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Today was the worst day of the whole trip. (Hang with me, it will get better. The turnaround will happen in two days!) But this Twelfth Day of the Walk was a dirty-rotton-no-good-very-bleak day of miserable, horrible, painful, distressing hopeless walking.
I left Leon at 6:00 a.m. and walked awhile in the dark. It started out great, as I excitedly walked passed a zoo where it sounded like the animals were being led by banshees and were rioting inside. Then, about an hour and a half later, something strange occurred. I had pain in every bit of me: fingers, neck, hands, arms, back as well as all the usual places. I guess the reason I was experiencing this all-over pain, and had not before, was because this was the first morning I had been cold. And I was cold. And stiff. And sore.
I took off my pack and sat in the sun, warming my bones, with a nice hot cup of cafe con leche and some churros. I then bought a couple of ham sandwiches to take with me and was off again.
But I took a wrong turn which put me on one of the other routes and put the albergue ten kilometers beyond where I had planned to stop and sleep. I was in so much pain. I cried and cried. I hobbled on one foot, and then the other foot burdened by the offload, swelled and screamed as well. There was no escaping this hell. I had to just keep moving. A little old man stopped me, saying something about my bad foot, but he then encouraged me by saying that "poco a poco" I would make it to Santiago.
Limp. Limp. Limp. Limp. Limp. Others would stop and ask if I were okay. A man from Arizona offered me a pain pill. Other than that, there was not anything anyone could do. There was no rescue. I had to just keep walking.
Eventually, I got to the municipal refuge at Villadangas del Paramo. Men and women were crammed together in one room. I had the bed closest to the bathrooms, so I was privy to the 'activities.'
A couple of miles before the albergue, I had been passed by an unfriendly guy with long hair. He looked like Fabio on the cover of a dime store romance novel. He was wearing rust-colored gauchos, a white cotton pirate blouse and a straw hat. I thought, "Wow, he is really getting into the part. That is some get-up."
When I arrived at the albergue, there was a note posted on the dormitory wall (spelled wrong) that said, "Fres chicken soup with paprikas 1 Euro plate." When I stepped out of the shower, I smelled the chicken stock boiling, and who should be cooking it, but Yanni-In-The-Gauchos. He smelled pretty bad, and I wondered if he had washed his hands.
I later learned that his name was Ka'l Ma'l and that he was Transylvanian. When we were hanging our laundry outside, he told me how his bank had twice taken auto withdrawals from his account, despite his having instructed them not to, and how he was having to cook meals at the albergues in order to keep going, because he did not have any money. He said he had started in St. Jean Pied de Port on July 10th and had had bad luck the whole time, starting with his having lost ten euros when he pulled out his identification in Bucharest, to his puffy pirate shirt never drying, and him always having to wear it wet.
A couple of hours later I sat down to a bowl of his awful soup. It basically was just a bowl of broth with onions, carrots, parsley and bones. Ka'l Ma'l ate with me. He seemed very sad. I guessed he was about thirty-eight. He said he had a thirteen-year-old son in Transylvania, and that he was walking to Finnestere hoping to be reborn there, "to return a new man." He said his father had died seventeen years before without ever having seen the ocean. Ka'l Ma'l had brought dirt from his father's grave in a bottle to put in the ocean. He planned to then fill the bottle with ocean water and pour it on his father's grave when he returned home.
Others in the albergue (including the hospitalero) laughed at him. I was moved by his story and by the fact that we each had our hardships on the Way. He was humiliated by his having to cook and clean his way to Finesterre. When I stood to carry my bowl to the kitchen, he said, "No, sit. What is one more plate?" I thought, "No, let me serve him instead." So I went into the kitchen and did the dishes.
I then went to sleep early. Ka'l Ma'l's cot was next to mine. Before tiptoeing out of the albergue early the next morning to try and find a bus to Astorga, I put ten euros on his pillow. I hoped to help him on his way. Who knows, it might have been a big bamboozle, but I do not think so. I do not think he was someone who had necessarily done a lot of good in his lifetime, but I believe he was someone who wanted to.
At one point, he had asked me about my faith and about how to find God. I had not said much. He was the third person who had expressed to me a desire to find God on the Camino. He was the third person whom I very likely had prevented from seeing God.
As I rode the bus the next day to Astorga, I asked God to forgive me for the times I had closed others' eyes to life, to optimism, and to hope; for the times I had kept others apart from His love through the din of my folklore and my distorted views.
