NOVEMBER ISSUE - IN AND OUT OF GESTALT THERAPY

GESTALT THERAPY AS A WAY OF LIFE

Fritz Perls

          IN AND OUT OF GESTALT THERAPY

Lately, I have been inspired by the late old master and principal founder of Gestalt Therapy Dr. Fritz Perls. His autobiography “In and Out of the Garbage Pail,” (1970) written and published by Bob Hall. It was his last book written about one year before his death. My own Gestalt teacher and Mentor Jorge Rosner, was a close friend of Fritz and spent many years with him at Esalen, CA. and Chicago. When Fritz was ill with pancreatic cancer, he made two major decisions: first to call his wife Laura in New York and second, he refused to stay in bed when the nurse ordered him to do so. He told the nurse: “I will not be told what to do!” then he stood up and then fell down and died. The year was 1970.

Re-reading his autobiography, I am inspired by his clear and direct way to express himself in the ‘here and now’. I want to write like he did – just starting with a short verse by Fritz:

“In and out the garbage pail

Put I my creation

Be it lively, be it stale

Sadness or elation”

Yet, he admits that he wants to impress, to show off…he wrote poetry as a young man in Berlin in 1934. I also want to ‘show off’ that I write poetry and even published a book and now am writing Haiku poems. A Japanese Haiku is written in only three lines but show the whole ‘gestalt’ - the full image in words to state the whole.

Fritz wrote in “verbatim” form, just as the words came out of his thinking without editing but letting the mind flow like a river. I am sitting at my writing desk and begin to let ‘the river flow’, just writing the sentences as they emerge from my thinking without rehearsing: “what to say?” More about Fritz:

Frtiz shifted from Freud to Existentialism. Like me, I stopped reading Freud’s books and entered the world of “BE HERE NOW” IN 1971. Most if not all of Freud’s discoveries as an analyst, became obsolete with the latest brain research and neuropsychology. Gestalt became a ‘cool’ therapy in my training years and continued into the 90’s and up to 2012.

I agree with Fritz that all theories and hypothesis are simply fantasies about how the world functions. Once they are verified and are applicable in actual practice, they become reality. All ideas are articles of faith (like all religions) and the same applies to my attitude towards Gestalt today.

As I experience the ‘gestalt world’ today, I see and feel that the field is becoming more and more an intellectual (mind) exercise in the training institutes and the courses look more and more like some sort of ‘brain washing’ of students learning Gestalt therapy. We are split between the experiential and experimental gestalt approach and the rules and theories that are written in books. Now this structured curriculum is called a “new wave of training” and a “contemporary/relational phenomenon” that is becoming more out of touch with the real world of practice. There is a kind of ‘no man’s land’ populated with strong forces that split self and otherness apart. We are split between the life healing, experiential and experimental process of being present and the requirements and rules to complete the ‘subject’ in order to receive a certificate. Creative encounter has no place in today’s gestalt training. Gestalt contact, relationship, physical touch is not on and forbidden and ethical rules mandate the therapy work not the person as a professional practitioner. As Fritz stated: “This intermediate, (I call programmed method) is populated with prejudices, complexes, catastrophic expectations, intellectual activity, perfectionism and mental jabbering, and words, words at all times”(p36).

Since gestalt therapy officially begun in New York and with the publication of the GESTALT book in 1951, we suddenly entered the world of a new, creative phenomenology. Fritz published an earlier book EGO, HUNGER AND AGGRESSION in South Africa (1942) but even he claims that it was only an attempt to ‘learn how to type’. He was not well received by the readers that were not impressed by the title and yet, the open-ended ‘dialogical’ text was a creative adjustment for Fritz and the beginnings of a new way of working with people.

Brisbane city

Now, it is 2015 and I have lived in Australia since 1978. Arrived on a cold month of July and reporting to my job at the University of Queensland, Department of Social Work. Soon I met a couple of psychiatrists that were very interested in Gestalt therapy and they had a private practice clinic in the city. I was offered a working space to conduct groups and thus the Brisbane Gestalt Institute was born. My friend and graduate in gestalt from the Toronto Gestalt Institute, Dr .James Oldham established an institute in Melbourne a year earlier.  We both were at the Toronto Institute under Jorge Rosner and Dr. Harvey Freedman as our teachers.

I am attempting to imitate Fritz’s style of writing – just flowing as the river with my words here. I am reflecting on the first gestalt training group in Brisbane and Jorge Rosner arrived here to run our training group. I called his style “the Rosnerian Gestalt” model. He came in January and about 30 students arrived at a residential facility. The program was simple and experiential. Morning body work, then small group work discussing theory, then Gestalt ‘hot seat’ work as established by Fritz at Esalen and more encounter group work.

