Day 16 - 10.07.2020

 I forgot to tell you a story yesterday, after leaving Samos, walking full of boredom but still admiring the beautiful oak and chestnut forests, at one point we met a pilgrim who was returning from Santiago on foot.

Among other things, I related with the lady when I was able to sympathize with her feelings during the pandemic. I had a deja-vu and it was as if I went back in time 8 years ago, a few months after my accident, when it had been months since I had seen the sun's rays, except through the window.

Maybe you remember those who read my "story", at that time I lived with my family in an apartment, on the 2nd floor without an elevator, so if I wanted to go out I needed a real adventure. This is probably why I missed being on the go, but also my stubbornness to motivate other people to travel, even if at first with fear or shame, but then I can guarantee that it is worth it.

Let's go back to our story, everything goes smoothly until we reach the albergue in Portomarin, when we want to take up quarters, we notice that we do not have any identity documents. Crazily, we unpacked our bags to look for them as we didn't understand how or where we could lose them, because we always kept them in our fanny pack, and the other things were all in place. Scrolling through the previous day, we realize that the last place we used them was at the pension`s reception in Sarria. We check to see if they're there, and the gentleman on the phone tells us he forgot to take them out of the scanner and return them to us. The gentleman offered to send them to us in a taxi, so that we don't have to go back after them, our forgetfulness cost us 25 euros.

Being the only pilgrims in the hostel again, the owner lets us use the kitchen, make our own food and coffee, even use the cutlery and plates in the albergue. The owner of the albergue tells us that every day at 7 pm there is a service for pilgrims at the church of St. Nicholas. To our surprise, about 30 people gather at the church, the priests were very nice and at the end of the service, they stopped to talk only to us.

A pleasant sensation warms your heart, being a stranger thousands of miles away from home, when someone tells you that you are a person with a gift and a special mission.

We didn't expect that. 

Everything is divine.

Day 14 - 08.07.2020

We start early in the morning on the way, when it is still dark, so we can cover the 15 km to O Cebreiro.

It is said that it is the queen stage, it remains imprinted in your mind because it has the hardest climb of the French Way, on the territory of Spain. 12 kilometres of continuous ascent with a level difference of 660 meters altitude does not seem like much, but in the last part of 5.7 km from Herrerias to Laguna de Castilla is a level difference of 480 meters.

The climb from my point of view was torturous due to the fact that you have nowhere to buy water in the villages on the route, and the taps had warnings of non-potable water. Only in Laguna de Castilla we find a bar open and we manage to buy water. With small and very small steps we follow the difficult route, trying to encourage each other.

My hands hurt a lot, Vasi can barely breathe, but we don't give up. From birch to the next curve, from certain flowers to the next oak, somehow we manage to reach the plateau. The view heals and the beautiful mountain village is enchanting.

It's lunch time, we sit on the terrace of a restaurant, eat pinchos and then combined dishes and a mixture of embutidos, we enjoy our coffees and set off again. The municipal albergue in O Cebreiro is closed, so we made a reservation in Fonfria.

Because we were very tired, we went on the bike path, to make our descent easier.

At an intersection where we had to turn right, we didn't notice the marking because a motorcycle seating exactly on it, where two boys were working. Unbeknownst to us, we go on about 2 km until a lady in a taxi stops to tell us that we are going in the wrong direction and we have to turn around. Astonished, we believe we are in a nightmare, because we had come down, which meant we had to go back up. Slowly we reach the initial marking, where we notice with difficulty the almost erased arrow on the road.

Tired, with water running out, again, we climb drowisly el Alto de San Roque and el Alto do Poio. We arrive in Fonfria and to our surprise we are the only pilgrims in the huge albergue. For the first time at dinner we take the pilgrim's menu.

Sweet Christmas

       It's monday and I woke up blinded by white. While sleeping, a fine layer of fluffy snow laid itself quite majestically on the, until then, green field. Christmas is around the corner and I can't stop myself thinking about distinct dishes, sweet bread and mulled wine or for those who want something stronger, palinka.

The loudness is unbelievable this morning in our house, our children's excitement making them especially loud and my husband's patience ran thin but even so I couldn't stop my mind from savoring memories of my favourites: cookies and chocolate.


And if we are already talking about Christmas let me tell you more about our habits of this holiday, here in this Transylvania Land and maybe you will think  about joining us.

