Ken and I love to ride our bikes to the library in town whenever I need more research material, and then eat lunch at a fun restaurant. It’s about a 14-mile round-trip. There’s a sizable Hispanic population in town, so today we decided to try a little hole-in-the-wall Mexican store/taqueria that features authentic, homemade food. As soon as I stepped inside the little bodega, I was transported into the past. Early in our marriage, Ken and I spent two years in Bogota, Colombia while Ken performed with the National Symphony, a world-class orchestra. Meanwhile, I taught fourth grade in a Colombian school. I taught all of the subjects in English but my students and their families spoke Spanish, which made parent-teacher conferences very challenging.
So, when I walked into the little store and was suddenly immersed in a flow of voices chattering in Spanish, I was taken back to our adventures in Bogota. I remembered how Ken and I would traipse through little stores like this one, searching in vain for American products. Our Spanish slowly improved as we learned to decipher labels, but remind me to tell you the story, someday, of Ken’s disastrous attempt to buy cat food for our American cats. (It ends happily but a Colombian cat nearly lost one of it’s nine lives.)
The bodega’s meat counter reminded me of that incident, and also of the butcher shop down the street from our apartment, which I passed every day on my way to school. The Colombian butcher shop hung their raw meat from hooks in the front window, without refrigeration. I got really good at holding my breath for the full length of the block as I hurried to work. (We did not buy our meat there!)
This fresh produce section reminded me of the open-air market where we would shop for fruit and vegetables. Colombia has varieties of fruit that we’d never seen back home, like lulo and guanabana. Ken loved haggling over prices and trying to get a bargain. I just wanted to know “how much.” Ken said I was being gouged, but when I did the math, he was haggling over mere pennies. This little bodega even had an aisle of pottery like we used to buy in Bogota but the items all had price tags. Ken was disappointed that he couldn’t haggle.
Colombian food isn’t at all like the Mexican food the bodega served, which is good because we like Mexican cuisine much better. Here’s our lunch…and it was delicious!
We ate it as a picnic in a nearby park, something we never did in Bogota because it rained all the time. In fact, it rained every day for the two years we lived there. I always carried an umbrella. The city sits at an altitude of 8,660 feet, but if we took a bus down the mountain, we could enjoy sunny, tropical weather at a lush resort and breathe much thicker air. Of course, it required nerves of steel (or a blindfold) for the trip down the narrow, winding mountain road with no guardrails and sheer drop-offs, on a dilapidated former school bus—but that’s a story for another blog.
As we pedaled our way home from town again, I couldn’t help thinking about how our past experiences shape us and transform us into the people we are today. My time in Colombia drew me closer to God in many ways and became part of the foundation for my writing career. And it occurred to me that the things we’re experiencing right now—today—are shaping us into the people we’ll be in the future. We learned to adjust to a lot of changes when we moved to South America, and now we’ve all faced too many unwelcome changes these past two years. How we react to them will shape the people we become in the future.
In these challenging times, I don’t want to be taken captive by the constant arguing, fear-mongering, and divisiveness I see all around me. I want my faith to grow stronger and to flow out with joy everywhere I go. Right now, our journey may seem as harrowing as that bus trip down the Andes Mountains, but we’re God’s beloved children, and our future is safe in His hands.
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Loved this, Lynn. Both learning about your current adventures and the ones in Bogotá. Joe and I visited there some years back and it was quite the experience! We went to Cartagena and traveled around. A beautiful place, interesting culture, and oh the food! So delicious!
God is so good to meet us at every turn and, through the power of his Holy Spirit, to convict and encourage us, and give us everything we need to do his good and perfect will.
I attended a Bible study weekend recently, and as Kristi McLelland said, let our lives be marked by God’s love, by his Word, and by the never ending power of the Holy Spirit as we trust without fear about the future, without mumbling and complaining. We of all people have a reason to hope like no other. This world is not our home and we should never act as though it is. Love and appreciate you!
I enjoyed your very timely comments, Tammy. Colombia was a beautiful country. And Cartagena especially. The study you’re in sounds wonderful! Yes, we should all shine like stars in the darkness. I miss you, my friend. Wish we could meet again.
Me too, friend. Me too.
Beautiful, Lynn! Love your cross-cultural stories=). And yes, yes, may we allow the Lord to change us for His glory and the good of all around us.
Amen, Elizabeth. I hope you are enjoying a good rest. Hugs!
I love this little peek into your past!
They were fun years.
Lynn, I love to hear about your bicycle outings, as well as learning more about your colorful experiences. I’ve seen pictures of those buses traveling such narrow roads in the mountains with no guard rails, and the pictures are enough to scare me! Recently I read that people are less patient and more intolerant of others these days, which strikes me as odd, considering we’ve all been in the same boat for the past year. I hope that Christians are not part of the intolerant group but are more adaptable than ever with peace and love toward others.
I agree with you. I want my faith to grow during these challenging times. I know that reading my Bible will help me to keep grounded. Thank you for your interesting blog.