On the last day, Jorge suggested we all take our clothing off and begin to examine our body as it is. This created a big fear and nervousness in the group. Jorge suggested that those who do not want to participate in this “body reading” exercise, may leave. No one left and we proceeded to volunteer to stand before the group – first, facing the group and then turnaround with the back to the group, on a side and front again. The group seriously studied the person and made comments about the body aspects that they saw and how the body shape is telling us a lot about the inner person. Jorge’s comments had a very uncanny accuracy revealing the inner person’s issues by looking at the body. He then mentioned his work with Eva Reich, daughter of Wilhelm Reich who was Fritz’s analyst during his studies in Germany. We learned to take risks to be alive and feel open to all the life experiences. In Australia the Gestalt movement was a joy of discovering that learning is possible. Creative learning. Whatever we did, it was full of fun and engagement. Our activities were not for purely economic reasons (marketing) but we were learning to shift ourselves from rigid cultural ethics to a new path: making a difference in the world.

I need to tell the Australian gestalt history because it developed as a special model of training and evolved into a wonderful community of institutes.

 ( Note: due to a request from Brian O'Neill I am deleting his rather complete account of the Gestalt in Australia and add my own personal account)

Here is a short history of Gestalt in Australia:

Last October was my birthday and I am aware that I am living now more than 70 years in Brisbane, Australia. I still love my life here and have a very full history myself. " Why Not?" was the word spoken by my Mentor Jorge Rosner.... "What is the worst that can happen"? I will now reflect on my history and how my contribution and that of others have made Gestalt therapy flower here:

The gestalt training centres – 1976 to 1980

In 1976, Don Diespecker, initiated ac ourse in gestalt therapy as part of a University of Wollongong psychology programme. In 1980, he established the Wollongong Gestalt Centre. When he left in 1984, to live in the Bellingen valley, Brian and Jenny O’Neill developed the Illawarra Gestalt centre and continued training students in the region.

Dr. James Oldham began offering Gestalt training to groups he formed in Melbourne. The Institute was  formed in 1979  In July of 1978, I, Yaro Starak arrived in Brisbane from from Toronto, Canada and began teaching social work at Queensland University; together with psychiatrist Barry Blicharski, Peter Mulholland and Patty Oliver, we established the Brisbane Gestalt Centre. Barry became my best friend and we continued to share training events when he moved to Sydney. 

In 1981, James Oldham developed the Gestalt Institute of Perth. WA. Early graduates, such as Zish Ziembinski and Richard Hester (Perth), joined the Institute as trainers in 1984 and were later joined by Claudia Rosenbach-Ziembinski from Germany.

 

 

After Barry retired to his land at Ulladula NSW in 1997, Rhonda Gibson-Long and Phillip Oldfield continued to manage the training at the Sydney Gestalt Centre  under the same name.

While these two institutes closed, others opened such as the Gestalt Practitioners Training Sydney (GPTS) in 2003. This institute was primarily founded by former faculty members and/or graduates of the Illawarra Gestalt Centre, under the direction of Michael Reed and Judy Leung. In 2009, the new directors became Ashleigh Woolridge and Maria Dolenc.

In 2006, Yaro Starak was invited to become the director of the new Terrigal Gestalt Institute (TGI), situated in NSW. It was initiated by a graduate of the Brisbane Institute, Tanya Field. Later, Dinah Buchanan became the next director. The Institute closed in 2013.

 

Theoretical contributions through books and articles

http://gestaltarttherapy.com/1/books_for_sale_585828.html

 The first book (published in Melbourne) was Risking Being Alive (Oldham, Key and Starak, 1981). This first Australian text includes numerous experiments. As the authors state in the introduction, gestalt therapy is not only working with clients but taking a risk to grow and change our lives.

Australian gestalt therapists have also contributed to the literature on gestalt therapy through several books written especially by therapists and teachers. I have contributed, along with others in Australia & New Zealand to tow major publications: GROUNDS FOR GESTALT AND MORE GROUNDS FOR GESTALT. Edited by Yaro Starak, Anne Macleane and Anna Bernett.

 

The Brisbane Gestalt Institute has four publications on a range of topics related to Gestalt therapy. “Risking Being Alive” by James Oldham, Yaro Starak & Tony Key, “Group Work Skills” by Yaro Starak and “The Princess and the Dragon” a manual for couples work in Gestalt therapy by Yaro Starak.

http://gestaltarttherapy.com/1/books_for_sale_585827.html

Finally, the Illawarra Gestalt Centre has made contributions to the theory, practice and training of gestalt therapists through articles, commentaries, book chapters and books. This has occurred in several interrelated fields, specifically in couple and family therapy, supervision and training, field theory and the development of community in gestalt therapy.

Gestalt Therapy associations and societies

The first large national conference for Experiential Psychotherapies, entitled Crossing Boundaries, was held at Queensland University in 1988. Hosted by the Brisbane Gestalt Institute. The major coordinators were Yaro Starak & Barry Blicharsky. The conference was attended by several hundred practitioners from around the country, many of whom were gestalt therapists. There were movements from this conference to establish ongoing professional bodies, such as an association of art therapists, however connecting gestalt therapists as an association was to take another decade.

