new friends... old friends... just along the way

one of the highlights of being in ligonde was the amazing people i met who were working alongside me or just passing through.

here are a few of the people i remember. (i'll have to come back and write some more about the people i was working with, as i really did learn a lot from them as well. and there is a lot more to be said even about the pilgrims, i am just too tired to write much more right now.)

a spanish guy with 3 kids, i unfortunately don't remember his name, but he got me thinking about walking the whole camino - about 30+ days and about doing it more or less alone. he said he thought everyone at some point should do the whole thing and do it alone. not just as a challenge, but as quality time to think and grow. after the day with the Lord, walking alone, i would really love to walk the whole thing and am trying to think of a time i could actually do it. we'll see...

several hungarians, one named kata, and another one who i can't quite remember her name either, possibly esther. anyway, she impressed me as she talked about her country and asked for our prayers for it. hungary and hungarians will probably always have a special place in my heart since during college our Cru group prayed for hungary and sent people there in the summers to help with an english camp for high school and college students. many of the hungarians who passed through had a hungarian flag on their backpack, so were easy to pick out. but anyway, i digress, this girl i'll call esther asked for prayer for her country during our prayer time, so later i asked her about that (both specifics of why she wanted prayer for her country - since i haven't been the best with keeping up with news of hungary over the years - and about her spiritual journey - she mentioned that several were fasting and praying for their country, not the thing you hear everyday). it was interesting and encouraging to hear that many hungarians are calling out to God to heal their country, which economically isn't doing so well and still has a very high rate of suicide among youth. so, if you think of it pray and fast for hungary with them and for them.

i also met this woman christine, who is an american and who will probably crash at my place on wednesday on the way back to the states. she was walking with an austrian friend she had met along the way, named crista.

there were some sweet madrileños and catalans and sevillanos i met as well, including several who were extremely open about their spiritual journey. it was fun to talk about God and Jesus and what He means to me and my spiritual journey as well as listening to them.

i met an english woman and a spanish woman who had both discovered God along the camino. after explaining the Gospel to both they both said that was what they wanted in their life. they had both grown up with spiritual baggage that had kept them from allowing God into their lives, but now wanted to release control to him. please pray for them.

there was a japanese kid and a german girl, both of whom were searching for God but who were waiting for him to reveal himself to them along the camino. they had three days left of walking when the stayed with us. please pray for them.

again and again people commented on the peace present at our refuge and how there was something different about this place, something that drew them in and made them feel at home. we shared that we wanted to serve them and to demonstrate Jesus's character through both actions and words. it is amazing how open people are during this journey, pilgrimage, and how almost all of them are looking for something spiritual. pray that they would find Jesus.

there are a few people i will hopefully talk with again, but many whom we were only a day in their life. fortunately God is in control and he can use their time with us and at the refugio in powerful ways to draw them to him.

three days walking...

as we were working at the house with pilgrims, most of which had spent nearly a month walking the camino and some just a few days AND as part of the training, we walked the camino for three days. we had 5 Euros each for the entire time, plus some group money which was limited. we walked with all the belongings we would take and we had to find housing along the way and take care of any other needs we (personally and collectively) might have.

the first day was our day with the Lord and we were asked to walk alone and given some instructions for how we could spend our time if we wanted some instruction. this was a great blessing, particularly after a week of having very little time alone. it was so good to have time really completely ALONE with Jesus. the only thing i was sad about was that this day came to a close.

also on this day the Lord blessed me with a walking stick. i asked a man at a store where we began in O´Cebreiro about buying a walking stick. all his sticks were 7 euros and i only had 5 for the next 3 days. i asked if he might have something less, he asked how much i had and i said 5, but quickly added that i couldn't spend it all on the walking stick. i told him that i could spend 2 and he said he didn't have anything, so i went on my way. about 5km (3 miles) into our walk, i saw a car stop ahead and it was Alicia (a friend) with a walking stick saying that the guy went looking for me later to gift me this walking stick. he said that he liked me and felt bad for not having anything to sell to me, so wanted to just give me one of his walking sticks. i just happened that she arrived right before the big hills came along (where a walking stick, particularly on the downhills, is very helpful). i might also add that this night, after finding a place for us to eat, a woman invited me to a coffee. so at the end of day one i still had all of my 5 euros.

