Dust to Dawn/Morning to Night Part II

In the last blog I started sharing about meeting a CPE supervisor. The hospital was located in Tai Po. I needed to ride the KCR train northward from Tai Wai northward toward China. It would be 4 stops - 20 minute ride. As I went toward Tai Po, the train stopped at University. I remember traveling here for language study for 2 years. How energetic I was in those days. The balance that I attempted to manage between spending time in the books and spending time with my two children. Yes, I started school with two and ended school with three! Matthew was born here during the second year of study. As I made my way out of the Tai Po Train Station I saw familiar scenes from the past: men sitting in the park with their bird cages hanging from the trees, people riding bicycles, students in their particular school uniform at the bus stops and a blind man playing a Chinese 3 string instrument sitting on the floor with a mat in front of him for people to show pity and drop a few coins for his benefit.

I had walked to the market in order to buy a gift which is custom to visiting someone. The most common gift is to buy fruit (buying flowers is not a good expression because they are usually associated with death because they are often seen at funerals) I bought oranges because to Chinese they represent bringing gold by their similarity in color. Added to them were apples and grapes. I rode a taxi to the hospital and there at the entrance was Ms. Tong. I dwarfed her in size but her gentle face and spirit enveloped me with kindness and grace. I gave her the fruit and she was surprised and pleased to see that I remembered this common but important custom. She took me to the cafeteria where I ordered beef and green peppers with black bean sauce ( my favorite dish). Her six students were waiting at a table. We introduced ourselves and then finished our meal. She gave the fruit to the group and it was shared among all. We bounced back between English and Chinese because of my limitation to remember how to say everything in Chinese and their courage to use English that they knew well but were at times afraid to use.

As the students went back to visiting patients, Ms. Tong gave me a tour of the hospital. It had 450 beds. The surgical departments had been moved to other hospitals. This was for patients who stayed approx 4-6 days. Most of the wards had rooms with six people in each room. This hospital had 4 staff chaplains and one supervisor who taught courses. The courses were only 3 months long. The students were pastors from the area churches that were given permission from their church to study in the hospital. Even though this is a Chrisitan hospital it does not pay the salary of the chaplains and supervisors but a Chrisitan society group provides them financial support. I gather that the churches donate to this group to support this kind of ministry. There are no other chaplains beside Christian in the Hong Kong hospitals. Catholic chaplains have their own training and work in Catholic hospitals.

I will continue this experience later......