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A Journey to Santiago - Part 3 - épisodes 11-12 anglais/français

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bonjour ami.e.s du blog du CVR, 

pour notre plus grande joie, UN VOYAGE À SANTIAGO - SAINT JACQUES DE COMPOSTELLE LE CHEMINEMENT D'UN PÈLERIN  est de retour pour nous présenter la suite de ce pelerinage merveilleux.
Les épisodes précédents sont toujours disponibles sur le « Blog actualité » il vous suffit de cliquer sur Plus en bas de page pour arriver aux
épisodes passés.

 

 Retrouvons l’energie de  Lynne Burney Yashoda à l’épisode 11 de son chemin, et laissons nous guider :  ou va-t-elle nous emmener ?.

En rappel voici  les mots de Lynne Burney Yashoda sur l’origine de cette aventure :
Cette histoire commence juste avant Pâques en l'an 2000. Elle s'étend sur 4 ans et 3 saisons. Au fur et à mesure que je raconterai l'histoire, je ferai une pause pour vous poser une question, à vous, lecteur ou auditeur, à laquelle vous pourrez choisir de répondre ou de la partager avec d'autres.
Vous remarquerez que je fais référence à ce voyage de manière alternative en l'appelant le chemin de Saint Jacques, El Camino ou parfois simplement Compostelle.

Belle lecture et merveilleux cheminement intérieur à chacune et chacun. 

 

 

A JOURNEY TO SANTIAGO - SAINT JACQUES DE COMPOSTELLE  A PILGRIM’S PROGRESS 

Lynne Burney Yashoda

Part 3 - épisode 11 (anglais/français) (version française plus bas)

This story begins just before Easter in the year 2000. It spans 4 years and 3 seasons. As I tell the story I will pause to ask you, the reader or listener, a question which you may choose to answer or share it with others.
You will notice that I refer to this journey alternatively as le chemin de Saint Jacques, the Way of Saint James, El Camino or sometimes just as Compostella.


Episode 11 : From ecstasy to hangover

 

Navarrenx

We walked into Navarrenx on August 19th. The previous 4 days had gone according to plan or at least without anything having happened worthy of note. In Navarrenx, though, something worthy of note did happen and could not have been foreseen. While the event in itself is a tiny thing, it really left its mark on me.  I absolutely do not remember how I came to be standing outside a church face to face; eye to eye; hand in hand with a catholic priest.

 

 

 

 

 

He holds my hand and my gaze a fraction longer than is strictly necessary for a first encounter. His eyes look deeply into mine. He whispers softly, “Ultreia”. I know its meaning. He is sending me forward and onward with the famous cry of the pilgrim on her way to Santiago. Except this is no cry. It is soft and sweet and seductive but curiously enough, not sexual. It is not an invitation to indulge in a sexual fantasy but his voice, nevertheless, caresses my ear. His energy field is irresistible. It pulls me towards it like a helpless moth to the evening light.
Suddenly, as if plugged into an electric light socket, my whole body is charged with electricity. I light up! I beam! I want to dance! I feel I could run all the way to Santiago - and back! The fatigue accumulated in my mind and legs after endless hours and days of walking, just up and disappear. I feel in love with the world and generous towards all its creatures. Magic is in the air. I am as high as a kite on a natural phenomenon. I wish I could remember what else he said to me. All I have kept of this extraordinary exchange is an overriding sense of having met a kindred spirit on the way to a holy shrine. No, it wasn’t a Damascus moment.

Question :
- What do you know about ecstasy and its inevitable aftermath?

Because, the following day I crashed. If I had been a drinker, I would have described it as a massive hangover. I was out of sorts the whole day. My feet were leaden. I had to sit down a lot. I sighed as I walked. Each step forward was a major effort. “Ultreia”, was just a fancy formula; a trinket to collect along the Way to Santiago.

Even today I find it hard to believe that a priest could induce the state of ecstasy I very clearly experienced or that I could feel so dreadful the following day.

