Exercises in Being Here, Day 1: eating snails

I left in a 2 piece walking suit, aka business suit. I bought it for 2 euro's and will walk in it and transform it, or it might transform me. It is suit number 9, another Soft Armour (and if you're curious about the other suits just click on the links in the right upper corner). C., my faithful walking trolley, was packed with art materials and handy stuff for a journey that would undoubtedly bring many surprises. I prefer to walk but I already walked to Galicia last year, so this time I took a slow train which wasn't easy because C. had to go through security scanners and be disassembled before entering the train. I hadn't counted on the scanner and lost my beautiful hunters knife. But there are always things you lose on a journey, and there are the things you gain in return. 

Lleida, Zaragoza, Pamplona, Victoria-Gasteiz, Burgos, Leon, Ponferrada, Monforte de Lemos. With more than an hour delay, I arrived around 21.30 in the capital of the Ribeira Sacra. 

After putting C. in a room without a view next to the railway station, I ordered a beer in the nearest bar. I had forgotten that a drink here comes with a tapa, a little snack, and you can choose from more than 10 different ones. I guess it was like that in Barcelona once, but this traditional form of hospitality has been long lost in the city that is dominated by tourists. I chose the snails and they brought back memories of a project I once did in Sweden, where snails were my collaborators and performed their life (and amazing love-making) in a little gallery in the middle of nature. I wore a black suit there and sometimes some snails would crawl up my trousers because they like dark spaces. Those snails were the descendants of French snails that were brought to Sweden in the 12th century by monks, to be eaten on their fasting days -they weren't considered meat- and after the monks left, the snails stayed and flourished. 

There was a newspaper on my table with an article about shepherding in Galicia. I read: "Para mí es como magia. Me voy al monte, con mis perros y mis libros, y rejuvenezco. Hasta que alguna oveja me hace una faena. (Risas)." In English: "It is like magic to me. I go to the mountain, with my dogs and my books, and rejuvenate. Until one of the sheep requires some work. (Laughs)" 

Snails and shepherds, a good way to end the day. Tomorrow I will walk, I can't wait to be with the river and the mountains again, with rocks and mosses and owls in the night, with fog and local stories, to be slow like a snail again.