You don't always get what you want

Jeremy decides to wake up early.

The youth hostel is empty, and some doors are open in the corridor with a trolley full of used white bed sheets chucked into the dangling basket. So the Spanish cleaning ladies are already at work!

To Jeremy it suggests some pilgrims have risen early, even earlier than him; which he finds a tad disappointing. Leaving the hostel and pushing the key into the small slit in the box on reception, he feels an itch of irritation that someone has stolen his thunder.

‘They have probably set out for the day along the Camino francés northern route, there is a path which branches directly out to the right from the hostel,’ he thinks.

He leaves the hostel with a machine-made coffee in a plastic cup at half past six. It will be a hot day in Santiago de Compostela. With its cobbled streets and stone steps that lead to 12th century abbeys or narrow streets or old market halls or even the huge square of the Cathedral Basilica. The beating heart of Galicia.

‘Over 35 degrees celsius today’ says the Spanish weather forecast as he looks at his iphone, but for now it's still cool in the shadows. So he sits in a small courtyard with a decorated marble fountain (he’d passed it by yesterday evening on the way to the youth hostel) under exotic eucalyptus trees - to finish his 1 euro coffee.

Afterwards, Jeremy has a lot of time to walk through ‘old town’ before his girlfriend arrives at the estacion de autobuses. Hours in fact; as she doesn’t arrive until 11 am. More churches and stone steps lead into narrow medieval lanes, more than he could count, and the mediterranean sun blasts down, bleaching the walls.

He lies underneath large sycamores on a park bench trying to read his holiday book ‘Odysseus’. The snoring of fellow dormitory sleepers had kept him awake for much of the night. He falls into a quiet and deep slumber. Not even the genius of Homer can keep him awake.

Three young people, don loose elephant pattern slacks and colourful wristbands, play loud drums at the park entrance. The booms of the drum echoed loudly around the rock gardens of the Parque de la Alameda. He falls asleep and later wakes up to the sighing of wind in trees - the harsh drums have stopped. People saunter around him on the gravel paths, their feet crunching.

It's now mid-morning. His girlfriend Janine arrives in half an hour and the thought of her gives him a pleasant tingling sensation in the right side of his gut.

*

It upsets Jeremy that Janine does not enjoy walking. But she had surprised him when she agreed to come on this trip to the Spanish north-west.

‘So I shouldn’t complain,’ he thinks. But walking 800 miles on the Camino de Santiago, like all the other pilgrims, was a dream, an impossible one. The Way of St. James, who it is said was one of the thirteen apostles of Jesus Christ leads out from the centre of the city, where relics are said to be buried in the Archcathedral Basilica.

For him, walking the Way of St. James as a pilgrim would have to happen in another year; but it would cost time and money, both of which, for now he didn’t have. Only enough for a few days here and then together on to Porto - where the fresh sea air swung down into the estuary and into the populous banks - the historic Ribeira district.

As he crept toward the Santiago station, he walked around crowds of people gathered in the streets in front of the aged facades of the brown-yellow stained 12th century buildings - that emanated the prints of time: they looked like something you’d see in a travel guidebook.

*

Janine smiled broadly as Jeremy approached her. He did so too. She was standing outside the swinging glass doors of the estacion de autobus. He’d missed her slight Irish ‘twang’ in her voice, courtesy of a year’s exchange through the 2004 Erasmus programme. The family had been horrid, but she’d loved Ireland and picked up accents like an expert athlete picked up sports.

Janine was forty two now, but she still had maintained her slender figure - the same one as when they first had met several years ago.

‘Slimmer even,’ thought Jeremy.

The product of good dietary habits inspired from strong healthy Slovakian upbringing. Cold 5 am starts at the ice rink. A demanding father and kind mother; it was the perfect combination. She shook off early starts like a swan flicks away the droplets of a lake.

‘What took you so long?’ asked Janine.

‘Well, I fell asleep in the park,’ Jeremy said.

‘Relax,’ she said and hugged him tightly around the neck, followed by a short but deep kiss.

‘Have you been waiting long ?’ Jeremy asked, noticing the flash of sandy skin as her dress shifted in the wind.

‘Not at all so long,’ Janine said, ‘the train went so fast, it almost felt like flying - it’s a feeling I’ve never had before. I think it crossed half of Spain in a flash. Two hours ago, I was still in Madrid. It sort of feels weird to be here in a completely different part of Spain… so quickly.’

‘First time on the bullet train?’ Jeremy asked.

‘Yeah. I quite enjoyed it to be honest: good air con and coffee.’

‘Not a fan of it all,’ said Jeremy.

‘I knew you’d say that,’ replied Janine, ‘typical YOU!’

‘Then you know me,’ said Jeremy, and he paused to scratch his head, ‘how long has it been, that we’ve been together? What, nine years?’

‘Eight,’ she said.

‘That’s a long time,’ said Jeremy.

‘It is,’ she said.

‘My longest relationship had been one year,’ he said and Janine laughed, before she gave him another (longer) kiss this time.