The only thing vaguely similar to the experience that I can think of was when I ate a bar of chocolate in the middle of a squash match when I was playing high ranking competitive women’s squash at the Montparnasse club in Paris. I was losing and needed an energy booster just to keep going. I got the benefit of a sugar rush into bloodstream for a couple of games and played some dazzling shots until the sugar effect wore off and my play collapsed. I lost for want of energy. I just wanted to lie down and go to sleep.

But the contact with the priest in Navarrenx had nothing to do with chocolate bars. I could not explain the soaring energy in me any more than I could explain the radical plummet the following day. I put it down to “mysterious occurrences” that happened to those who walked the Way.

I did hear the following year that the priest in question no longer held his post at the church in Navarrenx. It was just a routine change of diocese apparently. Or was it?

What I know much more clearly today than I did back then is that regular spiritual practice builds a strong psyche. A powerful psyche charms and disarms others. It dresses itself in coats of many colors. It has the power to seduce even its owner. Mostly I can catch myself just before falling in love with my personal self-knowledge and spiritual awareness. When I don’t, the fall hurts. I feel foolish and, worse, back to square one. Caught again!

So, looking back on this encounter in Navarrenx and then hearing about his removal later, I wonder if “my” priest had been seduced by his own power and had the local church authorities considered him a risk to gullible pilgrims like me? Had he been perceived as a threat to less talented priests? I have no answer to these questions.

 

  


Episode 11 : de l’extase à la gueule de bois

Navarrenx

Un prêtre catholique prend ma main - ses yeux regardent profondément dans les miens - sa voix dit doucement « Ultreia ». Je sais ce que ça veut dire. Il me souhaite «bonne route ». Il tient ma main et mon regard un peu plus longtemps que ce qui est strictement nécessaire - sa voix caresse mon oreille - irrésistible ..... Soudain, c’est comme si tout mon corps avait été branché sur une prise de courant. J’éclaire, je rayonne ! Je pourrais danser. Je pourrais courir jusqu’à Santiago et retour ! Toutes les heures et les jours de marche accumulés dans mon esprit et mes jambes ont soudainement disparus. Je suis amoureuse du monde et de toutes ses créatures. Il y a de la magie dans l’air.

 

 

Le lendemain, je me suis écrasée. Si j’avais été un gros buveur, j’aurais décrit ça comme une gigantesque gueule de bois. J’étais perdu, sans repères toute la journée. Mes pieds étaient en plomb. J’ai dû beaucoup m’asseoir. J’ai soupiré en marchant. « Ultreia » était un cri lointain et chaque pas en avant, un effort majeur.

 

Même aujourd’hui, j’ai du mal à croire qu’un prêtre puisse induire l’état d’extase que j’ai vécu très clairement ou que je pourrais me sentir si terrible le lendemain.

Question : 
- Que savez-vous de l’extase et de son contre coup?

 

Je n’imaginais pas ce gain radical d’énergie et puis  cette perte soudaine ! Je ne peux pas l’expliquer. Ce n’est qu’un de ces mystères qui appartiennent t au Chemin. Reste que j’ai entendu dire  l’année suivante que le prêtre en question n’occupait plus son poste à l’église de Navarrenx. C’était juste un changement de routine du diocèse Apparemment.

 

Je savais alors et je sais encore plus clairement maintenant, après plus de 40 ans de pratique yogique, qu’il y a un point dans l’évolution d’un yogini où l’on peut être séduit par sa propre et grandissante puissance psychique. C’est un moment qui nécessite des conseils attentifs; car tomber amoureux de sa propre puissance psychique, c’est tomber dans un piège majeur. La Bible est pleine d’histoires de ceux qui ont chuté à la recherche de la Lumière. Sans parler du nombre de faux gourous actuels prétendant aujourd’hui guider les naïfs vers le nirvana.

 

 

Mon prêtre avait-il été séduit par son propre pouvoir et les autorités ecclésiastiques locales le considéraient-elles comme un risque pour les pèlerins crédules ou les prêtres moins talentueux ?
Je ne le saurai jamais.

