Illinois Group Departure

Bulgan

Miigaa

Family picture at the airport

Nomin, a sweet girl I visited this week, who had surgery in Indianapolis this year

  What a blessing this week was! For a year, Miigaa has been on our waiting list.  He has a heart defect called Tetralogy of Fallot, meaning he has 4 problems with his heart, needing one surgery to fix this.  In America, this heart defect is normally repaired around 6-8 months of age, but he is 4 years old.  And his oxygen saturation's a year ago were in the 50's, half of normal.  I was not sure he would make it to this day.  Bug God has sustained him and today is the day he departed for surgery in Illinois.  Bulgan has been on our waiting list since February and is an active 2 year old who has one hole in his heart needing surgical repair.  He is going with his aunt, as his mother recently had a baby.  Miigaa is going with his mother, who is from the countryside, so the US will be quite an adjustment.  Please join me in prayer for these sweet boys given a very special gift from the Lord to have surgery in the US.  May the Lord watch over them as they travel, may their adjustment to their host home go smoothly, and be with the doctors and nurses caring for this special group. 
  I had the pleasure of visiting Nomin last week.  She had surgery in Indianapolis in February and is recovering so well.  She is now a healthy, active 2 year old.  She talked up a storm and showed me her stuffed animal friends.  Her family moved to UB so her father could find a job.  He is working as a welder, but spends hours a day on a bus since they live so far out. 
  Our staff is doing two last trips this week.  One coordinator will go to far western Mongolia to see 4 families and another coordinator and coworker Lora will go to northwest Mongolia to see 2 families.  Our trips will then stop for about 4 months with the cold/snowy weather.  It snowed here in UB Friday which was beautiful, but now it is ice covering the road and sidewalks.  I put my down comforter on my bed about a week ago and need to start wearing long underwear.  It was -6 F when I went to the airport this morning.  And this week is Chinggis Khan's birthday, November 14th.  I bet you did not know that! 
  I pray this week brings lots of opportunities to share the truth and hope of Jesus Christ to those searching for answers. 
Blessings,
Emily
 

Angarag

 
  Isn't this little boy the cutest!  I have heard a lot about this child over the last 5 months, but finally got to meet him Friday.  He is about 20 months old and has gastroschisis, a condition where part of the intestines are outside the body through a hole near his belly button.  Through six surgeries, doctors attempted to put his intestines back in, without success.  Each time, a surgery to reverse it had to occur.  This was something I had never seen before.  I have some experience working in the neonatal ICU where these patients are often cared for, but not many come through the pediatric ICU where I worked primarily.  So it was very interesting for me to find out more about his case.  I found out about him through one of our transport nurses who met him and his family on a medical mission trip to Ulaanbaatar in June.  Since then, she has been sending formula and supplies to help him and he is making great progress.  In June, he only weighted 4 kg (just above his birth weight) and has gained 3 kg in 5 months from the formula that transport nurses has been sending.  Now he is happy (as you can see) and beginning to walk.  But his family faces many obstacles.  His mother and grandmother brought him in to our office.  His mother as 3 or 4 other children and I thought she was younger than me.  This family is on a feeding program the ger district (poor part of town).  Their situation is very difficult.
  Angarag's last surgery was a year ago and the doctors told the family he needs to grow and they will maybe consider another surgery in the future.  He has one small hole where a very small part of his intestines are present and then a large hole where two loops of his small intestine hang from.  His grandmother invented an amazing system to cover those loops, one of which he stools from.  She created a belt that has a ring (from a water container) in a soft cloth.  She wraps the intestines with gauze and places a condom over it and secure to the ring to protect it and also collect his stool.  I was amazed at how well the system works, but has to change it multiple times a day.  We do not have options for ostomy bags for this child due to expense and availability.  There love for this precious boy is deep.   
  I enjoyed meeting this family and although there is nothing CHP can do for him, I was thankful we could spend some time with them and encourage the family.  We gave them a Bible and Children's Bible for his brothers and sisters.  Please pray for this boy, especially that one day he might be able to have surgery to fix this. 

Shoe Shine

                  Wednesdays often bring med sheets.  Every child entered into our project, we do a med sheet on.  This form gives us information about the family, the child, and his or her health information and history.  We did two med sheets with Dr. Rita, the pediatrician we partner with, visited a sick child we know in the pediatric intensive care unit, and met with the head of the pediatric hospital and the head of pediatric cardiology.  It was a full day, so by 2 pm I was ready to get some lunch.  We left the hospital and I invited my coordinator, driver, and coworker to lunch, but my coordinator declined as she wanted to get home for lunch since her son was sick. 