This was at a time when gestalt therapy training was becoming standardized and accredited through GANZ. This created an ethos of measurable standards (competencies) in training therapists with the expectation that this should lead to measurable standards of efficacy. The move to join PACFA, an organisation that covered all therapies in Australia, begun a long road of demise of GANZ as a true representative of Gestalt Therapists.

This move to access academic requirements for higher education rushed several centres to gain higher education accreditation, and the tension begun between the experiential learning in gestalt therapy and the ‘neat boxes’ of academic regulators.
 

Future challenges in Australia:

I am not sure about the future - it is not yet here and the past is a nice way to recall and boast about my work and life. Fritz already stated that  "all theories and hypothesis are of value only if they fit the observable facts" - That is experience is the source of real knowledge. My observations and experience shows me that the challenges that face GANZ and the community it represents is in the NOW!. The future work of "gestaltists" is to show that academic work is good and also experiential work is good. Since even the most reliable observation is an abstraction, it is imperative to include all the elements: What is reliable observation, what is fantasy and what is evidence.

Market Forces and Accreditation

Changes in funding models by the Federal Government for mental health and couples and family therapy create a challenge for gestalt therapy, especially in its ability to maintain its uniqueness and difference while attending to forces in the wider field. In particular, there is a challenge to demonstrate evidence-based practice. So far, Directors of training have run after the academic accreditations and on the way they lost the soul of Gestalt as Fritz and his followers established. Many gestalt leaders are now 'managers' of paperwork to keep being accredited and at what cost? Many are showing anastrophic fantasies that more business will come as a result of accreditation. Many play roles and games in fantasy that create a mental chaos, self-torture and limitless wish needs. (Perls, 1970)

PACFA CEO secured a catastrophic fantasy when it was stated in a report:

"It would appear that unless GANZ and psychotherapy bodies such as the Psychotherapy and Counselling Federation of Australia (PACFA), can access such accreditation and government funding, then the market will ultimately direct people to services such as psychology instead".
That statement, for me, spelled the demise of Gestalt therapy and GANZ.

 

IN AND OUT OF GESTALT THERAPY - THE DEMISE OF GANZ.

                                          

I am sitting here and wandering: “what happened?” It seems that the ‘baby was thrown out along with the structural bath water”. The ‘cliché’ comes from an old story about bathing in the middle ages. On a Saturday night, the family took a bath in order to be clean for church on Sunday. Father went first then mother and then the kids (there were many of them) and somehow, as the water was getting more and more murky, the last one, a baby was thrown out with the dirty water. The family just could not see the baby there. So, I am looking at the whole Gestalt rush to get accreditation and student fee payment by governments and recognition as academic training. The whole community (Gestalt family) became blinded by the ‘requirements dirt’ and unknowingly threw out what Brian O'Neill indicated:

“It would seem clear that if gestalt therapy seeks to continue as psychotherapy practice in Australia, particularly with the support of the government funding being accessed by psychologists, it must either seek registration from government.”

No! It was not clear then nor is it now! Yet we all felt a fear of ‘dying’ as a community and as viable and strong therapy. The very SOUL that was Gestalt therapy is disappearing. I went to study Gestalt therapy as a young psychologist and social worker and felt that soul sense in every corner of the world where I met students and staff. As I am going out of the present community in Australia I want to share with you my reflections as they are in 2015. Comments are welcome:

Some time ago, as the director and the Brisbane Gestalt Institute (founded in 1979) I wrote a short discussion paper for the DOT (Directors of Training) meeting in 1990 entitled “IS THE SPIRIT OF GESTALT DYING?” my rationale to write this paper was based on my hearing words spoken by many participants at Gestalt conferences, student comments and training faculty that somehow the ‘spirit’ of what attracted us to learning and practicing gestalt therapy is no longer apparent. The ‘soul’ is going out and only the format or structure is still apparent.

Why is the spirit ‘dying’?

Sam Keen made a very good definition of the word spirit: “Spirit is the capacity to transcend the encapsulation (rigidity) of a persona-lity (mask) To transcend the roles and myths that inform the adult Ego….spirit is the realisation that we are embodied within a continuum, that we are alive only when a universal life-force flows through us like breath through lungs, like the wind through the forest.”(A Passionate Life, 1988).

Therefore, I am coming more and more to the sad realisation that GANZ, the Association of Gestalt Australia & New Zealand is on the brink of losing its soul or spirit quality. There seems to be a creeping invasion of the bureaucratic ‘virus’ where we experience from the outside a tyranny of ‘standardising’, ‘streamlining’, ‘equalising’, demanding ‘requirements’ and making the whole process a dead academic exercise. This invasive, rule oriented development is clearly leaving the ‘spirit’ or life-force of Gestalt out of the core of teaching and learning.

At this time, I want to highlight (only one example)this loss of Spirit in Gestalt as represented by GANZ. The story is my and my wife’s experience with the ‘management’ of our publication of a workshop we completed at the GANZ conference in 2014 entitled:” Gestalt Therapy and Art Therapy”. The editors of the GANZ journal asked all presenters to write a report about the workshop so it could be published in the Journal. The papers were spread out in two publications. My wife Gemma (co-presenter) and two participants at our workshop volunteered to contribute and the paper was submitted to the editor. The paper was to be published in April 2015.

