Thursday, November 28, 2013
Monday, November 18, 2013
November 18th Santa Barbara
Tracy's post-camino retreat house is called 'A Casa do Raposito,' the Little Fox House and it is lovely; a two and and a half story stone house, just across the street from the village church in the old part of Carantona. The peregrinos sleep under the dormers on the top floor. There is a library with internet on the second floor, a comfy living room and small kitchen with dining table on the ground floor. Next door in part of the same structure is a grey donkey, very friendly and fond of carrots. All of this is enjoyed on a "donativo" basis, we pay what we feel is right or can afford.
Tracy cooks, and is available for limitless information about Galicia, the history of the Camino and many other topics. She is a former race car driver, horseback rider, has degrees in history, ecopsychology, clinical psychology and a certificate in hypnosis which she regularly uses in her practice. A fascinating woman.
She is available for hire as a tour guide for northern Galicia and the Costa del Muerto, so called because the Atlantic here is ferocious with huge waves crashing everywhere against the black rocks and a sea floor so uneven that it has caused numerous shipwrecks of the many years that humans have lived and traded here.
She took me and my two Canadian women Camino friends to a very large dolmen, protected with an elaborate glassed-in cover because of the paintings inside; a castro, a prehistoric, stone-age village with only the circular stone house walls remaining in a beautiful pattern, climbing a grassy green hillside; a well-preserved castle, with lacemaking women and weavers hard at work inside and most interesting to me, to the Museo Aleman in Camelle.
In 1962 a German man named Manfred Gnedeger arrived in Camelle wearing a suit. He rented a room in a house and began giving German lessons. Apparently he fell in love with one of his students but she was already betrothed. Broken hearted, he moved out of the house, purchased a piece of the coastline at the Atlantic end of the village, took off his suit and spent the rest of his life in a loin cloth, winter and summer, making exquisite rock sculptures with the beach rocks and cement. ( I took so many pictures there in a drizzle that my IPhone didn't work for 4 days; finally 3 nights of rice treatment brought it back. Whew!).
Some people in the village liked him very much, others wanted to get rid of him. He was accused of molesting a little girl, arrested and thrown in jail, where he was for 6 months. There was no evidence, the girl and her parents denied it so eventually he was released and returned to his small, square concrete hut on the beach and resumed his work.
The second attempt to get rid of him was a plan to build a breakwater right through his sculpture garden. He pleaded and his supporters pleaded, but the breakwater was built. As a protest, he lay his body down on the wet cement top of the structure, in three positions, face up, face down and sideways, so today there are indentations on the top that collect rainwater.
He began painting the breakwater with large and small circles in different colors, and since his death some in the village have refreshed some of these circles.
in 2001 an oil tanker called the Prestige broke up off the Galician coast and Camelle was one of the worst affected towns. Manfred was heartbroken, and the villagers who often took him fresh bread noticed that the bread was not taken into the house, inquired and found him dead in his house. He apparently had a heart condition that required regular medication and he just stopped taking it.
After his death, there was an effort to preserve his legacy, and Galicia named the site Museo de Aleman. He had left 120,000 euros to the state, but that money has completely disappeared and his house is in extreme disrepair but Tracy and an American academic who has walked the Camino several times have installed an exhibit of his belongings and photographs of the sculpture garden as it once was in the Camelle community center. (see photos)
When I returned to Santiago, I traveled by fast train to Madrid and spent four nights in a hotel belonging to a Camino friend's family. I recommend it: Hotel Santander on Calle Echegaray, very reasonable and conveniently located. I did see and grow to love the Sagredo family and Teresa Soler and her husband Fernando Mendez, and I visited four museums in 3 days - heaven for me! especially the home of Joaquin Sorolla, one of my favorite painters. I walked there and back, about 5.4 kms with no appreciable discomfort. Bravo.
Some reflections of the Camino:
I learned how to drop my story, to be just a woman, interested in other people, asking questions instead of constantly pontificating - that's a learning: how unbalanced my relations with other people sometimes have been, too little curiosity about them and too much telling my opinions, ideas, history.
I learned how little is essential to life, not just physically, by living out of a smallish backpack and eating food, day after day, that wasn't "on my diet," but again, in relating to people: only openness and good will seemed to suffice.
