Kendall’s Quest:

One of the differences between Portugal and Spain is that Spain is far more prosperous, and I suppose one bit of fallout from that is the fact that public transportation is not what it was, now that so many people own their own cars. As a result, the train from Santiago that used to leave for Lisbon at 6:25 a.m. has been cancelled. I am booked in a hostel in Santiago for tonight and in another one in Sintra, Portugal (near Lisbon) tomorrow. The only way I can get to Sintra tomorrow is to leave Santiago today, in a couple of hours, forfeiting my night in the hostel here and forfeiting the remainder of my second day in Santiago. I then ride the trains all night, with various layovers and changes. I arrive in Lisbon at 5:15 tomorrow morning, wait around for a couple of hours, and finally get another train for Sintra. Migraine material, and not as I hoped it would be, but so it is. I went to the Cathedral this morning. There is a Pilgrim Mass at noon, and at 11 a.m., every seat in the house was taken already. The queue for the Tree of Jesse had over 200 people in it. There are large tour groups being led by people who speak very loudly and carry umbrellas so their tour group can see where they are. The energy has a wa-WAH-wwwwaaaaa quality, like deep feedback from a sound system. The stores selling tourist junk were open at dawn: hats and sticks with pilgrim shells on them, shell necklaces, shell earrings, shell purses, shell shoes, shell ashtrays, shell dishes, shell T-shirts of many varieties, shell candy, shell sandwiches, backpacks with shells on them (for pilgrims who may have met bed-bugs on the way and had to throw their old backpacks away, I suppose), and the beat goes on. It´s a beautiful, beautiful city, and early August is probably its busiest time of the year. I loved it. I got the book. I´m leaving it. No more time for blogging today.

This incredibly beautiful city is altogether too much to take in. Even if I had a week, a month, a year, I would still be taking it in. I bought a book about it to take home, and I am not even trying to take pictures. The most surprising thing so far is that when I got to the Cathedral, I staggered around for a few minutes, and then I began to cry. I didn´t mean to cry. Nobody else I saw, of all the hordes of people, was crying. In fact they were shooting pictures and videos, talking, chewing gum, whistling, cajoling their kids into paying attention, lining up to touch the Tree of Jesse or to see the relics, kissing, holding hands, helping their aged mothers and grannies, and doing all the things that people do. I was shocked at myself, sobbing. I couldn´t help it. My sense of privilege was overwhelming. My awe was overwhelming. My sense of history is overwhelming: I feel the energies of the many people who have come here on foot, on their knees, as penance or as praise, hundreds of thousands of people for more years than I can imagine, many of whom must have died on the way. This is where they were trying to get to. And here I am. Not even a Christian. Did not follow the golden arrows. Sobbing. I found myself gazing into the eyes of a beautiful little figure of Santa Nossa Señora Salome. Salome was made into a saint? Wasn´t she the one who asked for the head of John the Baptist on a silver platter? The one Oscar Wilde wrote about? They made her a saint? Well, no matter. Obviously it is not her legend that moved me, since I don´t really know what her legend is. It is her stillness. The statue has a great stillness and presence to it that moves me. I did take a picture of her. I could wrap my spirit around her. She was the one presence in that vast and unimaginably complex cathedral that I could wrap my spirit around, and I put my hand on one of her little feet for a while, till I felt grounded enough to move again. If anybody knows anything about how she became a saint or what her story is, do tell me. But more about Finisterre, and more about this place. Read the rest of this entry »