From every house are not missed some soupe or borsch (for the quests who mind their calories), aperitives whith bacon and home-made sausages, sarmale and all sorts a meat delicacies and if you are vegan, fear not, as we already dropped the idea of meat.

To our home now it begins with salads and different sea-food, fish and other numerous ingredients I don't remember.

Cake and sweet bread whith nuts, cinnamon and vanilla, hazelnut and almonds, these are my favourite part of my Christmas, oh and the fruits also, of course!

On every small street in the villages waits are wishing you a Merry Christmas with their charols.

So as they say :

 Hai la Maramu!

Welcome home

       I don’t want to describe the Romanian medical system as any other system it has its ups and downs, but at that moment all I wanted was to go back home, to my rays of sunshine, to my children, cause I was too disgusted by this system and I was ashamed that I was a long time ago part of it, or tried to be.

 Everything revolved around money, after six weeks of hospitalization on 5 December I signed the discharge papers, I couldn’t stand mentally in a hospital anymore, I couldn’t stand to just lay uselessly in bed and watch how my husband loses himself from watching me lay around anymore.

 Even though I couldn’t move at all and my husband was exhausted from staying in a chair 24/7 on 6 December we arrive home with some presents for our kids (in Romanian culture is Saint Nicolas holiday).



And so a new chapter of my life begins…

Helplessness

       Fallen on the humid ground, I remember looking at the sky and thinking that it was a nice warm autumn day, the sun was shining and the sky was a brilliant blue.
       Even to this day I hear the drumming of hooves and the sound of the chariot’s wheels drifting into nothing. My husband’s roar of despair and the darkness in his gaze, the fear and the groans of utterly pain, it shook me out of my stupor, I almost came alive, he was trying to take me in his arms, to embrace me as close as he could, he was raising slowly my head.

‘Don’t…please, I can’t move my legs…I have spine trauma’ he could hear me barely whisper. Agonizing flashes that I barely remember go on: the ambulance came with a young nurse, who was more panicked than me, she didn’t really know what to do, she barely got my neck brace on and we go to the hospital.
       Between salons and doors at which I needed to wait the doctors finally decide to keep me at a hospital a night to see if I survive.  A single nurse approaches me all night trying to keep me calm, trying to encourage me ‘remember what you need to live for’.

 The next day my husband appears threatening trying to rationalize with the doctors, pleading for me to go to a better hospital, to Cluj Napoca. I was supposed to go with a helicopter, the situation was a critic one, but in my place goes an 80 year old man with a broken femur ( apparently it was more critical, he was the father of a senator). I wish to say my trip on the ambulance approximately 125 miles, and maybe it appears that it was made quick and easy but let’s remember we are in Romania, so the trip wasn’t slick and nice at all. In fact it was hell for me, the inflatable mattress that was supposed to keep me from feeling the bumps of the road was punctured so it staid deflated all trip. Next up awaits me hellish days that sometimes I wish I could forget, because of lack of cash, the hospital decides that until I have 3800 Ron cash to pay for the titan system that I needed, I won’t be put under surgery. My mum manages to arrive from Spain with the money, Saturday night, but the surgery won’t happen until Wednesday.

Days and nights of despair, hopelessness and trembling fear pass.

 I know what will happen, but do you want to?

Broken wings

         Seven years ago, in a beautiful autumn day somebody decided to tame my life, hopes and dreams were shattered but let me tell you...

      I was in our farm, we were supposed to reap the harvest and bring home some hay. Because we were pretty new in this domain, we didn't have the instruments necessary for all the work we were supposed to do. We only came from Spain back home, in Romania and we decided to ground ourselves more with the nature, so we decided to build our own little farm.

     Although I am a nurse, I didn't find a position without bribery and the farm was the only possibility for me to bring money in our house. As I was saying, that day we were bringing home some hay, with the help of our neighbour, that had a chariot, which would help us bring it all. We were at the end of this proccess when one of the chariot's horses gets spooked and runs and I couldn't get away fast enough.

     The result of a stupid accident from where I get spine trauma and not even now do I know the verdict. Will I be able to walk again? Nobody had an answer.

      Therefore the follows a husband and a wife without the ability to walk and four children, the younger having only a year.

     Time doesn't wait for us, wounds heal and life slowly goes on.


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