After several ‘reviews’ of the paper by some unknown readers (no dialog here) the editor sent me a criticism and attached an old GANZ journal to look at the papers published. Here is the quote from the email dated Dec 30.

“I’ve copied you in to an email that lets you download the recent issue of the Journal that has several examples of presentations at the conference. I can see that you’ve made some changes, however your paper still falls short of describing what actually happened, including the structure and process of the workshop, instructions to participants, how SIDICAIR was used etc. – like you put in your submission. Have a look at the articles in the Journal”

This comment was a total surprise to all of us who wrote exactly what he is saying is missing. Perhaps he only read the GANZ conference proposal? So, we sent the paper to two senior Gestalt trainers and know editors of gestalt books and journals and received a very positive response with only a few corrections. In consultation with the contributors of the paper, we responded to the editor that we are confident that the paper is well written and we ask that the reader make comments when the paper is published. I received a reply that he is not publishing the paper as it stands.Thus, I have had the opportunity to experience directly this demise of spirit in Gestalt. There is a lot of 'pigeon-holing as to what must be done right.

The Gestalt Spirit almost dead!

“Gestalt therapy is a continually undergoing innovation and expansion in whatever direction is possible and with whatever means are available between the therapist and the patient in the actual therapeutic situation” L. Perls.(1992). Experiential work is the main ‘teacher’ of innovation and evidence based practice.

Gestalt as an innovative process is sadly declining by the ongoing evaporation of actual contact with the field and a certain ‘death’ of the Spirit that was the main energy driver in the early days of its founding by Fritz Perls, Laura Perls, The Polsters and many others. Now the so called ‘contemporary gestalt movement is dividing Gestalt into “originalists” and “relationalists” (D. Bloom, 2011).

The ‘new relationalists’ seem to feel that the ‘old originalists’ who propose a contact and dialogue is a turn away from Gestalt psychotherapy. They claim that the therapist is some sort of stage director proposing ‘role plays’ and experiments to the patient. While the ‘reraltionalist’ emphasises the importance of therapy with “compassion, kindness, wisdom, equanimity and humility”. (Yontef 2009). There seems to be a real fear of somehow ‘shaming’ the patient. No wonder that the current “Mindfulness” method is already entering the Gestalt practice as if to ‘calm down’ the fear of shaming. What is now being forgotten is the fact that Carl Rogers and Martin Buber pioneered the dialogical encounter with the Client-centred model and the I-Thou principle. To relegate them to the “originalist box” is to clearly become blinded to the essence of Soul in therapy.

The danger of ‘splitting hairs’.

The original search of gestalt therapy was to enhance the curios and the alive in the human soul. When I went to Esalen Institute just after Fritz Perls died, I was amazed at the multitude of human potential experiments there. We explored marathon groups, encounter groups, massage training, Psychodrama, bodywork, Rolfing, and so on. Today students enter a Master’s program and undertake a series of subjects like Awareness 102, Contact functions 203 and so on; finally a  presentation of a thesis on some research about Gestalt therapy. We are entering a field of a confused mental duality created by requirements and academic subjects. When Soul or Spirit is lost, the mind begins to structure dualities and anything that needs integration will not work. The whole is not there and when only the mind is at work, then confusion and theory and books explaining that confusion get the upper hand to no real effect.

In my own gestalt training, I was exploring the process of awareness, emotional release, body work, group therapy and was told to drop any books and not to read anything for a period of one year. As a young academic, I was shocked. How am I supposed to learn anything without the readings? I was told to do my personal work and learn by experience. Abraham Maslow was correct when he proposed the idea of Peak Experience. It makes a person healthy and alive and that process can help the person achieve Peak Experiences – in other words connect with Soul. Here, the books are useless.

To enable to heal the current split between the so called “Relationalists” and “Originalists” we need to come to the classic Gestalt encounter in dialogue with the two:

Relationalist: “I am humane, compassionate, humble and empathic”

Originalist: “Bull shit, you are totally in YOUR MIND. You just think and do not feel!

Relationalist: “As you speak, I feel hurt, ashamed”…

Originalist: “Transcend your mind set, enter into LOVE!”

Relationalist: “And what am I to do with Love”?

Originalist: “You must use that word to communicate with me. Love is an encounter with Spirit. It is not dual, it has no subject nor object. LOVE and SPIRIT are ONE!

Summary

To summarise this discussion, here is a quote from Dan Bloom, fellow of the NY Gestalt Institute:

“What could divide the NY Gestalt community (and others in the world) into “originalists” and “relationalists” is the defending the implicit relationality of basic Gestalt therapy theory and claim to have been trained to be relationally from the forming days of Gestalt therapy to those who style themselves as “course correctors”. Shifting Gestalt therapy away from the original ‘individualist’ model to a ‘dialogical’, relational Gestalt’. NONE are on the correct path. Life is not one or the other. Life is transcendental (both-and). Attempting to claim one aspect as the right or good one is a big mistake. Gestalt means WHOLE. We are not separate from Nature (Spirit) We ARE nature. It is absurd to claim that one mental set of beliefs is better, more contemporaneous’ than other.”(2011)

The Gestalt community does not need a new ‘split’. Over the past 30 years we had a plethora of splits. West Coast Gestalt vs East Coast Gestalt. Gestalt and other modalities, Gestalt and Mindfulness and so on. All this leads to more intellectual arguments at conferences but leaves students unimpressed.