After trains and buses from 8 a.m. till 7 p.m. yesterday, including a two-hour layover in Santiago de Compostela, where the action at the bus station is better than an erotic movie (more on that another time, but let me say now that Chaucer was not wrong about the Camino and its affect on the lusts of the pilgrims)–after all that long schlep, I finally got to the End of the Earth, Finisterre. Fisterre. Finis Terra. I am here with the warm sun, a blasting fierce wind, more seagulls than I thought possible in one place, and many young pilgrims with shaggy heads, walking sticks, hiking boots, and wild joy. As I was walking the 6 km road up to the lighthouse at the end of the world just before sunset yesterday, a young man with a lean face, glasses, and blonde curly hair was walking down the road barefoot, carrying his shoes, smiling. I beamed a great smile at him, and he burst into English (so much for my thinking I am not instantly recognizable as an English-speaker): “I am enjoy life this moment. Everything is beautiful. I am beautiful this moment!” I opened my arms to him and shouted, “Yes, you are beautiful!” He rushed into my arms, gave me a long hug, and then backed off, his eyes full of tears, and kissed my hand. It was that kind of afternoon. Read the rest of this entry »

I have acquired the coolest flip-flops in the universe (Brazilian Havaianas; even movie stars wear them, and I got them on sale for 11.90 Euros), a tan, and a little less of myself (the result, I suppose, of all this walking). When I catch my reflection in shop windows, I don´t recognize that woman. Could she be French? No. But Belgian, possibly, or German. The longer I stay here, the less often people recognize me as American on sight. Getting rid of the Beppis was a good move. I have also been turning over in my mind a braid of four conversations on the subject of exile. I have been observing and even practicing the Portuguese art of hanging out. I am so happy, the radiance has completely reordered my aura, I´m sure. I will have to ask Lola, who sees auras, when I get back to Texas. But about exile, wanderlust, and degrees of separation…. Read the rest of this entry »

Viana do Castelo was established as a Roman outpost called Diana, at the place where the River Lima meets the Atlantic. It is an elegant, feminine city, rather like New Orleans was before the floods: shops selling tourist crap, glorious old buildings with wrought iron balconies, the river, flowers, churches, and (what New Orleans never had) a bustle of development. Old warehouses are being rebuilt into lofty condos, the statue of “Viana” herself is hidden behind construction cranes, businessmen somewhat less spiffy than those in Porto walk with a spring in their steps. They are swimming in technological transfer, here. A beggar near the train station was mewling his poor-me melody when suddenly an unmistakable ring came from his pocket. He interrupted his cry, pulled out his flip-phone, and in a completely different voice, cheery and upbeat, “Hola!” I´m going to blog a bit more about this city, but I´ve had my epiphany for the moment, and apart from the conversation with the taxi driver who brought me down the hill from St. Luzia, I´ve had no intense encounters, so if you´re having a busy day, you can stop here and check back in another day, perchance for more depth. I´m staying in a hostel on a ship docked on the Lima, and so far the highlight for me was the Atlantic beach at sunset yesterday. Read the rest of this entry »

I was the only person on the bus when I arrived in Melgaço near 9 p.m. on Friday, and I needed a taxi to take me to the hostel, which is not actually in Melgaço but is about two miles away, in a pine-woods area of the mountains designed for sports, with two enormous football stadia, a swimming pool, a four-star hotel, walking trails, and the offices of Melgaço Radical, an organization that runs white-water rafting trips. There were no football games scheduled, so I was almost the only person in the hostel. On Saturday some families appeared in three and four generations, but no single (nor even coupled) travelers. The only bus for Viana do Castelo, where I am now and about which I will talk in another post, did not leave till 7 p.m. Sunday night. So I had a weekend of astonishing quiet and the first boredom I have experienced since my year and a half of being bedridden as a child. I was forced to confront what I have avoided, even in lengthy meditation retreats: the bare and embarrassing truth of who I have created as my self, the humiliating truth of my habit of discontent, and the possibility of letting it all go. It was an experience more uncomfortable than bed-bugs and more startling than any adventure I have had yet. Read the rest of this entry »

