Click click click. Click click click. Thats the sound of all the cameras in China photographing us. We look around and a menagerie of Chinese speaking Beijing men, women, and children (did we mention we are in Beijing!) were taking photos and videos of us. Twelve Americans walking through the Forbidden City is apparently something that doesn’t happen everyday. Everywhere we went people were standing next to us and taking photos. For one afternoon we knew what it felt like to be a celebrity- it’s exhausting and we definitely were feeling the culture shock!

Beijing was an amazing experience. It really is not something we have in America: a modern building can be right next to something that is 1000 years old. We walked on the Great Wall, saw the Forbidden City, and the Ming Dynasty tombs. The bullet train ride there was long but it was worth it!

Back at the hospital- we are moving and shaking. Some members of the team are making videos that patients can take home for home rehabilitation purposes; Sam is preparing to give a presentation on what an SLP (speech language pathologist) does – (they don’t have them here apparently); and our EMTs, Cait, Gabe, and Brandon, taught the ER Nurses new techniques on CPR! The nurses plan on implementing the new protocol Gabe and Cait taught on CPR and have been practicing with them.

Although our trip is coming to an end, we have had an awesome time here.

If you have ever wanted to feel like a celebrity, come to China.

Cameras flashing. People around you. Children being handed to you. It’s hard to remember if we are China GHE or the Pope. Then again, we had a little boy walk up to us, and silly us thought he wanted a picture with us, only to find out that he was asking us to video HIM as he danced for us; it goes to show that the Father likes to find ways to keep us humble.

 A highlight of last week was being able to be on one of the largest lakes in China and visiting an island on the lake that we had to take a bus, a boat, and a tram to get there; which sounds like the opening to a really bad dad joke, but it’s true and the long travel time to get there was absolutely worth it for the sights and memories we had on that island. We were able to see a local temple with a lot of history and culture, as well as experiencing a lot of other local pastimes such as playground dancing, playing shuttlecock with the locals (a lot harder than it looks), and making MANY trips to the knockoff Dairy Queen called Dairy Fairy. At this rate we will be keeping many of the local restaurants in the mall in business for years. We have also been working with the hospital in areas such as cardiac rehab, exercise prescription and testing, and patient education. We were able to present some of our work to the physicians and nurses of the hospital and by the Father’s grace all of our presentations went well. We want to thank all of you guys for your continued PR’s for the cohesion of the team and our safety. So much of this trip could not be done without them and we are so appreciative of it!

Favorite Quotes of the Week-

“That’s not my udder”

“Go deeper. (Into the word of God)”

“ Thou shall not take gum from one’s mouth and put it into thy own mouth (1 Boyer 2:3)”

“Are you corn? Cause i want to wrap myself around you and stalk you”

“PAUSE.”

Stay tuned for our next update:  A weekend in Beijing

            Close your eyes, imagine sitting in a tin can for 33 hours not knowing whether our final destination would bring us great joy and fellowship or the hardest trials of our life.

            Now open your eyes and smile, because China has welcomed us with open arms. This place is a crazy combination of the ancient world and the future of technology. We have only been here for three days and we have already seen more and done more than we ever imagined we would.

            We have seen a dancing festival at 6am (those of us that know how to run). We had countless photos and videos taken of us. We use the “squatty potties” by gripping the wall with both hands and holding on for dear life. Professionally, we are already employing the skills that we learned in undergrad classes. We have done this by creating two programs for their cardiac rehabilitation center – we have split into two teams to create an exercise prescription and testing program, as well as health education material for discharged patients.

            Personally, we have gone from twelve strangers to one team unit. Some of us run together in the morning, others do squatting competitions, some sleep, but we all struggle to figure out the prices of things in the mall. The people here are warmer than a summer day in Riverside. They have gone out of their way to make us feel welcome and safe because they know we are dealing with culture shock. We had an incomparable dinner with President Jin-Shu of the hospital. We had local dishes that made us question everything we knew about Chinese cuisine. Professor Boyer was (as always) correct-the food is amazing!