Fritz Perls, Laura Perls, the Polsters, Zinker and many others may be defined as ‘originalists’ they are - in the sense that they were the original writers and contributors to the vast wisdom if Gestalt therapy. Yontef, Jacobs, Hycner and others may be defined as ‘relationalists’. However all have quoted and used the philosophy of Martin Buber: I-Thou vs I-It dynamics of human nature. We are all built on the previous creators of something new and then we add more to the “cauldron of knowledge”. Many concepts that were only experimental in the early days of Gestalt Therapy are now being more refined, more clarified and more explicit as well as researched over time. There is no need to split and separate and if separation happens (like in any relation), So, my advice is: do the right thing and place two chairs in front of each other and create a dialogue until integration happens.

That is the challenge!

“Mind is all your beliefs collected together.

 Openness means no-mind, openness means:

You put your mind aside and then you are

Ready to look into life again and again

In a new way – not with the old eyes”

OSHO

"Introjection and projection
Retroflection, oh behold
Will not suffer more neglection
Wishing to be called.

Jump out of the garbage pail
Have a conversation
That the reader can avail
Himself of your location"
F. Perls.

CAMINO DE COMPOSTELLA 2006

Three pilgrims walking the CAMINO stopped by a statue of an old pilgrim. The walk has been going on for at least a 1,000 years.

Extreme right is HOSHI, centre: ANDY, Left: YARO

The pilgrimage routes were spaced all along the way with holy places, holy places in which the pilgrim could experience the localisation of the inner spirit in the most intense way. The greatest route in the way of Santiago is the old Roman road over the Pyrenees.

COMMENTS 2015

HOSHI

It’s a huge kick to read about this time and id forgot that we’re now in our ninth year of that unbelievable journey and i get goose bumps just by thinking of it.

It’s also really funny to read about these trips we had together and who could forget Andy disappearing all the time? And in all fairness Andy, I was not disciplined, I was LOST. Therefor no women in sight, I was too selfish to think about them.

I think I told u guys as well that I tried the north Camino in 2010 but my story takes a weird twist.

I started off a day’s journey before San Sebastian and took the train there from Madrid after partying for a couple of days with a friend. After the first day trip when i got to San Sebastian, I realized I had made a huge mistake and pack WAY TOO MUCH so both back and leg got really screwed. So I stayed In San Sebastian for 2 days but finally realized that I couldn’t make it cause of my leg so i rented a car and went down to Alicante to visit my old friends. I ended up staying there for 4 weeks and met a Dutch girl named Meike. She had a boyfriend at the time but we got along really well and kept in touch when she went back to Amsterdam. 2 months later I went to see her and we got together. Now, 5 years later she moved to Sweden and for 2 months now, we’ve been living together. So even when u don’t do the Camino, something happens that changes your life forever.

But I hope you both know how dear you are to me and even with thousands of kilometres apart, your right next to me on my drunken nights when I dream of the Camino and our great adventures together, for example:

*Dog incident at the end of the Camino.

*Leanne and the girl from NZ being locked out of the alberge and when I talked to Andy, he sais in a calm voice: ”I heard them screaming but I thought they needed to learn a lesson”… That’s how I remember it at least.

*The albergue with the pool to rest our feet in with ice cold water -and the dinner that night.

*Our night of being freed of my chains that kept me so angry with my dad.

*Also that climb up the hill where we had the view of Spain beneath our feet… I could go on and on but I think u both have plenty of memories and either way, thank you both for a memory I will tell my grandchildren one day!

ANDY

Thank you for the link to your blog Yaro. How lovely to read about your journey, so interwoven with mine and so distinctly separate. We slept in the same albergues but were dreaming of different women!!!

 Women, walking, wine - the www of the Camino. I laughed so much at the times you write of me disappearing, chasing after women. Not much has changed, as I drive between Melbourne and Bermagui to see Dan! Hoshi was far more disciplined!

 Walking that road was an experience that has never left me. I learnt that we choose what to carry and what to let go of. The image of an American woman struggling under the weight of a heavy pack but unwilling to shed any items, it's a vivid memory. As my favourite saying these days goes - life may have given you a cactus but you don't have to sit on it!

 The road may be unknown, fate and destiny have their own plans for us. But we also have choices to make along the way. Each morning now as I meditate I choose to allow the path to unfold, trusting that it will take me exactly where I need to go.

 Maybe next year we should all go for a little walk on the Camino del Norte and celebrate 10 years.

YOLO!

