This morning as I was having breakfast in a café, I happened to mention to a local woman of a certain age that I have a friend in Zaragoza whose father is from Estella. The lady asked me his surname and no sooner had the name Andonegui left my mouth when she started to tell me the history of the family dating back to the Visigothic era. As soon as I was able to get away from the nice lady, I left the café and phoned Pablo, my friend whose father is from Estella. We caught up after I told him all about the incident, as it’d been a while since we last spoke.
I left Estella under persistent rain, one of those light drizzles that looks like you won’t even feel it but it actually drenches you to the bone. After Ayegui, I arrived at the wine fountain in Irache. As the story goes, it would be easy to think that one fine day, through the intercession of Saint James the Apostle, wine started to flow freely from a normal everyday fountain. However, the reality is much more simple. The fountain in question is situated in a winery and the liquid that flows from it, when the tap is on, comes from a barrel. Whatever the origin of the wine, there isn’t a pilgrim who doesn’t stop here to quench their thirst and get their photo taken.
In my case, my visit coincided with that of a group of German pilgrims and a Navarran monk who was accompanying two novices, one Colombian and the other from the Ivory Coast, on their visit to the neighbouring Monastery of Irache. I spent a while talking to them all and before they left I asked them to kindly pose for my video camera and let me film them doing something spontaneous. As they couldn’t think of anything, I suggested that they link arms and move their legs in time, like a type of improvised can-can. As the experienced reader will guess, the result was absolutely catastrophic, still at least there wasn’t any ankle twisting or any type of personal disgrace…
I said goodbye to the improvised international ballet that had formed at the fountain and briefly visited the Monastery of Irache. After that I started walking again, leaving Montejurra, the place where the Carlists celebrate their annual romerías (pilgrimages), behind to my left. After passing Azqueta and before reaching Villamayor de Monjardín, I bumped into a shepherd who turned out to be Ecuadorian and I stood and chatted with him for a while. He told me how hard his work is and how much he would love to go back to his country.
An hour and a half later I arrived in Luquin where I stopped in the village square to eat a couple of pieces of fruit I had in my rucksack and drink something. There were three old granddads in the square passing the morning. I asked them to sing a Navarran ‘jota’ for me but they told me singing wasn’t their thing. At least they didn’t tell me to fuck off, which probably would have been fair given my unusual request.
A short time after leaving the village, it began to rain again. Fortunately it was a passing cloud. A bit further ahead I met Eva, a twenty-something Californian who was walking with a slight limp. She told me she’s travelling with her father but as they have different walking speeds, he went on ahead. I mustn’t be ready to be a father because it really surprised me that he left his daughter alone, limping, in a foreign country where she doesn’t speak the language, but anyway, I didn’t dwell on it and continued on my way.
A bit further ahead also limping very noticeably was Yun, a South Korean who recently turned eighteen and headed off on this adventure before having to do military service in his country. "Well, what a moment you’ve chosen” – I said to him, making reference to the recent tensions between the two Koreas, to which he replied, with a forced smile, that it wasn’t him that chose the moment. He laid into the North Korean leader for a while who he accused of being a bully and a danger to his own country and those neighbouring, as well as a fickle man who collects fancy cars while his people are dying of hunger.
I immediately thought Yun was a nice guy and so I decided to walk with him on the rest of the route, even if in order to do that I had to slow my pace down to adjust to his weary steps. The boy seemed curious and asked me a lot about Spain and our customs; one such question was if we actually have siestas. I told him that only those who can have siestas, which is not necessarily everyone. However, he gave me the impression that it didn’t matter what I said because the mere concept itself seemed like something from science-fiction to the boy, who is longing to start working day and night in his father’s company, without going to University, as soon as he finishes his military service.
I couldn’t resist asking my new friend why
the hell so many Koreans are doing the Camino de Santiago and he told me that
it’s because someone famous in Korea did it and since then it’s become quite
popular. It’s a good job that celebrity didn’t get his balls pierced, I thought
to myself. Yun admitted to me that the Camino is very hard, and no wonder, as
they had already warned him in his country that this was harder than the army. "Damn,
you’ve got it good. If your hairy neighbour finds out, he’ll be in Seoul
tomorrow” – I thought but decided, without doubt, that it was better to keep
that remark to myself.
The last eight kilometres to Los Arcos were
through never-ending crop fields. Yun asked me if I can tell one European from
another and I told him that sometimes it’s complicated due to the amount of
mixes that exist but that in general there are certain features that can’t fool
anyone. This was really funny for Yun as, to him, we’re all the same. I told
him that it’s the same for us and that we usually lump together those with the
same type of eyes and round face as him. He told me that he can easily
distinguish a Japanese person from a Chinese person and a Korean, of course. To
give me a few clues for future reference, he gave away that the Chinese don’t
like washing themselves and the Japanese have very bad teeth. The truth is I
don’t know how Yun reached these conclusions if it’s the first time he’s been
away from home but anyway, I preferred to let it go and not get into it in
depth.
As we were nearing Los Arcos, Yun’s limp
and tiredness got a lot worse. I was starting to worry that he wouldn’t make it
to the town, partly also because every time he said the word Korea, and Yun
says it in practically every sentence, he inhales suddenly and lets out the
name of his country in one go, with emphasis on the ‘a’ as he exhales: Kore-aaa!.
I was absolutely knackered as usually at this stage of the route I would be looking
down at the ground or into the distance, and every time he said Korea, as if he
was a martial arts instructor, I was bricking it thinking that he couldn’t
breathe and that I was going to have to put my first-aid into practice there
and then. It goes without saying that giving mouth-to-mouth to a Korean wasn’t
on my list of things to do today…
Fortunately it didn’t take us too much
longer to get to Los Arcos, but we weren’t so lucky with finding room in the
pilgrim hostels as they were all full. After traipsing around the whole town,
we finally found room in ‘Hostal Ezequiel’, just as you’re leaving the town. After
showering and stretching my legs, something which is turning out to be
fundamental for my recovery after the exertion, I went out for a walk to visit
the church and the main streets of the town until Miguelo arrived, who yet
again came all the way from Pamplona to have dinner with me. Dinner in the
hostel was nothing special but I enjoyed the company and conversation of my
maño buddy. Yun excused himself
beforehand and hit the sack at nine pm telling us he was shattered. And God
knows the kid wasn’t lying…
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