Traveling across the world can be an intimidating experience, but when our team returned to Hangzhou this year, it felt like a second home. From the moment our group stepped off the plane we were warmly welcomed by the familiar faces of the Hangzhou Medical College staff. This return journey felt as if we had never left. Meeting the new students, and getting reacquainted with those from the previous year, was wonderful as everyone is so welcoming. Many of them have invited us to share meals or join us when we take our lunch in the canteen (the cafeteria). Our day begins every morning at 7am when we walk to the bus stop where we catch the school shuttle, this time we did not require a guide. Our past experience in Hangzhou helped us develop techniques to encourage the students to interact and participate in class that we were able to incorporate on day one. The students here are eager to learn, and we are blessed to have the opportunity to teach them. The Dean and the college staff have been very attentive to our needs. One of our team members required medical attention and was aided without hesitation from several Hangzhou Medical College staff members who stood by our side every step of the way. We cannot express the gratitude we have for the compassion and care our Hangzhou colleagues showed us in our time of need. Shortly, our CBU Hangzhou team will be heading in two different directions. One professor will remain in Hangzhou for one more week while the rest of the team travels to Changchun, China where they will have the opportunity to teach courses at Changchun University of Science and Technology. Though we are sad to part ways, we look forward to fulfilling the remainder of our journey.

Margaret Appenzeller

Hello from Uganda,

I arrived on Saturday at 1:30am to the Hope Speaks compound.  It is a beautiful place and the housing is very nice.  There is a team of 13 Speech Language Pathologist, 1 Social Worker, 2 graduate students and 2 undergraduate students at the compound.  Hope Speaks now has the most experienced SLP in the country at least for two weeks.

Hope Speaks has 3 special needs school they provide services for approximately 100 students and growing.   They have two clinics in the slums of Kampala, which serves the very poor of Uganda.  A recent addition has been a pay for service clinic, which helps pay for the free clinics.

My first two days have been so tiring and wonderful!  I have seen many children with severe needs and parents wanting to get the best help for their children.  I have fallen in love with children of Uganda.  They are so friendly, wanting to come up and talk to the team and always ready to play.  I am looking forward to being at each site at least twice during my stay.  I have been able to use my feeding skills to help families and train graduate students.  God continues to stretch me and grow me in my faith and clinical skills.

The highlight so far has been worship at the Worship House.  Worshiping with fellow brothers and sisters in Christ was so powerful and humbling.  The Christians in Uganda worship God with their hearts and souls.  I have learned to dance and praise God at the same time.  It was a unique experience and so uplifting.

Hope Speaks had its first Neuro Support Group today with 4 clients.  The team that was able to work with the group said it was great.  One client road a Boda (motorcycle) transportation to get to the group.  The pray is that the group will continue to grow as there are very few services for adults with TBI and strokes.

I feel so blessed to be with the team that has come together to serve the children with special needs in Uganda.  There are 4 million people in Uganda who need some kind of speech-language, OT or PT services.  The need is great and Hope Speaks continues to rely on God to provide the workers and the resources to meet the need.

Maggie

Wrapping up another full week at the hospital, we have been blessed to have numerous divine appointments with many more patients with positive outcomes, which created more opportunities for prayer. There were many memorable patients, but two particular cases reminded us of how important this ministry is for the physical and spiritual wellness of each person.

Rishoni was a stroke patient who had suffered from paralysis and was recovering. He was a patient that faithfully sought care the past two weeks to improve his quality of life. When we first met Rishoni, he had difficulty walking and shuffled his feet into the clinic. We, also, noticed that his facial expressions reflected hopelessness and discouragement when he first walked in. After persistent treatments and prayer, we noticed the patient made substantial progress each visit with us. His spirit and attitude became positive each time we treated him, which also improved his physical health. On our last day at the clinic, we had the opportunity to meet with Rishoni one more time and he came in with immense joy and gratitude and decided to model his progress with a huge smile on his face because of the improvements he made.

            We also had the opportunity to treat and talk with 3 Somali sisters who were morbidly obese and suffering from various musculoskeletal problems.  They were very interested in receiving treatment. Each sister had a specific problem that stemmed from their obesity, high blood pressure, and low back pain. Over the course of their treatment we improved one sister’s high blood pressure with proper nutrition and exercise. The sister with the low back pain saw improvements with manual therapy interventions and exercise treatment protocols. The 3^rd sister began a weight reduction exercise program and worked very hard.  Each time we met with these sisters we were able to have conversations with them about the Truth of the Gospel and pray for them. However, by the end of our time at the clinic and on our last day only one sister showed up and got offended when we prayed over her in the name of Jesus one last time. Although her heart was hardened, the seed was planted about the Gospel and we ask for prayers that the Word of God will flourish in their hearts and bear fruit one day.

