A peculiar sight flies through Guatemala’s densely packed cities streets and rolling, mountainous countryside: a fleet of thousands of American school buses. But they are not the ordinary yellow vehicles that ferry children to school every day. Not any more. Here, and across Central America, these buses are the region’s main form of public transport. In Guatemala, the vehicles are a source of endless creativity and variety. A few buses hit their routes unadorned—still bright yellow, still carrying the names of the school districts they once served. But others get…
