where the women collecting tea leaves, receive, in addition to their wages, employer-provided housing, healthcare and education for their children.

We came to see the social-democratic state that is secretly envied by Indians.