            We would like to extend our gratitude because this past week we were able to go back to the village, meet with the people, and dive deeper into the Gospel. This was a huge blessing because, in the previous week, we were not able to go and share the Gospel. As we are finishing our last week in Kigoma and heading into the weekend we are looking forward to spending time and sharing the Gospel with children in a different village. We ask for prayer at this time over the people of Tanzania for more seeds to be planted and to see growth in their faith towards God.  This may be our last blog post—keep praying for us.  This trip has been an incredible blessing and adventure.

After a full week of serving in the hospital, we have experienced many blessings and many trials.  We have been able to see, serve, and pray for many patients this week at the hospital.  It’s especially been a blessing to have the opportunity physically care for Muslims and pray the gospel over them.  A patient who came in on Monday for treatment was experiencing lower back pain and hip pain.  She came back a few times throughout the week to progress her physical healing.  We’ve been able to treat her physically through a treatment called dry needling.  On Monday when she first came in she was in extreme, constant pain and was having difficulty walking.  After her third treatment, she reported that she was 75% better in terms of pain and was able to walk without a limp.  Not only were we able to minister to her physical needs through treatment, but we have really begun to develop a relationship with her and engage with her about her faith.  She was raised Roman-Catholic, but married a Muslim man. Therefore, she was required to convert to Islam.  We are grateful that she accepted prayer from us each time she came in and we are hopeful that the seeds we planted through sharing the truth with her will see her welcomed into the family of God.

We have also been able to really grow as a team and see the Lord move in our relationships with one another.  Seeing the way God has brought us together in unity to serve the people at the hospital and at the church has been so encouraging.  Every morning before work, we would have chapel on the hospital grounds where we would sing Swahili worship songs and someone from our team would share an encouragement from God’s Word.  On Thursday afternoon, we had a lull in patients and one of our translators suggested we have a worship session.  We had a guitar with us and got to sing praises in our clinic.

As we talked about in our last blog, we have connections with a church in a village called Nyantole, which is not too far from the hospital and where we’re staying.  We were supposed to go back Thursday night for Bible study to preach the Word to the villagers, but due to some unforeseen circumstances we were not able to go and our next couple visits to the village have also been pushed back.  This is one of the few instances since being here that we have experienced spiritual warfare and ask for your prayers as we continue to walk forward for the Kingdom.

We will not be discouraged and know that God is with us and is not finished with the work that we have here still.  He will continue to protect us and guide us to complete His good works.  Please also pray for the seeds we are planting that they will produce good harvest and that we will see physical and spiritual healing for those we encounter!

5 May 2019

WE MADE IT!!! After around 30 hours of traveling we safely arrived in Kigoma, Tanzania! Thank you so much for all the prayers! We were blessed with smooth flights and no delays. We arrived in Kigoma on May 4 around noon and were welcomed by Dr. and Sally Pepper. We then had a great meal and set up all our equipment at Kigoma Baptist Hospital. Everyone was a little jet lagged, but we all persevered through the night. Sunday morning, the 5^th, most of our team seemed to have managed to great night of sleep which made us all very excited to go to church. The ride to church was like off-roading up in Big Bear. We took a different trail than usual and it was super fun. Church was amazing and we actually had the opportunity to see how powerful God is at work in Kigoma. Last year, Erik Salley and some of the Kigoma team were evangelizing around the village in Kigoma. They encountered many people, but there was one woman in particular who was touched a lot more than they even knew. Her name was Neema (which means “grace”). She actually decided to share her testimony with us at church. She talked about how Erik was preaching the word of God to her when he knocked on her door one day. At that time, she didn’t want to hear anything about Christianity, but little did we know that God was planting a seed in her heart that day. She has now completely turned away from her Islamic background and put her faith in Christ! God is so GOOD!! Neema has been faithfully attending church every Sunday and is very engaged in her faith and relationship with God. This is such a blessing to be able to see the work and impact that God is accomplishing through all of these trips. We are so excited to see what God has planned for our team and the people of Kigoma throughout these next few weeks! We greatly appreciate all your love and prayers, please continue to pray for us to be used by God to reach the hearts of the people of Tanzania and plant more seeds just like Neema!

Blessings,

Team Kigoma 2019

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