  


 

Episode 12 : You can’t pull wool over my eyes

The Basque Country

We were among the last to arrive at the farmyard in Aroue some 20 kilometers further on from the priest in Narvarrenx. We were feeling pleasantly tired and looking forward to something a bit different in the way of a night’s lodgings. Word of mouth had told us it was worth a stop and guide books too, would later claim it as an authentic taste of the Basque country. We were close to the gateway to Spain by then and the roads were starting to converge. Pilgrims, travelers, walkers and wanderers were more numerous and the choice of accommodation more limited so, anyway, the farm was an obvious choice.

We were met at the gate by a noisy tableau of farmyard animals: snorting squealing pigs, mewling kittens, squawking chickens; lounging dogs and skulking cats; a grinning donkey posed next to a silent horse; a few muddy cows shambled around a trough of animal feed; food scraps were scattered indiscriminately across the yard; no rats or mice in view. Had I been more amused or less tired, the imp in me would have burst into “Old MacDonald…….. - E-I-E-I-O!

 

Questions :
- Have you ever been taken for a ride?
- How did it happen?

We picked our way across the ragged, muddy yard, careful not to upset the rural décor. I kept a close eye on the lounging dogs whose docility I didn’t fully trust. My stick remained on duty and I was on my guard, impish self, included.

We entered the two-storey farmhouse and clambered up the stairs to our room for the night. There was nothing wrong or memorable about the room. The corridor was filled with the amicable chatter of tired walkers waiting patiently to take their turn in the bathroom. I could hear people bustling around in the kitchen clanging pots and pans and there was already the smell of our evening meal wafting up the stairway. I took a guess on “Poulet Basquaise – Basque Chicken” Everything looked and smelt authentic but it didn’t ring true to me. There was something orchestrated about the rural scene outside that made me feel like an unwilling actress in someone else’s play. The place obviously wasn’t what it was cracked up to be: “an authentic farm-stay in the Basque Country”. It was only for one night and no one was forcing us to stay there but still, I didn’t like feeling that wool was being pulled over my eyes.

Sham or not, we were part of an eager buzz of pilgrims converging on this farmhouse.

I was reminded of the many holy sites I had visited along the hippy trails in south east Asia during my twenties. There was always a keen bustle of pilgrims and tourists in and around the temple and where there were visitors, there were vendors. They had their own pricing codes for westerners based on a sliding scale between hippies doing Asia on a shoestring to tourists in airconditioned taxis or buses. I was on a shoestring.

I can still see me in my beads and sarong; long hair and sandals. I can hear feigned outrage in my voice as I haggle over a ring with a vendor in Bali telling him that I am staying in a hut on Kuta Beach and not some fancy hotel in Sanur. I can almost feel the strut in my stride and the expansion in my chest as I gloat over my purchase. I get what I want at the price that I want. No one pulls wool over my eyes!

And thirty years later I am in shorts and drip-dry shirt; my hair is much shorter and I am wearing walking boots. My self-pride is still well intact and I still don’t like feeling someone is trying to put one over on me. I don’t buy what I am being offered as the real MacKay, even if it is only for one night. It is not humiliating; it is just annoying.

Unlike the time I was sitting in a terrace café on the Left Bank in Paris with a foreign friend and the waiter delivered my salad without a knife and fork. What happened was not just annoying but also humiliating.

 

I asked for “un couvert” – cutlery. Admittedly I spoke French with a foreign accent and consistently confused masculine and feminine nouns but still the waiter didn’t have to show me up in front of the friend I was trying to impress with my Parisian savvy. I had chosen the café because of its waiters dressed in the traditional garb of the French garçon: black waistcoat and long white apron over black trousers. They glided and pirouetted from table-to-table balancing glasses: filled or empty, plates piled high; filled or empty. The sun was shining. All was well with the world until the garçon added insult to injury by delivering a large soup spoon to my table in response to my request for a knife and fork.  I shouted in genuine fury – in French - that I was a local not a tourist and that no one eats a bloody salad with a spoon. I really hate to be made to feel a fool in front a friend especially one I am showing off to.  Conceit still won’t let me see the funny side of a very typical Parisian summer-on-the-Left Bank scene.