The lights in Guimarães are not ALWAYS lit. This happens to be the biggest celebration in the town in 100 years. The patron saint of the town is St. Gualter (St. Walter in his English manifestation), and on the first weekend in August since 1906, there has been a big celebration, homecoming, festival, hoopla. That´s why I had to leave: every room in the town is booked for the weekend. That´s why the streets are full of lights and people. The brochure for the event (available only in Portuguese) quotes Jose Saramago as follows, “a memória que temos e a responsabilidade que assumimos porque sem memória não existimos e sem responsabilidade não mereciamos existir.” I love his dry sense of humor. This morning as I left Guimarães, the streets were not sleepy, as usual. They were packed with people shopping, hauling great plastic bags of things up hill and down hill, buying flowers and foods and gifts for relatives arriving from out of town. There was a feeling of intense excitement. There will be food and music and dancing in every square of the town tonight. I´d love to be there, but it can´t be, so I´m on my way to Melgaço, which apparently is the one place in Portugal nobody else wants to be this weekend. Read the rest of this entry »

Guimarães at night is unbelievable: the city THROBS with energy, life, and light. There are flashing, twinkling, twirling LIGHTS all over the main streets. I got several pictures. It´s like a huge fair, only it´s every night. It´s ten American cities at Christmas. Where do they get the electricity to run all these lights? I don´t know, but it is joy, and it belongs to everyone. Families are out with their dogs, their kids, and their grannies, walking, talking, playing, competing at chess or card games in the park with many onlookers. The college students are dancing to their own beats, or rubbing against each other, or arguing and drinking many beers. There is such life here. I´ve never seen anything like it. There is even a “Museum of the Night,” but I was too tired to check it out. So this is just a quick blog, the morning after, to add that, and also to add a couple of qualifications and apologies for my offenses. Read the rest of this entry »

I thought Lisbon was terrific; Porto was even more lively than Lisbon and would have been fabulous but for the bed-bugs; then Braga blew me away; Ponte de Lima was the perfect place to be sick and watch the river and let my eyes land on beauty and peacefulness till I could walk again. But lemme tell ya: Guimarães (pronounced gee-ma-RYE-sh) beats everything. This is it, this is the top, this has to be the most exciting city in Portugal, if not in the world. It has incredible art, jaw-dropping architecture, a castle with parapets you can stroll on, a cable car up to the nearest mountain top, a slammin University community full of pierced and tattooed people reading books in the park and listening to MP3s and kissing and sitting in cafes that blare out heavy metal and doing what college kids do, a cyber center that´s open till 2 a.m. and only charges one Euro per hour, and GET THIS! A washer and dryer available FREE in the hostel. So I will wash all my clothes again and dry them for a very long time tonight, freeing myself at last of any possible bed-bug eggs left anywhere. And it´s my birthday. And I am so happy, if it weren´t for my all-terrain Beppi´s I´d be levitating. Read the rest of this entry »

Here I am by the River Lima, and like the Roman soldiers, I had a trip with memory loss yesterday. Man, I haven´t had a high like that since the hash parties of the 70s. After the IV antihistamines, I blogged in for a few minutes, and then I went to sit by the water. It was absolutely fascinating. My brain turned off entirely, and it was just the speckles, the water, the movement, and time passing in silence. It was just like deep meditation; only of course with meditation, you can stop the experience when you want to. But hey. I´m not complaining. It was hilarious. The light, at some point, started bothering my eyes, so I reached into my new cheapshit daypack to get my sunglasses, and as soon as I got the bag open I sat there staring into it, wondering what the hell I opened that thing for. I thought about it for a long time, then looked back at the water, and Voila! sunglasses. That was it. The evening went sort of that way, till I fell asleep in my room around 7 p.m., and that was it for July 24. I missed the sunset and everything. But it was a delicious sleep, and I had a dream that was remarkable. I´ll save that till the end of today´s blog though, because I know other people´s dreams can be boring, and this one is only of interest to other writers anyway. So I´ll say more about the beauty of Ponte de Lima, the market, the shoes, and then finally the dream. Read the rest of this entry »