Preaching in Puerto Rico always involves travel--lots of it on croweded freeways, well they're not exactly free as most are tollways. If you can read the map on the left enough to see Caguas, then you know about where we are staying. Each night we are preaching in Dorado, which is to the west of San Juan--about a 45 minute drive each way. Last night there was a semi trailer jack knifed across the east-west tollway but on our way in it was on the opposite side, so the only hold up for us was all the rubberneckers. On the way back, around 9 :15 PM, we were detoured on to another highway and the traffic was light enough that it probably added only 5 minutes to our commute.
The preacher, Joe, makes this drive on Sunday morning and Wed. night, plus other times as needed during the week. With the price of gasoline here around $2.80 a gallon, that little trip is becoming a real burden. To us, it's just an inconvenience, but it's only for a week, but to them it can be a real factor--there are times his wife cannot attend on Wed. night because she gets home too late from work. And when he gets there, on a good Sunday they will have 30 or so--there were 26 present this past Sunday, but 3 are out of town.
Driving in Puerto Rico is always exciting--between the significant minority that are driving 10-15 miles below the speed limit to the "kids" driving 10-15 miles over it, plus lane closures without warning, stalled cars, entrances and exits on both left and right every mile or so it is always exciting. A law will go into effect tomorrow making it illegal to drive on the shoulder and the fine is $250. I foresee the gov't getting rich, as both shoulders serve as lanes during rush hour. A one lane exit becomes 3-4 lanes during rush hour.
As the Jamaican lady in the National Geographic article put it some years ago, when asked about life in Jamaica, "Life it ain't easy, it's haaard." When you think your life is hard I have to tell you you don't know what hard is.
Tol Burk
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