For the past four days, I’ve woken up in a different country. It’s a little disorienting, but I’m glad I’ve finally made it.
The original plan was to meet with Adventures in Missions’ ministry contacts in Panama and Costa Rica for two weeks to build relationships and see how our teams may continue to serve them.
Thursday morning I received an unexpected call from my dad to let me know that my grandpa had past away. Adventures in Missions was able to change my flight, but I was over 20 hours away from the airport I had to fly out of, and I wasn’t sure I had enough time to travel there. I had to try though.
We were staying with a missionary couple, Jeff and Audi, who were kind saints. They drove us an hour away to the Panama-Costa Rica border and waited a long time for us to try to buy tickets to Nicaragua during a crowded Panamanian holiday celebration.
We were told that the only way to buy a ticket was to find a man named Rolijando who walked around the border wearing a Ticabus uniform. We searched for this mysterious Rolijando for a while when a Ticabus arrived to the terminal. I took a break from calling the man’s cell phone which had a Gangnam Style ringback tone.
I thought surely Rolijando was made up as a cruel joke, but when we asked the bus driver if we could buy a ticket, he began to call out for Rolijando as we had been doing. He told us he could not sell us a ticket.
Jeff and Audi drove us all the way to the bus terminal in the city of David only to find out that they didn’t sell international bus tickets and the office we had to go to was closed.
A little discouraged, we decided to try again in the morning. Jeff and Audi drove us to the border once again, and we arrived at the perfect time. A bus to San Jose, Costa Rica was in the terminal and we quickly stamped our passports and bought our tickets and were on the bus within an hour. The remaining three days of travel went incredibly smoothly.
Moral of the story, if you find yourself at the Panama-Costa Rica border, use the Tracopa busline to travel to San Jose around 9 am.
Thank you for your prayers for my family.