this night we slept in a gym with hundreds of others and got VERY LITTLE sleep, thanks to the chorus of snoring people and several crying children which then echoed throughout the gym. at least it was dry and warm. and since we didn't have to pay for our housing, we got to have a bit nicer dinner with hot food!

the second day was the day where we would walk with one other person and ask the Lord to give us opportunities to bless the other pilgrims along the way and to share the Gospel with them. i walked with Esther from Austria and a 10-year old boy, Nicolas, from France. i got a chance to practice my limited french and to learn some more. i also met some fun catalans (from NE Spain) and got to talk quite a lot with Jose and the others about Jesus and what it means (and doesn't mean) to follow him. they invited me to a drink and some snacks. (i spent 1 euro on a coffee along the way, was later invited to a snack, and later got an extra euro that i was told to keep after buying the sandwiches and translating for our group. and someone invited me to another coffee. so, i still had 5 euros.)

this night we slept outside under a cement covered overhang. i met a sweet girl from Estonia (in northern europe). this night was nice other than the annoyance by some that several of our group got beds inside (for which we had to pay) and the rest of us (and the majority of us) were sleeping outside. i slept pretty well, but was harshly awakened by two japanese pilgrims sleeping with us under this overhang arguing and one throwing up in on the step right above where most of us were sleeping. it was strange and disturbing and for awhile i thought he was not drunk, but severely sick. my estonian friend was unfortunately directly by the vomit, so she quickly moved down to where we were and eventually the craziness subsided and we went back to sleep.

all three days were amazingly beautiful, but this day we left at 6am, which meant we were walking as the sun was rising and through a heavy fog, which made everything quite surreal.

the third day was the day we walked in small groups. andreu had asked to be my partner the day before, right after i had agreed to walk with ester. so he and i had agreed to walk together this day. marian, reyes, and ester joined our group (which was great fun). andreu and marian took advantage of me being around to practice their english and it was fun to get to know them both better. this day we walked 37km, which is a bit more than 22 miles. generally we would have walked the first stretch and done the later half on the next day.

after leaving at 6am without breakfast or coffee we decided that the first cafe we came to after walking a bit, we'd stop for coffee. we stopped at this really quaint rustic place which i have always passed when walking the camino, but never stopped to eat. we ordered coffee and pan con tomate (good spanish bread toasted with tomatoe and olive oil rubbed onto it - the best breakfast in the world, or close there to). the coffee came in large bowls, at least 2-3x what we would have normally gotten - tazones en vez de just tazas. we enjoyed a semi-leisurely breakfast and then went on our way. we pooled all our money together and by God's grace we had all saved most of it until this time. and thankfully our money went far at this particular cafe.

later we stopped in puertamarine (where several years ago both marian and i had jumped off a bridge a couple times into the lake below). we reminisced about this time, endured the never ending downhill, part of which we walked backwards to help out the knees, and all stopped to get some lunch. we enjoyed a salad between the now six of us and got tuna empanadas (a specialty of this region) and stopped by the grocery store for some aquarius (the spanish version of gatorade, and by the way in my opinion it also tastes much better) and fruit for the camino. the second stretch was ALL uphill and in full sun. it was definitely a time where i needed to depend on the Lord to be patient with others, to love others, and to choose to slow down to walk with those who wanted to stop and rest or go at a slower pace. it was good to be pushed beyond my normal limits. and it was great to have my friend marian, or mari-angeles, with me to talk and process our reactions (mainly the not so good reactions/emotions of impatience, judgment, criticalness, etc.,).

when we got to ligonde, where the refuge/albergue we have, it was SOOO nice! and we actually got to sleep in a bed for the night. it was nice to just be clean.

this night we shared about our experiences and i learned quite a bit from just the sharing of others. if i have time, i might share more about each of these days later.

note: the picture above has the yellow arrows that you follow on the camino. they show the way to santiago (the destination for most). we actually walked only to ligonde, where the albergue is.

cows, blisters, tents, horreos, and simplicity

There are many things about which I have both contemplated during my time in Ligonde.

First, to paint a picture of our time, we were living in a town of I believe about 80 or 90. Most of the living beings we saw were animals and, in fact, our neighbors lived in the same house as the animals. The most common smell was that of cow manure and a several time a day occurrence was the moving of the cows. They went from one plot of land or barn to another. (I should have asked more questions, but I'm still not fully sure why this took place.) But without fail we'd have to move out of the way to not get stampeded or pooped on (literally). It was a town of simplicity. A place in which many of the houses recently got electricity and plumbing. A place in which it is a normal thing for laundry to be washed outside by hand and for women into their 70s and 80s to work HARD from sunrise to long after sunset. A place where common knowledge includes how to birth a calf or a lamb or a baby for that matter.

