“We need to leave the house at 6:30 tomorrow morning,” Barbara told me smiling. “The Bible study starts at 9:00, and the bus we need to catch leaves at 6:45.”
As I drifted off to sleep that night, I slept lightly, hearing most of the sounds that had kept me awake the first night but that I now ignored. Dogs barked. Roosters crowed. Bus and truck horns blared.
The next morning, just before the alarm went off, I awoke. Even though the morning’s first light was filtering through the window, I lit a candle to help me find my way around the room. I quickly dressed and sat down on the bed to read and pray a little. At about 6:25 I left our room and headed into the dining room to wait for Barbara who emerged just a few minutes later.
By 6:40 we were at the bus stop, but the bus was not there. Instead, a 15-passenger van was there waiting. Barbara approached the van driver and asked about the bus.
“Oh, it already left,” he told her.
She smiled and said to me, “Bus times are not always reliable here. I asked yesterday, and I was told it would leave at 6:45.”
So instead of taking the bus, we jumped in the van. Before long, other passengers arrived, and the van driver thought he had enough people to begin the trip. He drove at a walking pace through town, beeping his horn at every location where he thought people might be interested in boarding. When we reached the paved road and the houses were fewer, he sped up to a normal speed.
We drove through several small towns until we reached San Juan Sacatepéquez, where we jumped off to catch the bus to the city. We walked about a block until we saw the bus for the city. At the back of the bus, two seats beckoned. We had hoped for a place with two empty 
seats together, but there were none. We were thankful, though, for seats. We sat down, one in front of the other. The radio blasted from the back of the bus, so I put my fingers in my ears. It was so loud it hurt. Even with my fingers in my ears, I could clearly hear the words. I intentionally thought about other things since I did not want some of those words running through my head all day.
The bus passed by the market, already in full swing. Then it wound its way through the mountains, passing makeshift greenhouses, vegetable gardens, and furniture builders. We went through San Pedro where many people disembarked for their day’s work and others who worked in the capital city boarded. With the shift in passengers, Barbara and I were able to find seats together, though the loud music made it hard to carry on a conversation.
Eventually we arrived in the capital city. Traffic sometimes came to a complete stop. Motorcycles wove in and out among the cars, and pedestrians sometimes took their lives into their own hands trying to cross. Vendors got on and off the bus selling their wares. “Three for five quetzales,” one called as he held up small packages of cookies. I quickly did the calculation. That was three packages for about 65 cents. Snack food is certainly inexpensive here.
Barbara turned to me. “Our stop is coming up,” she warned, 
so we got out of our seats and headed to the front of the bus. We got off and climbed the stairs to the overpass to cross the highway. On the other side, Beth, a missionary here in Guatemala, waited for us in her car. When we arrived, she was busy studying her lesson.
After a short drive, we arrived at the home of the hostess. Even though it was only 8:35, there were already quite a few women there. When another few arrived, Beth instructed the group to load up their plates and have some breakfast. With my stomach rumbling, I was glad the food did not come after the study. I checked my watch. It was only 8:45, yet here we were starting. I guess things start here when enough people have arrived.
We loaded our Styrofoam plates with breakfast sandwiches, papaya, melon and grapes, filled our cups with black sweet coffee, and sat down. Soon everyone was enjoying the food and the camaraderie around the table. These godly women shared their stories of things going on in their homes and churches. More than once laughter rang out. Other women arrived and joined the group. By this time there were twenty women around the table, most of whom were wives of pastors in the area.
By the time breakfast was over, everyone was ready to dive into Bible study. Out of large purses came Bibles, pens and Bible study notebooks. For the next hour, we listened to Beth teach and many chimed in with personal insights. It was a group I knew I would love if I lived here.
As soon as we were done, we headed home again.
We walked to the bus stop and stood watching the buses as they whizzed by. When one marked “San Juan Sacatepéquez” approached, Barbara lifted her arm to indicate that we needed a ride. It stopped. We quickly climbed on and it took off again as we held on to the luggage rack to make our way to a couple empty seats in the back. Once again, the music blared. I did not think it was possible for the music to be louder than it had been on the bus in the morning, but it was. I turned to Barbara and said, “I need to move forward away from this noise.” Once again, that meant we could not sit together, but it was worth it to not have my eardrums hurting quite as much.
When we arrived in San Juan Sac, as it is affectionately called, we got off and walked to the bus stop for Cerro Alto. There were quite a few people already waiting.
“You need to be ready to move quickly when the van comes,” Barbara told me. “There will be a rush for the door.”
Sure enough, when the van came, the entire group surged for the open side door. But Barbara was smart. She asked the conductor to open the back gate, and we climbed in the back and settled in the back row. By the time we headed out, twenty people were crammed into the 15-passenger van. Another four stood on the edge at the open door, hanging on to the roof, and the conductor was hanging on to the ladder on the side. 
As the van was leaving San Juan Sac, a whistle blew. A policeman on the side of the road signaled to the van. The van pulled over, and the four men who had been hanging out the door jumped off, ran to the side where they climbed the ladder to sit atop the van on the luggage rack. The conductor moved inside to start collecting our fares. I smiled. Evidently, it is against the law to hang out the open door, but it’s not against the law to sit atop the van on the luggage rack, and it certainly does not matter how many people can be stuffed inside. Before long we were home again.
When we started out that morning, I wondered if I would be willing to make the four-hour round trip every month for a Bible study. But after having been there, I realized why it was that important to Barbara. It was a refreshing time with other women in ministry. It was certainly worth the trip.
Harold Lawrence Bernard Lovestrand worked for the fairest, yet the most merciful, boss possible. Throughout his years as a missionary, pastor, and in various supplemental jobs, other people signed his paychecks, but Harold knew that God was his real boss. On August 8, 2019, at 93 years of age, he received the promotion that earned him rights and privileges he never knew before: perfect health, wealth unimaginable, and the privilege of a face-to-face meeting with the One he served so well all his life.