I really came to believe that the Camino never ends, that making a commitment to come begins the Camino and then, although supposedly it ends in Santiago or Finisterra, for me it will not be so. The changes in me, the remembrance of feelings, sights and conversations will be with me always. The latter were so often in synch with the inner dialogues I experienced walking alone. Of course, there are also the new friends, four or five of whom will be friends for life. (I am reminded of the rich man in Amarillo who spends his wealth on public art, most famously, Cadillac Ranch which can be seen from I40, but most importantly (I think) the fake road signs all over town - Andy Warhol's Marilyn Monroe, the Jabberwocky but best of all, a yellow and black, diamond-shaped sign near his own house that says "ROAD NEVER ENDS." So with the Camino for me.
Another observation, from early on: how much more energy it costs me to be judgmental than to just notice attributes of another person. Here's an example: a man walks by, and I might say to myself, "he is really FAT!" or I might say to myself, "he is carrying a lot of extra weight." One loses me energy and tends to linger in the mind, and one is tinged with compassion and tends to flow right through. Hope I can hold on to this one.
Tracy cooks, and is available for limitless information about Galicia, the history of the Camino and many other topics. She is a former race car driver, horseback rider, has degrees in history, ecopsychology, clinical psychology and a certificate in hypnosis which she regularly uses in her practice. A fascinating woman.
She is available for hire as a tour guide for northern Galicia and the Costa del Muerto, so called because the Atlantic here is ferocious with huge waves crashing everywhere against the black rocks and a sea floor so uneven that it has caused numerous shipwrecks of the many years that humans have lived and traded here.
She took me and my two Canadian women Camino friends to a very large dolmen, protected with an elaborate glassed-in cover because of the paintings inside; a castro, a prehistoric, stone-age village with only the circular stone house walls remaining in a beautiful pattern, climbing a grassy green hillside; a well-preserved castle, with lacemaking women and weavers hard at work inside and most interesting to me, to the Museo Aleman in Camelle.
In 1962 a German man named Manfred Gnedeger arrived in Camelle wearing a suit. He rented a room in a house and began giving German lessons. Apparently he fell in love with one of his students but she was already betrothed. Broken hearted, he moved out of the house, purchased a piece of the coastline at the Atlantic end of the village, took off his suit and spent the rest of his life in a loin cloth, winter and summer, making exquisite rock sculptures with the beach rocks and cement. ( I took so many pictures there in a drizzle that my IPhone didn't work for 4 days; finally 3 nights of rice treatment brought it back. Whew!).
Some people in the village liked him very much, others wanted to get rid of him. He was accused of molesting a little girl, arrested and thrown in jail, where he was for 6 months. There was no evidence, the girl and her parents denied it so eventually he was released and returned to his small, square concrete hut on the beach and resumed his work.
The second attempt to get rid of him was a plan to build a breakwater right through his sculpture garden. He pleaded and his supporters pleaded, but the breakwater was built. As a protest, he lay his body down on the wet cement top of the structure, in three positions, face up, face down and sideways, so today there are indentations on the top that collect rainwater.
He began painting the breakwater with large and small circles in different colors, and since his death some in the village have refreshed some of these circles.
in 2001 an oil tanker called the Prestige broke up off the Galician coast and Camelle was one of the worst affected towns. Manfred was heartbroken, and the villagers who often took him fresh bread noticed that the bread was not taken into the house, inquired and found him dead in his house. He apparently had a heart condition that required regular medication and he just stopped taking it.
After his death, there was an effort to preserve his legacy, and Galicia named the site Museo de Aleman. He had left 120,000 euros to the state, but that money has completely disappeared and his house is in extreme disrepair but Tracy and an American academic who has walked the Camino several times have installed an exhibit of his belongings and photographs of the sculpture garden as it once was in the Camelle community center. (see photos)
When I returned to Santiago, I traveled by fast train to Madrid and spent four nights in a hotel belonging to a Camino friend's family. I recommend it: Hotel Santander on Calle Echegaray, very reasonable and conveniently located. I did see and grow to love the Sagredo family and Teresa Soler and her husband Fernando Mendez, and I visited four museums in 3 days - heaven for me! especially the home of Joaquin Sorolla, one of my favorite painters. I walked there and back, about 5.4 kms with no appreciable discomfort. Bravo.