‘Life is far more than about speed and convenience. It’s why I love walking so much! It slows life down and helps get a sense of perspective. Life for me, is best served on a cold dish of discomforts and sleepless nights - but at least it leaves you to stare at the stars.’

Janine laughed again.

‘Aren’t you some kind of masochist?’ she blurted, stepping away flustered.

Jeremy said nothing and looked away. ‘No. I don’t think so,’ he said after a pause. Janine laughed again.

*

The sound of a female voice boomed out from a hidden loudspeaker somewhere in the station filling the wide empty spaces. People passed by like waddling penguins, pushing their way through the glass doors which opened and closed automatically.

Some were smiling and had clad themselves in trendy and expensive clothes and similarly over-priced sunglasses. Others looked gloomy and tense as if disappointed to have arrived at a place that was once, many years ago, sacred. Now, the Santiago de Compostela had turned into a capitalist hot spot; the very thing the Camino pilgrimages did not stand for.

Walking the Camino, a deeply religious or spiritual pursuit had been turned into a commodity for sale in the 21st century. For just two euros, ‘fake’ hikers could pump out their chests proudly with a shell badge pinned on the heart spot of their shirt.

‘But then what did that make me?’ considered Jeremy, ‘I haven’t even walked the Way either!’

Shells, shells, shells. Shells were on sale in every form in the shops that cluttered the small streets of another time - a time where there was ‘real quiet’. No cars or anything. Those times have gone.

Instead, Santiago now has postcards, fridge magnets, wayward sign marker ornaments.

‘Or heck, a tourist might even fancy getting an artificial St. James finger for a good price and name it a relic,’ thought Jeremy.

‘So are we doing this thing or what?’ said Janine.

Camino de Santiago's old town was, predictably, a dense throng of tourists. Strong smells of Portuguese fish and cooked Spanish Octopus (fresh off the boat) or the scent of bubbling shellfish paellas drifted along the haze through the Riva de San Pedro.

The couple eyed the menus hungrily, tapping the glass cases impatiently on eight hundred year old walls. The words were all in Spanish, and but for a Spanish omelette (Jeremy guessed) they saw nothing to their taste; nothing to abate their hunger.

They were famished.

‘Well, that’s no good, is it? Janine says with an extra ‘Irish’ roll of the tongue.

I’d say, this is all they have on offer - these Octopus and trout. Yuk! Where’s the proper food - I’m absolutely starving,’ she said.

‘I’m so hungry, I’d eat the moon right now; if it were made of something nice. But not fish - I absolutely hate fish.’

*

Along the Avenida Libertador Bernardo O’Higgins, grey stone with patches of a moss shaped white, gave the city an emphasised ancient feel; like stepping back into the 12th century. And yet while the churches and romanesque pillars of the market halls were a mixture of tuscan yellow and grey as a rhino’s skin - the measure of time - the stone’s rough touch mirrored the menacing stares of the locals.

Big ladies in white frocks stood outside their trinkets or clothes or souvenir shops with their arms folded. There were more upmarket jewellery or shoe shops, but the ladies felt just as threatening to Janine.

Eventually, Janine and Jeremy took a seat in the middle of a small court full of tables and chairs.

‘It seems there are several different restaurants operating here,’ said Janine, ‘we have to choose. Look there’s an empty space there - let’s go.’

The tables were filled by sitting guests all laughing, eating and drinking - their voices a cacophony of human hum in a calm atmosphere. The place was surrounded by grey walls and ancient churches.

As they sat down, a Spanish couple wriggled in their seats as if a foreign plague had just come to their table.

While the waiter was all smiles with the large groups. When he finally passed them, he quickly took down their half order with a swipe of the wrist and pen on a notepad (six small croquettes and a Spanish omelette).

The Spanish couple giggled as they looked at them, then continued their conversation loudly in Spanish. Janine looked like she was about to burst into tears.

Jeremy stopped the illusive waiter after twenty minutes, by standing up and said: ‘Me gustaría pagar la cuenta ahora, por favor,’ (I’d like to pay the bill now please) taking care to say it with the Spanish ‘lisp’ as he’d been taught in school.

They were about to leave when Jeremy turned to the Spanish couple, who were now as white as sheets, as if a nearby bomb had exploded around them.

‘Perhaps it’s not so polite to speak so rudely about other people. Especially when you think they can’t understand your language. But I know a little Spanish,' he said. He winked at them and they squirmed in their seats, looking left and right with red faces.

Without another word, Janine and Jeremy headed down a narrow lane towards the Alameda park to check out the eucalyptus trees and a small market which offered fruit, snacks and good quality souvenirs. Then they went to the hotel.

*

That night, from their hotel room, they watched flashes of white through the window - sounds of booming drums ripped through the streets of the UNESCO Heritage town. The Archcathedral Basilica stood towering in the centre, like a long dark shadow flickering on an elephant’s back.

‘Good thing we didn’t go for a stroll tonight," says Jeremy as he turns, slowly, to Janine and kisses her on the cheek.

‘Thunder is so exciting isn’t it?’ Janine says.