 

 

 

THIS MONTH IS THE 9TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE CAMINO - SPAIN WITH YARO & ANDREW

 

 

CAMINO COMPOSTELA 2006

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

JUST STARTING - ST. JEAN PIED DE PORT

 

 

 



WELL EARNED REST - MIDWAY

ALMOST THERE -  890K

 

 

 

THE CAMINO - A JOURNEY NOT TO BE FORGOTTEN!



 MY OWN JOURNEY ON THE CAMINO DE COMPOSTELA. 

“My own story is different, just like every pilgrim’s Camino is different on the same walk we make in life” reflected the old man. It is 7am at the ‘refugio’ de San Tiago, France. We have breakfast and begin walking up hill and onto the mountains. The weather is magnificent this August 31, 2006. We are lucky as it may often be cloudy and misty and difficult to see the road ahead. But we are having a magnificent view of the ancient country and of the French Pyrenees. “The angels are guiding me and Gemma in Castellon that loves me, she will meet me at the end of the Camino in San Tiago de Compostela to celebrate the end of the walk” thought the old man with a pleasant smile on his face and carrying a heavy, much too heavy pack on his back. The Camino of the heart is calling and we go! From Roncesvalles to Zubiri, a small town in Navarra province of Spain – we are only on the third day of the Camino we cannot find an ‘albergue’ to spend the night in so we improvise; I get a room at a small hotel for 6 Euros for myself. No snoring pilgrims and warm showers. This is a luxury but without the proper care of the body the souls cannot travel well. Next day I got to Pamplona and sent some unnecessary stuff to Gemma and felt relieved from the heavy burden (4K) in my backpack.

Notes from my diary: “My body aches all over, Andrew disappeared with a couple of girls One from NZ who lived at the ,Gold Coast Australia and now lives in London and Leanne 28, an Irish/Indian lass from Dublin. She finished her MA in Ecological engineering and her dark hair and very pleasant constitution AND not carrying much in her back pack inspired all of us – amazing!- I think Andy is in love.”

More writing: “I am tired and still 25 days or more to go. I have to pace myself better and have even less weight on my back. Take more ‘siestas’ during the hot midday period. Not worry about the next ‘refugio’ like many pilgrims who rush to the next stop like sheep. I am wondering how this will be for me in the next long days. Well I can always take the bus. Yet that is only in case of an emergency! So far the Camino is all forest and going downhill to Zubiri. I am exhausted and walked very slowly, I realize that I lost track of my companions. Suddenly I felt a presence in my back, thinking it is a pilgrim wanting to pass me by, I looked back and saw no one there. At that moment, I felt that an angelic presence was caring for me on that difficult trek.

Many small ‘miracles’ emerged along the way.  For example, I found a walking stick when my new one was lost. I was walking out of Pamplona early in the morning (Andy and friends were still asleep) and thinking that I need a stick to help me walk, suddenly in front of me dropped a stick! I was shocked as the streets were deserted and there were no wooden sticks around to be seen. “Here is a gift from San Tiago and the Angels” thought the pilgrim. “Thank you!”

Day 7 - week one - walking from Los Arcos to Logrono – 27K.The walk to Los Arcos in 35C was a real trial! Leanne, Andrew and I walked very slowly on a hot road. Finally I gave up and I rested in a shade of a big hay stack and there I met a young Iranian man Hushi. He lives in Sweden but now is working as a bartender in Alicante.

With another young man, Ed from London we made up a very interesting group of ‘yolo, yolo’ pilgrims. We came to Logrono, capital city of the Rioja province and the best wine in the country! The inner city is a typical medieval town with a huge cathedral and plaza. Very dark inside and outside a nice café where I had a tortilla and coffee. Dinner with my new group of friends with a lot of Rioja wine, this pilgrimage is turning to be a party every night. Oh how different and good we all feel!

The imagination flows on the Camino. Our group of five pilgrims, walking all day, gave us a sense of walking on the “yellow brick road” in the wizard of Oz folk tale. Leanne was like Dorothy, intelligent, cute; Andrew as the Tin Man, pursuing ‘Dorothy’ and wanting to get her in a private room somewhere, while she flirts and plays ‘not ready yet’. Hushi the young, bold, intelligent, critical and handsome Iranian – we called him ‘the munchkin’; the young Englishman writing his first novel as he walked, Ed, was named ‘munchkin two’; Yaro(me) was named ‘the lion with heart’ He kept connecting with lovely Gemma on the mobile. Their love is growing even on the Camino. This is one of her many texts:

“Your memories give me many emotions, our meeting is near. I love you without any conditions, in a profound way! How are you my butterfly?”

And  

“Closing circles in life- how good and also enjoying the walk! My love, I am so happy. I wake up with the vision/image of our contact soon!”

HALF WAY TO THE TOP

I AM HALF WAY TO San Tiago. Connecting with Gemma, my love on the internet at about 4pm each day and receiving her text messages. I think “how is that I deserve such a love? I answer: Because I was open to love and she came in. She was waiting for millennia” LOVE IS LIFE. Love is pain and happiness!