There is still an eclectic mix of people. One is Jose who lived in Switzerland for some time, speaks french, italian, english, german, spanish, and gallego, or at least decent amounts of each. He came home when his brother died to help out the family and hasn't left since. He said he's already seen the world and has no need to leave Ligonde for much. He enjoys his simple life and his family.

Maria and Jesús are the neighbors who live WITH their animals. You walk in their house and the room on the left is for the cows, the kitchen is on the right (with no door, just a door frame, between the two, then upstairs is where the people and cats sleep. Definitely a very modest and unupdated home.

We slept in tents outside the full two weeks, so as to not take the spaces of pilgrims in the house. I began the time sleeping with my friend Ruth and her daughter Elia and then, after they left, had a tent to myself. We ate outside, generally showered with cold water (occasionally it was warm, which was always a nice surprise), and definitely lived in community. We woke up at 6:30ish to prepare the coffee & milk for the pilgrims, to clean the house, and to eat ourselves. We had a time of prayer in pairs and then began our day. The morning was spent preparing the house for the day, greeting pilgrims who passed by or stopped momentarily to get their credential stamped, to chat, to get some coffee, to use the bathroom, etc., and we had some teaching times for the western european new staff training. After several hours of class we got ready for lunch and then spent the afternoon attending to pilgrims, relaxing a bit, and preparing for the evening (cooking, preparing stories, etc.,). In the evening we showed the Jesus Film, had a time of prayer (for our needs and those of the pilgrims - this was generally in about 4 different languages with some translation), ate dinner with the pilgrims inside, had a storytelling time (where we shared a couple prepared stories, heard stories from the camino, and then spent some time reflecting on the day and to take care of business (in terms of forgiving, asking for forgiveness, and receiving forgiveness so as to "not let the sun go down on our anger"). This was a very special time. Lights in the house went out at 11pm, which is about the time the stars came out outside. Often we'd walk to a local cafe to hang out a bit more and during which I enjoyed the quietness of this little town and the clearness of the sky (with its millions of stars) and would quietly thank God for bringing me here, for His creation, for His goodness, and for the happenings of the day.

While I haven't much shared about my ponderings, the simplicity and the magic of this place will remain with me. (And in just about 10 days I will be back in this part of Spain hiking the camino with teenagers from across Europe. You can definitely pray for this time.)

Note: The second picture is of an "horreo", is is where corn is kept so as not to be eaten by the squirrels. And it is pronounced "oreo" like the cookie. The first picture is of a ternera, a calf, Eva and I were shown some 4 day old calves by Maria Eugenia, one of the neighbors. Amazing!

coming back to madrid...

so, i arrived back in madrid this morning at about 10:30am. amazing, since i left ligonde this morning at 5:15am, but thanks to johnny & chema, i got home safe (and was able to sleep for more than half the trip). i had planned on coming home by train (which would have put me back at 9:30 pm), but after finding out they were driving back through madrid i canceled my ticket. it was a good decision.

when i found out it was only 10:30 am, i thought, "wow, i have the whole day left!" but in reality i have spent the day unpacking, doing laundry, sleeping, resting, and sleeping some more. (it's kind of ironic, as when chema asked if i was going to go back to sleep when i got home, i said definitively no. oh well. the only thing i really needed to do today was catch up a bit on e-mail, get resettled, go grocery shopping (so i can eat - which is yet to be done).

while much warmer than ligonde (which by the way was FREEZING), madrid is not quite the smoldering heat i expected. i even have the windows open and have a nice, cool breeze.

note: the second picture is the sierra, the mountains which is what we passed through on the way into madrid. it is really beautiful! (as is much of spain.) :-)

my last couple of weeks

the past two weeks i have been in VERY rural NW Spain, where it is much more normal to see cows, roosters, hens, sheep, chicks, goats and dogs running down the street than people, except the pilgrims traveling the Camino de Santiago.

i had the privilege of joining 30-40 others from around europe to serve at the Fuente del Peregrino albergue in Ligonde, Spain.

the next few posts will be dedicated to sharing some of the memories and lessons from that time.