‘When you’re not out in it, it is.’ says Jeremy.

*

Today they have decided to walk.

Following the wayward shell markers on the Camino francés soon the signs stop and they get lost. The storm from last night had passed quickly and a cool wind blew with the fresh smell of flowers. In the background the blue sky was being cleaned by dish-cloth white clouds.

When they see three men with large rucksacks heading down a tarmac path toward them they ask for the way, feeling stupid.

‘That way,’ they say and point, designer watches flashing in the sun. They tell us it is their last stretch of the Camino - to the streets of the city. The Cathedral square, where they’ll walk through the stone arch and Scottish bagpipes bellow. It is just down the road we tell them.

Waves up on waves of pilgrims marching down towards us as they head up along the tarmac road. It looks a bit like a cycle path. It is constantly interrupted by speeding bikes lost on the tour de france or was cut across by busy road junctions. Eventually it melts into red dusty paths that lead through tiny hamlets.

The path winds round in an arc past shopping centres. Groups of younger walkers sing pop songs together at the top of their lungs as they bound toward Santiago, having walked several hundred miles. Many of the hikers wish them ‘Bon Camino’ in the 21st century.

"We are real Camino goers now," says Janine and laughs. ‘We just need the certificate now (the credential) to prove it, and get it signed in one of those offices.’ She clenched her hands into the ‘rock and roll’ sign.

‘Photo.’

At the top of the hill was a tourist office where queues of people with rucksacks (some large and some lightweight) waiting for their credential (the certificate) to be stamped.

They sit on a stone slab wall and look out. A ragged dressed Japanese man silently stands in the meadow. He gazes toward the cathedral hiding among the grey. Jeremy wonders what he is thinking about. What would it be like to walk such a long distance? The conditions? Does it change you as a person?

He has wondered about the answers to these questions all the time.

When Jeremy scans back, he realises the man is on the phone: perhaps Jeremy had a maudlin view of walking the paths. Perhaps it wasn’t all that spiritually enriching at all. But he didn’t believe that.

*

The next day they reach the town of Finisterra on the coast, the final stretch of the trail, by the local bus; a two hour journey. On the way, they’d seen hikers traverse the red dusty Camino; basically along the side of the busy road, until it disappeared into the barren wilderness or under coastal embankments. It had begun to drizzle as they sauntered up the mile long hill to the Cape Finisterra lighthouse from the town, known as ‘the end of the world’.

When they reached the top of the car park, it was full and they were wet, although it was still warm. The sea stretched out ahead to the horizon beyond the lighthouse and most of the people were scrambling across the smooth weathered slabs of stone shaped over a millenia by the Mediterranean winds.

The Costa Del Morte is a monstrous stretch of ocean that endures regular raging storms and the cause of many shipwrecks. While Romans or Celtic tribes built temples there and believed ‘that is where the sun died each day.’

‘Did you walk far?’ asked an English lady holding Jeremy’s camera. Her husband was busy taking photographs of people standing by the Finisterra sign and Janine had asked him for a photo. The husband was a man in demand!

‘No. We got the bus,’ Jeremy said suspiciously.

‘See that couple over there?’ she said sharply, ‘the 70 year old man with the grey beard and his wife?’

‘The ones your husband is taking photos of?’

‘Yeah, the same,’ she said and paused for dramatic effect, ‘well, they’ve just completed a 1600 walk on the Camino.’

Jeremy struggled to hold his anger. He raged inside like a volcano. He yearned to throw her off the cliff; anything to elate his frustration. Later he would wish he had answered differently.

Often, he would play the scene out again in his mind. ‘You don’t know us or know what we’ve achieved; you don’t know I’ve walked a 180 mile walk in the UK recently; you don’t know my girlfriend has had an operation ridding her of cancer in her privates and it was by the skin of her teeth she is even here.

Instead, Jeremy doesn’t say a word and takes a deep breath. Or at least so he wished he had later. Instead he freezes, unsure about himself, stumped and doesn’t breathe at all.

‘I bet you got here by car or on the bus,’ she added gleefully, trying to put the last nail in the coffin.

‘Yes…’ Jeremy stuttered, ‘one day I would like to do that too…and I will…’.

‘Sure you will,’ the English woman says, rolling her eyes.

‘Who are YOU to say?’ thought Jeremy.

‘Here,’ he grabbed his camera out of her hands, ‘Give it here. Yes. I WILL. One day.’

He turned away angrily toward the slabs of stone further up beyond the lighthouse, leaving here to stand gaping.

Past the tall lighthouse, there were hundreds of shoes piled together in one ‘shoe cairn’ at the end: on a final promontory of land - a football pitch sized area - covered in the foot gear of hikers who’d finished the Way.

‘What a waste,’ said Jannie leaning onto Jeremy’s shoulder.

They looked toward the sea, totally covered in mist. There was the movement of something in the water faraway; it could have been dolphins. He pictured great ships sailing in from somewhere across the world from a long time ago. The end of the world, but their journey was not finished yet. Not by a long stretch.