 I caught up with Andrew and Leanne and we had dinner celebrating her master’s degree. A man played a harmonica in the ‘albergue’ and I sang a Russian song - the ‘katiusha’ with him to the delight of all tired pilgrims. Miracles are small but they do appear on the Camino. After getting a walking staff in Pamplona, I was doing a very agonizingly hot walk to Estella and missed the yellow arrow. I lost 3kilometers and was exhausted before getting to the town. I arrived at a cathedral at 3pm and there was bus stop and a bus. The young female driver said that she is going to La Estella in five minutes and for only 95c I was in the refugio in about 5minutes. Ah a rest – thank you angels! At night, I imagine I am with Gemma, I close my eyes and feel her kisses, so gentle and passionate. I see her naked with me in bed and we make love. ….. I am on a magic carpet flying to her side. I wake up in the early morning and have to get going. They close the albergue at 8am. The Camino is calling me!

September 11/06. Walking at night from Najera to Santo Domingo (21K) It is full moon and the OZ group wanted to walk at midnight in moonlight. However, after much wine and late night, only I and Hushi were the only ‘volunteers’ to do the midnight walk. Hushi and I walked for six hours and did a lot of talking about life and women. I felt like Paolo Coelho on his Camino with his master. Except that I was the ‘master’ and Hushi the ‘disciple’. We passed by Santo Domingo at 4am and ended up in Granon, a medieval town, by 10am exhausted. Santo Domingo was also an old medieval town and had a very dark energy. We felt the many awful things that must have happened there. The old sculptures on the buildings reminded us of the Inquisition and its horrors. We were exhausted but did not go to the albergue at the church but slept on a bench in the plaza, like tow hobos. Later we walked on to Granon where a nice refuge greeted us. We slept in a church on Yoga mattresses and then went on to Burgos. I rested in a nice little hotel-posada where I had two days of blissful rest and got in touch with Reyes, Gemma’s cousin and her family. From Burgos to Leon a tough 30K walk. Here you have a bit of history of that fantastic city: BURGOS.

There are many human settlings dating back to the Neolithic period (4,500BC) especially on the hill of the castle that has a full view of the city. The city of Burgos itself was founded by Diego Rodriguez in the year 884. King Alfonso III of Leon trying to stop the advances of the Moors, ordered a building of a military castle surrounded by a vast wall.

After the re-conquest of the area, the warriors that were given land built houses and developed commerce. The city was not changed much until about 1071. Alfonso VIII establishes a court in the city and helps build the Monastery of Huelgas and rebuilds the city walls as they are today.

The XV Century brings Burgos into its full potential as the centre of the Catholic Kings: Fernando and Isabel the couple who financed Cristobal Colon that lead to the discovery of America. Howe3ver, in the following years, Burgos suffered disintegration due to wars in Flanders, the centralization of Spain in Madrid, diseases and a shift of economy to the New World.

The Spanish civil war (1936-39), placed Burgos in a special category. From its beginnings, the city decides to support the Nationalist Government and was well rewarded by the dictator Franco who became the leader and the head of state.

Now, in the 21st century, Burgos has evolved as a mayor centre of commerce and tourism. It has also become the main point of meeting of the pilgrims to Compostela. It is situated about half way Santiago.

SANTIAGO DE COMPOSTELA

According to ancient local tradition, on 2 January of the year AD 40, the Virgin Mary appeared to James on the bank of the Ebro River at Caesar Augusta, while he was preaching the Gospel in Spain. She appeared upon a pillar,( Nuestra Señora del Pilar), and that pillar is conserved and venerated within the present Basilica of Our Lady of the Pillar, in Zaragoza, Spain. Following that apparition, St James returned to Judea, where he was beheaded by King Herod Agrippa I in the year 44.

The translation of his relics from Judea to Galicia in the northwest of Iberia was effected, in legend, by a series of miraculous happenings: decapitated in Jerusalem with a sword by Herod Agrippa himself, his body was taken up by angels, and sailed in a rudderless, unattended boat to Iria Flavia in Spain, where a massive rock closed around his relics, which were later removed to Compostela. The 12th-century Historia Compostellana commissioned by Bishop Diego Gelmírez provides a summary of the legend of St James as it was believed at Compostela. Two propositions are central to it: first, that St James preached the gospel in Spain as well as in the Holy Land; second, that after his martyrdom at the hands of Herod Agrippa I his disciples carried his body by sea to Spain, where they landed at Padrón on the coast of Galicia, and took it inland for burial at Santiago de Compostela.         