Some reflections of the Camino:
I learned how to drop my story, to be just a woman, interested in other people, asking questions instead of constantly pontificating - that's a learning: how unbalanced my relations with other people sometimes have been, too little curiosity about them and too much telling my opinions, ideas, history.
I learned how little is essential to life, not just physically, by living out of a smallish backpack and eating food, day after day, that wasn't "on my diet," but again, in relating to people: only openness and good will seemed to suffice.
I really came to believe that the Camino never ends, that making a commitment to come begins the Camino and then, although supposedly it ends in Santiago or Finisterra, for me it will not be so. The changes in me, the remembrance of feelings, sights and conversations will be with me always. The latter were so often in synch with the inner dialogues I experienced walking alone. Of course, there are also the new friends, four or five of whom will be friends for life. (I am reminded of the rich man in Amarillo who spends his wealth on public art, most famously, Cadillac Ranch which can be seen from I40, but most importantly (I think) the fake road signs all over town - Andy Warhol's Marilyn Monroe, the Jabberwocky but best of all, a yellow and black, diamond-shaped sign near his own house that says "ROAD NEVER ENDS." So with the Camino for me.
Another observation, from early on: how much more energy it costs me to be judgmental than to just notice attributes of another person. Here's an example: a man walks by, and I might say to myself, "he is really FAT!" or I might say to myself, "he is carrying a lot of extra weight." One loses me energy and tends to linger in the mind, and one is tinged with compassion and tends to flow right through. Hope I can hold on to this one.
Saturday, November 2, 2013
November 2, 2013
I have just spent three nights on the 4th floor of a huge former monastery right across a square from the north transept of the cathedral in Santiago. Spartan, to say the least but a good bed and plenty of hot water. The room was about 6'x12 with high western windows on the west.
The first day, the day I arrived, was a glorious autumn day, sky as blue as New Mexico and no wind. I put the several enticing museums out of my mind and just walked around. Santiago is one of the least modernized, that is, most medieval cities I've ever seen. Narrow streets paved with stone wind around giving the sense of slow and organic growth over the centuries. The buildings are only three or four stories high, so the streets are not dark or canyon-like.
The shops are modern, though - electronics, shoes, clothing, camping gear and lots of bakeries and sweet shops, plus the expected souvenir stores everywhere.
Santiago is famous for its tart, which is scrumptious, made only with ground almonds, eggs and sugar. Since it is gluten-free, I will try to bring some home.
Now the rain has set in, and the forecast has no appreciable sun for the next week. Oh, we'll. I won't be walking much anyway.
The pilgrim mass yesterday was completely different from two weeks ago because it was All Saints Day. More priests and a bishop in full regalia, but the wonderful change was a glorious choir, singing from a loft at the west end of the nave up high. The voices resonated off the stones - I'm sure they were amplified, too. I cried almost the whole time, I was so moved. Quite a few people who had passed through Paloma y Lena were there, too, so it was lovely to see them again and hear their stories of the last week of their Caminos.
Here's mine. I decided not to try for the whole 100 kilometers, so I took the bus about 40 Kms forward to miss some very steep downhills. I then walked 2 and a half days. All was fine until the last afternoon when I could feel the inflammation starting again, so I took the bus the rest of the way.
The Pilgrim Office awarded me the Campostella anyway, which made me so so happy. I thought I didn't really care about it, but I guess I did. I only walked 615 of the 790 kilometers, but it was a big effort anyway and it is wonderful to have that recognized!
The museum I have loved the most here is the Pobo Gallego, the museum of the Galician way of life. It contains real fishing boats of different types, crab pots, etc. and so many models of homes, barns, whole villages plus old photos. There were two screens with narratives and photos with English text offered. I could have stayed there all day if my legs held up, but they didn't.
I am eating through the menu of two fine restaurants, one I think is the best Italian food I've ever had, the other traditional Galician food.
Tonight I meet Tracy Saunders, a British author and psychologist who has opened her home to pilgrims who want a little time for reflection before flying home. I will write about it after I have been there.
Lots of love,
Mary
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