Question : 
- What kind of situation challenges your ego or your sense of self the most?

On reflection, I wasn’t really discontent with our night’s lodgings as such but rather I was taken by a desire to let the owner know that I thought he was out for a quick buck and that he wasn’t fooling me with his authentic farmyard nonsense. I wanted him to know I knew fake from real but I was also caught up in another desire to be and not just act, the humble pilgrim on her way to Santiago. Pointing the finger at the farmer was more about my own self-pride than about a need to expose a falsehood. I felt pretty certain that he was milking the Way for all it was worth; peddling squalor because he was too lazy to make an honest living off the land like other Basque farmers. I thought he was a crafty businessman sitting on a little goldmine at the confluence of many paths at the foot of the mountain pass.

He was lining his pocket without much effort. In fact, the less effort he made the more genuine his farmyard mess looked. The more urban the pilgrim the more enchanted he or she would be with the genuineness of the rural experience on display.  

He was not unique. There were more shysters like him on the other side of the mountain.
 

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Épisode 12 : Contes cochons

Le Pays basque

 

Une cour de ferme: des cochons renifleurs et couinant - des chiens se prélassant – des chats furtifs - des chatons miaulant- un âne faisant la grimace - un cheval dans l’attente – des vaches peut-être – des poulets assurément – des rats sans doute ...

La ferme était un enchevêtrement de marcheurs fatigués, d’hôtes affairés et d’odeurs de cuisine. Je me souviens juste de la boue et du sentiment d’être comme pris en otage dans une pantomime traitant de l’expérience rurale pour citadins défavorisés.

 

Suis-je devenu cynique à ce moment-là ou mon nez pouvait-il vraiment sentir chez notre hôte les pratiques de l’homme d’affaires vendant sa camelote comme les gens l’ont fait depuis des milliers d’années aux portes des temples et des lieux saints. Nous étions alors prêts à entrer en Espagne et les routes vers Santiago commençaient à converger. Les pèlerins, les voyageurs, les marcheurs et autres vagabonds étaient plus nombreux et le choix de l’hébergement plus limité. La ferme avait une réputation transmise par bouche à l’oreille et, plus tard, reprise dans des guides spécialisés sur le Camino. 

J’aime le terreau. Il ya quelque chose d’honnête avec le terreau propre. Mais sous prétexte de misère le faire passer pour de la saleté ce n’est pas acceptable. Pour moi, notre hôte, ce soir-là s’est comporté comme quelqu’un qui enduit le plomb de peinture dorée, prétend  que c’est de l’or et vous octroie de tenir le précieux métal entre vos mains.

Question :
- Avez-vous déjà prétendu être quelqu’un que vous n’êtes pas?

J’ai vu le plomb, le manque de soins et, pour ainsi dire, ce geste vulgaire d’un doigt pointé vers ceux qui travaillent la terre. Je l’ai jugé imposteur, un paresseux qui mériterait un coup de pied aux fesses. Étais-je juste épuisée ce jour-là, dépourvue de patience compatissante? Je ne sais pas, mais je sais en avoir rencontré plus de son espèce de l’autre côté de la montagne pyrénéenne. 

Question :
- Qui avez-vous trompé ?

Comme le Camino gagnait en popularité, le nombre de ceux à l’affût prêts à vous alléger les poches augmentait également. Comme au Moyen Age. Pourquoi cela changerait-il au XXIe siècle? La nature de notre espèce n’avait pas changé, seulement  les circonstances et les données changent.

Je n’abandonnerai jamais l’espoir, quelles que soient les circonstances en la « perfectibilité » de l’âme humaine. Je n’ai jamais abandonné me concernant, mais il m’est arrivé de temps à autres de condamner.

Eh oui, c’est ainsi .....

 

 

 


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