 

 

SPANISH TORTILLA RECIPE

Ingredients
1 1/2 pounds russet potatoes (about 2 medium)
Extra-virgin olive oil, for frying (about 4 cups) See Cooks Note
2 medium onions, thinly sliced (1 1/2 pounds)
4 teaspoons kosher salt
10 large eggs
Serving suggestions: sliced chorizo, roasted pequillo peppers, or crumbled goat cheese or Sofritto, recipe follows
 
Read more at: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/food-network-kitchens/spanish-tortilla-recipe.html?oc=linkback

Directions
Peel and thinly slice the potatoes. Soak slices in water for 10 minutes. Drain and dry completely in a salad spinner. Meanwhile, pour enough olive oil into a large saucepan so it's about an inch deep. Heat over medium heat until a slice of onion bubbles gently when placed in the oil, about 310 degrees F. Add the onions and fry, stirring occasionally until just golden, about 8 minutes. Scoop the onions from the oil with a slotted spoon and drain on a paper-towel lined baking sheet.
 
Add about half of the potatoes, and fry until lightly golden and a little puffy, about 10 minutes. Scoop the potatoes from the oil, add to the onions. Repeat with the rest of the potatoes. Reserve the oil. Season the vegetables with 3 teaspoons of the salt. (The preparation of the vegetables can be done up to 2 hours ahead.)
 
Break the eggs into a large bowl. Whisk just enough to combine but not so much that they get loose and runny, about 15 times. Add the vegetables and remaining 1 teaspoon salt.
 
Heat a medium (10-inch) nonstick skillet over medium heat. Add 2 tablespoons of the reserved oil and heat. Add the tortilla mixture and stir briskly with a spatula to get peaks and valleys in the folds of the egg, about 2 to 3 minutes. Stop stirring and reduce the heat to low, cover and cook until the eggs are set but still pretty loose, about 5 minutes. Lay a flat pan lid or a plate on top and invert the tortilla. Add more oil to the pan if needed, and slide the tortilla back into the pan, cover and finish cooking until set and lightly brown, about 3 minutes more. Slide the tortilla out of the pan to a cutting board to cool slightly.
 
Cut into cubes or thin wedges and serve warm or room temperature as is or with 1 of the suggested toppings.
 
Cook's Note: Yes that's a lot of oil. But you can reuse it for other tortillas and in sauces, dressing or salads. It has a wonderful onion-y flavor that is great tossed on roasted potatoes or chicken.
 
Copyright 2007 Television Food Network, G.P. All rights reserved
 
We love this as a topper to grilled bread, with cheese, or as an alternative to cocktail sauce with shrimp or other seafood.
 
Sofrito:
Heat the olive oil in a medium skillet over medium heat. Add the onions and sugar and half the salt. Cook, stirring occasionally, until golden and sweet, about 1 hour. If the onions begin to get really brown, add a splash of water to slow them down.
 
Meanwhile, cut the tomatoes, crosswise. Grate them on the cut side on the largest holes of a box grater into a bowl all the way down to the skins. Discard skins. Add tomato puree, pimenton and bay leaf to the caramelized onions, and continue to cook until quite thick and the tomato separates from the oil, about 10 to 15 minutes more. Season with the remaining salt or to taste. Serve warm or at room temperature.
 
Prep Time: 10 minutes
 
Cook Time: 1 hour 15 minutes
 
From Food Network Kitchens
 
Read more at: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/food-network-kitchens/spanish-tortilla-recipe.html?oc=linkback

PILGRIMAGE TO THE END OF THE WORLD

This book helped me to prepare for this amazing but long journey that millions of pilgrims walked over the past one thousand years. The other, much older book is THE PILGRIM'S GUIDE.It is a medieval book that still is useful to those who want to get ready for the walk. Conrad Rudolph was inspired by the "guide" and wrote his book about his personal journey. My personal journey is written here and it is meant to celebrate the walk with my two friends Andy Moffat and Hoshy Afzalan.

What is a pilgrimage?

From Tibetan Buddhists at Jokang to Muslims at Mecca for the hajj, pilgrims across faiths and cultures travel thousands of miles - often by foot - to reach holy sites. Such journeys are considered proof of ultimate devotion, the most important act of an individual's life. The intense mystical and physical aspects of pilgrimages have recently sparked a modern revival, leading travelers in search of spiritual growth and physical challenge to embark on these sacred adventures. Pilgrimage to the End of the World takes the reader, via Conrad Rudolph's able eyes and feet, to the holy site of Santiago de Compostela, believed to be the burial place of the apostle James. Discovered around AD 812, it became one of the most important pilgrimage destinations for Westerners (after Rome and Jerusalem) and has recently received an influx of renewed attention since being named a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Today it is the second most popular Catholic pilgrimage center, having been visited by Francis of Assisi and Pope John Paul II, among others. Rudolph made this passage himself, traveling the two and a half months and one thousand miles along the ancient pilgrimage route from Le Puy, in south-central France, to Santiago, Spain. Offering his perspective as a medieval art historian as well as a veteran traveler, Rudolph melds the ancient and the contemporary, the spiritual and the physical, in a chronicle of his travels to this captivating place. From anecdotes to travel tips for "the wise pilgrim" (routes to take, physical training required, what to eat, where to stay, what to bring, and even recommendations of other publications), this book is at once travel guide, literary work, historical study, and memoir. Sincerely and engagingly written, it will appeal to travelers, religious scholars, and historians - and will have you wanting to embark for Spain as you close it.