Thursday, July 20, 2006

Shelora's Excellent Adventure

Shelora's Excellent Adventure
I have decided to enjoy myself, so instead of walking El Camino in 90 to 100 degree heat, with a backpack on my untrained back, and hiking boots on my untrained feet, I am going instead to stay at a lovely retreat in Toremelinos, with a swimming pool, and a garden. And a room of my own. Ok, so I'm not twenty three, as I would like to think! And I like my comforts. I don't think I have to suffer to get closer to God. In fact, I think he wants me to be happy, not miserable. So there I am, for a week at least in Torremelinos, near Malaga. Steering my life onward, and expecting miracles.

Shelora's Excellent Adventure

Shelora's Excellent Adventure
I am still in Barcelona. I have seen the sights, the Sagrada Familia, with its icecream towers, and its puff pastry saints, all carved in stone, waiting for completion in Manana land. I confess I have aquired a huge case of MANANA! The thought of doing El Camino drove me to spend an entire day locating the source of a good backpacking establishment. I went there, and bought myself a good backpack, designed for women. Thank God they had a thirty day return policy. Because when the woman I am staying with came in and asked me when I was leaving to do El Camino, I said NO! The thought of all that WORK, and PAIN and SUFFERING was too much. I took the backpack back, and went to work looking for a quiet location where I can stay and write in Spain. I found it. A Christian retreat in Torremelinos, with a pool, and air condiditoning, and cyber cafes and the beach twenty minutes walk away. Oh yes. All for an incredibly low price of $52.00 per night. Casa Nesca. She is a Dutch woman. She says that there are bulldozers next door, so it can be noisy, but nothing like Barcelona! Here it is constant traffic noise. I have seen the creations of Gaudi, the architect who built Sagrada Familia, and also built the Parc Guell, which was meant to be an enclave for the very rich, overlooking Barcelona. But the rich balked at his avant garde style, and for whatever reason it was not a success, even though the millionaire who funded it was a good friend of Gaudi's. It sounds like he gave up on the rich at that point. At some point in his life, having left his mark on many many buildings in Barcelona, he decided to dedicate himself to completing Sagrada Familia. He sold everything and moved into the Cathedral and slept on the floor. At one point, perhaps in a stupor induced by his visions, or perhaps merely hunger, he stumbled into the pathway of a tram, was hit, and died three days later. A tragedy. Then during the revolution of Franco, the antichurch people destroyed his plans for the church. But someone found a set that had been "forgotten" somewhere, and they are now dilligently working from his plans. It is quite lovely; so is the Park, gorgeous. When I was there I met students staying in a hostel. We hung together for a while, and let me say that Barcelona is VERY LIBERAL about certain activities. It was lovely to be sitting in a parc sharing with young people, openly! And all this to the tune of a lute, and a harp. It really was paradise! But so HOT! Yesterday I went to the top of the Mountain to see the city at night, but the last train was leaving in fifteen minutes so I really didn't see much. I will try again today. The smells and sounds of Barcelona are becoming a part of me. It is the sort of place where you never know what you will smell or see next. I have seen many, many different kinds of dogs, from St. Bernards to muzzled German Shepherds in the Metro, and tiny little toy dogs, and Alsatians, and, well, you get the idea. The two little white Scotties sitting by their master on the sidewalk were a trip. The girls are gorgeous, and EVERYONE wears skirts. NO pants, and very few shorts. Dancing in a disco on my birthday was a blast. I have decided to enjoy myself instead of suffering, so, for now, no El Camino. And for those of you who are curious, yes, I am still travelling alone, and nothing is as I expected, which is exactly what I expected. I have read Paulo Cohelo's "The Pilgrimage" and "The Alchemist" and now I am off on my own pilgrimage with the help of A Course in Miracles, and Rumi! And, of course, God. Via con Dios! Tonight I will eat at the "Spiritual Cafe!" Can you believe that?

Tuesday, July 18, 2006

Where to next?

I am on the verge of considering doing El Camino. However, the breeze is lovely here in my luxury apartment, and I don't relish the thought of all that walking! I have spent the morning packing away most of the uneccessary stuff which I will leave here. The rest, on my back in the backpack I will find today. Perhaps I will start with some bus touring. And the advice of Paulo Cohelo. "Somewhere someone is always waiting for the right moment for us to arrive."