Today was the worst day of the whole trip. (Hang with me, it will get better. The turnaround will happen in two days!) But this Twelfth Day of the Walk was a dirty-rotton-no-good-very-bleak day of miserable, horrible, painful, distressing hopeless walking.
I left Leon at 6:00 a.m. and walked awhile in the dark. It started out great, as I excitedly walked passed a zoo where it sounded like the animals were being led by banshees and were rioting inside. Then, about an hour and a half later, something strange occurred. I had pain in every bit of me: fingers, neck, hands, arms, back as well as all the usual places. I guess the reason I was experiencing this all-over pain, and had not before, was because this was the first morning I had been cold. And I was cold. And stiff. And sore.
I took off my pack and sat in the sun, warming my bones, with a nice hot cup of cafe con leche and some churros. I then bought a couple of ham sandwiches to take with me and was off again.
But I took a wrong turn which put me on one of the other routes and put the albergue ten kilometers beyond where I had planned to stop and sleep. I was in so much pain. I cried and cried. I hobbled on one foot, and then the other foot burdened by the offload, swelled and screamed as well. There was no escaping this hell. I had to just keep moving. A little old man stopped me, saying something about my bad foot, but he then encouraged me by saying that "poco a poco" I would make it to Santiago.
Limp. Limp. Limp. Limp. Limp. Others would stop and ask if I were okay. A man from Arizona offered me a pain pill. Other than that, there was not anything anyone could do. There was no rescue. I had to just keep walking.
Eventually, I got to the municipal refuge at Villadangas del Paramo. Men and women were crammed together in one room. I had the bed closest to the bathrooms, so I was privy to the 'activities.'
A couple of miles before the albergue, I had been passed by an unfriendly guy with long hair. He looked like Fabio on the cover of a dime store romance novel. He was wearing rust-colored gauchos, a white cotton pirate blouse and a straw hat. I thought, "Wow, he is really getting into the part. That is some get-up."
When I arrived at the albergue, there was a note posted on the dormitory wall (spelled wrong) that said, "Fres chicken soup with paprikas 1 Euro plate." When I stepped out of the shower, I smelled the chicken stock boiling, and who should be cooking it, but Yanni-In-The-Gauchos. He smelled pretty bad, and I wondered if he had washed his hands.
I later learned that his name was Ka'l Ma'l and that he was Transylvanian. When we were hanging our laundry outside, he told me how his bank had twice taken auto withdrawals from his account, despite his having instructed them not to, and how he was having to cook meals at the albergues in order to keep going, because he did not have any money. He said he had started in St. Jean Pied de Port on July 10th and had had bad luck the whole time, starting with his having lost ten euros when he pulled out his identification in Bucharest, to his puffy pirate shirt never drying, and him always having to wear it wet.
A couple of hours later I sat down to a bowl of his awful soup. It basically was just a bowl of broth with onions, carrots, parsley and bones. Ka'l Ma'l ate with me. He seemed very sad. I guessed he was about thirty-eight. He said he had a thirteen-year-old son in Transylvania, and that he was walking to Finnestere hoping to be reborn there, "to return a new man." He said his father had died seventeen years before without ever having seen the ocean. Ka'l Ma'l had brought dirt from his father's grave in a bottle to put in the ocean. He planned to then fill the bottle with ocean water and pour it on his father's grave when he returned home.
Others in the albergue (including the hospitalero) laughed at him. I was moved by his story and by the fact that we each had our hardships on the Way. He was humiliated by his having to cook and clean his way to Finesterre. When I stood to carry my bowl to the kitchen, he said, "No, sit. What is one more plate?" I thought, "No, let me serve him instead." So I went into the kitchen and did the dishes.
I then went to sleep early. Ka'l Ma'l's cot was next to mine. Before tiptoeing out of the albergue early the next morning to try and find a bus to Astorga, I put ten euros on his pillow. I hoped to help him on his way. Who knows, it might have been a big bamboozle, but I do not think so. I do not think he was someone who had necessarily done a lot of good in his lifetime, but I believe he was someone who wanted to.
At one point, he had asked me about my faith and about how to find God. I had not said much. He was the third person who had expressed to me a desire to find God on the Camino. He was the third person whom I very likely had prevented from seeing God.
As I rode the bus the next day to Astorga, I asked God to forgive me for the times I had closed others' eyes to life, to optimism, and to hope; for the times I had kept others apart from His love through the din of my folklore and my distorted views.
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