                I had our driver drop us off at a corner to walk the rest of the way to a French bakery for lunch.  Yes there is a French bakery in UB that has good ham sandwiches!  As we walked, we came across a poor looking man with a small shoe shine business.  He had a bag laid out with several brushes and polishes, along with a wooden block to put your shoe up on.  Sometimes I like to give people like this business or buy a product they have.  So I said, let’s get our shoes shined, which was a first for me.  You see, having clean, nicely polished shoes is a big deal here in Mongolia.  Me on the other hand, I do not care and often forget to clean up my shoes, especially after the snow we had recently.  So the man wiped my shoes clean and polished them right up in several minutes.  Then he cleaned and polished Lora’s shoes.  While he was cleaning mine, I thought I should ask the price, but truly how high could it be?  As he was cleaning Lora’s shoes, I noticed a few people hanging around.  I was perplexed by this, so became really aware of what was going on.  He wrapped up his shoes shining work in about 5 minutes for us both and said to Lora, the price was around $8, 10 times what it should be for one pair.  Lora and I look at each other and decide to just pay it as a blessing to the man.  I was a bit frustrated, but thought oh well, at least it was for the both of us.  Then he said, no that is just for one, I also had to pay the equivalent of $8.  I could not believe this was happening.  Sometimes it is very hard for me to be repeatedly taken advantage of and that frustrates me.  People do not realize I left everything to come to their country to serve their people and then I am totally taken advantage of.  But Jesus did that for us.  He left His heavenly home to come to earth to sacrifice everything for us.  His love is so deep that He would come to save us.  So I need to let things like this go.  It is all God’s money anyways!  I wanted to really get an argument going about this with him as it was not right what he did, but the crowd around us got bigger and bigger as I think people were interested in what we would do.  So I got my wallet out and paid and we hurried off to the restaurant with a big lesson learned.  Ask price first.

                At lunch, I called my best Mongolian friend to ask what she thought about all this and to confirm what the price should be.  She felt so bad we each paid 10 times the proper amount.  But in that conversation she shared with us she had a used tv to sell, which we needed since our other one broke.  And if we had not called her at that time, she may have sold it to someone else.  So we felt God redeemed that money so quickly as we were about to buy a $125 new tv, but we bought it from her for about $35. 

                The words of Matthew 5: 40-42 came true that day. 

Matthew 5: 40-42 “And if someone wants to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well.  If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles.  Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you.”

The picture above is my clean, shiny shoes and I am sporting some camel wool socks!

Turkey and Greece Pictures

Spice Market...I really enjoyed this market, actually more than the Grand Bazaar

I had fresh squeezed pomegrante and orange almost everyday in Turkey

Hagia Sophia, first a church, then a mosque, now a museum

Underground cisterns

I took a ferry from Asia where I stayed before the group arrived to Old City in Europe several days and the views were amazing!

Chicken Doner was my favorite in a pita bread

This is the oldest peace treaty ever found

Topkapi Palace

I bought lots of ceramic bowls

A cruise on the Bosphorus was so wonderful

Ruins of Troy, several miles from Troas where Paul came through.

Pergamum

This theatre in Pergamum was so steep

Sardis

Hierapolis

Hierapolis theatre

The limestone covered terraces were amazing.

No that is not snow, but limestone

Laodicea

This theatre in Laodicea has lots of rennovations to come.

Ephesus

The ruins at Ephesus were spectacular.  I just could picture John, Mary, and Paul walking the streets here. 

The part of the group from my home church in Missouri.  It was so great to hang out with these fun folks and many others from Texas and Florida.  I was the only one from Mongolia though. 

Theatre at Ephesus in background.

I could have stayed in Kusadasi for a lot longer!

About to board the cruise ship!

Our cruise ship

The island of Patmos where John was exiled

Our cruise ship in the background.

This Greek Orthodox priest let me get a picture with him. 

Rhodes

They had amazing ceramics here to buy.  I bought some beautiful hand painted crosses.

I love this picture of my beautiful mom!

Supposedly the oldest street in Europe in the ruins of Knossos at Crete. 

The view of Santorini as we pulled in from our cruise ship. 

The white buildings with blue roofs were so pretty on Santorini.

Lots of donkeys that could take you up the hill from the water. 

These buildings cling to the hill.  We had a seafood dinner overlooking the ocean and watching the sunset below. 

Corinth

This is the Bema where Paul was brought the Jews as they attacked him in Corinth

You could see the Agean and the Adratic seas.

Jim and Phyllis Ann Rose, the leaders of the trip.  I admire them so much and have learned so much from them.

This inscription in the stone mentions Erastus, who is referenced in Romans 16:23.

Our hotel in Athens had a rooftop terrace that you could see the Acroplis at night. 

Parthenon

The Agora, shopping area, below the Acroplis.

From Mars Hill looking to Acroplis

Original steps to Mars Hill which Paul would have walked up. 

The Acroplis Museum...what a trip!