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May peace prevail.
Shelora

Friday, July 14, 2006

Shelora's Excellent Adventure

Shelora's Excellent Adventure

Aboard the train to Stansted airport:
As the train winds its way to Stansted, I have a few moments to reflect on my whirlwind tour of London. Of course, the first thing that stands out is the amount of sheer stuff that I am packing around! So much of my attention has gone to managing it! OK.OK. You warned me. I cut it in half, but it is still Twice as much as I need. I was able to leave a whole wack of it in Left Luggage at Liverpool Station, and spent a good hour there, taking pictures, going to the Internet café (in MacDonald’s!) and generally getting myself situated. I was exhausted from being up all night on the plane, with a lovely young woman who kept me company chatting abuout her plans to buy in Canada with the thirty thousand dollars she had earned being a housekeeper and chauffer to a rich woman in London. Then I had to decide what to do from Gatwick. I met a teacher from Vancouver who teaches at Stratford Hall, which is an International School near Britannia. I decided to take the bus to Stensted, and fly from there to Barcelona the next day. I assumed that I would be able to get into the Travelodge there. No, of course, unlike my lovely daughter, Jessamyn, who was so well organized and planned, I had not booked, and there was no hotle anywhere to be had. The ticket lady quoted me a high price for the ticket, and said it was cheaper on the internet. Off I went to the internet, but first I took a shower in the airport so I could feel like a human being again. Mistake. I should have gone on the internet first. But at a pound for TEN MINUTES, I discovered not only that I could not book online, but that it was going to be MORE expensive. I went back to the ticket agent, and of course, she had gone home. There was nothing to be done except to stay in the airport. I was astonished to see literally hundreds of young people bedded down on the FLOOR of the airport. That held no attraction for me, so I stayed up all night walking around the airport. In the morning the woman said that at midnight the price had DOUBLED!!! I asked her what she suggested, and she said if you have no time pressure, I would wait a few days, and it will go down drastically, if you book on the internet. So I decided to go back into London, and stay a few days. I thought I would be able to stay with my friend Marta in London. Ironically, Marta Stajanova was not available, but I met another woman named Marta in a Youth Hostel. She was a performance artist from Brazil, and we spent the day touring London on double-decker sight-seeing bus. Then we sailed up the Thames to the Tower of London and back on the river boat, and took in a different view of London from the water. The bus went through Mayfair, past Buckingham Palace, and into the richest real estate on the planet, all owned by one man, the Duke of Westminster, the Queen’s cousin. He owns every property in Belgradia and Mayfair and Westminster, billions and billions of dollars worth of real estate. The ironic part is that much of it was clearly empty, five story Georgian Houses waiting for billionaires to rent them!
After the trip around the City of London, past the Temple of Mithras, 2000 years old, over the Tower Bridge, which is actually classified as a boat, because it is a floating bridge, past the Tower of London, where Fitzgerald relative, Anne Boleyn, was beheaded; past the replica of the Globe Theatre, which American actor Sam Wannamaker built, (those rich cultured Jews sure know how to spend their money, eh?) past the City of London School where Daniel Radcliffe, the star of Harry Potter, went to school; past Cleopatra’s needle, which was gifted to London by Egypt after the British prevented Napoleon from invading Egypt during the Napoleonic Wars in 1817, past The Playhouse, where The Rocky Horror Picture Show has been playing forever, past the black and gold railings along the Thames, which Queen Victoria had painted black after her beloved Alfred died, as a sign of her deep mourning; down the street where the Great Fire of London started in the bakery of Thomas Fine, and finally to Picadilly Square, where the Angel of Christian Charity, looking suspiciously like Cupid or Eros, stands guard. The story is that if you fall in love at the stroke of midnight,near this statue, you will stay in love forever. I will have to remember that.
Marta and I got off and had lunch, which we bought in a Starbucks. We ate on a Park bench, while having an amazing conversation about art.She does installation art, combined with dance, and knows someone who trained dance and technology at UC Irvine. His name is Johannes Birringer, and he is a professor at a small University in England. (Probably someone who knows your father, Katy and Jessamyn! These kinds of synchronicities continue to amaze me!) We became so engrossed in conversation about Growtowski, and Polish Theatre, and her installation of a woman dancing, naked in a BATHTUB filled with water, and the artist and theatre director Iadues Kantor, who used to direct on stage as part of the performance, until the day of his death, when they did the show, “Today is my birthday” without him, for the last time. His work was about the interface between life and death, so it was fitting that his last performance was without his presence in physical form.
But enough of that! Today is MY birthday, and I am not dead! I am alive and well and thrilled to be in Barcelona!
I am situated in an absolutely lovely apartment, with a view of Sagrada Familia, the famous unfinished cathedral started a hundred years ago by Gaudi. I have a lovely room with a terrace, and internet access! I share the apartment with a woman of my age who makes her living renting out rooms in huge apartments which she owns. She speaks no English at all, but the lovely young Ana who hooked me up with this place speaks English, and arranged everything. Today I will go to Sagrada Familia, and to the Cathedral, and I will have a lovely day. This evening I will go dancing at Emperitor. I am reading The Pilgrimage by Paulo Coelho. Really fascinating stuff, and just right for the contemplative mood I am in as I prepare to shed all the accoutrements I have brought with me, and put them in storage, and pare down to the essentials, to begin my real pilgrimage, El Camino De Santiago (Saint James) de Compostella. (which means the Field of Stars!). I am thinking of all of you. Wish me well on my adventure.