FOUR days ago I arrived in Guyana. After visiting a friend, I was returning from the West Bank on a bus. I was talking with a passenger who was heading to Woodlands Hospital to pay the hospital bill where his mother was a patient. He had to pay the hospital $65,000 for a four-day stay. He told me that each member of his poor family had to chip in to pay this enormous debt.

As he was telling me about his mother’s medical condition and her stubbornness to continue working with her deteriorating health and unwillingness to slow down to preserve her health, he received a phone call from his father informing him of his mother’s death.

Just like that while riding on a bus sitting next to strangers, still in his dirty work clothes, a phone call changed his countenance, mood, and life. The phone call lasted less than a minute, but he may remember it for the rest of his lifetime. I know that I will remember him every time I pass the Demerara Harbour Bridge because just minutes earlier the bus had crossed over the bridge.

This man in the presence of strangers and in a state of shock and denial with no one to comfort him had to bear his grief alone. I reached over and put my hand on his shoulder without saying a word while he wept like a little child.

A few minutes later, after composing himself for a little while he kept repeating these words: “My mommy is dead.” I told him that I was sorry to hear that his mother had died. But there we were two strangers travelling on a bus united by loss, grief, pain, and death. Sometimes, it takes the death of a loved one at the most unusual time to make one stranger reach out to help and comfort another.

In closing, I am happy that I came to Guyana. I have been in Guyana for less than a week, and I am already getting the opportunity to meet and help people in the most unusual circumstances and occasions. I came to Guyana to share the love of God with people. What a way to begin sharing that love with people when their loved one dies. May God help me as I try to share the love of God with the people in Guyana. May God comfort that family in their grief!