I got up around sevenish..I rushed hotel dude for breakfast, they had still been asleep because i was worried about missing train... then go to train station to find out there is not 8.54 train but a 9.45..so I sit round and journal for an hour... the train ride is a less than half hour to Lourdes, the scenery is pretty, lush green hills crowding in.....i find the tourist office, I get my map and general information, I was fixated on the idea that there was a buddhist center here in Lourdes..the woman does an internet search..no, it is near Toulouse...(this is the second or third time on pilgrimage where i thought there was a center near where i was and found out i should have done more homework) she cant get through to the gite..so I walk there... gite closed .... back to train-station because tourist info says the cafe across from it lets you store
bags for two euro....i leave my bag there...
I meander slowly down the tourist warren and shop!! prayer cards, a tiny water bottle for the holy water from the Grotto... small bag for my lap top...Lourdes change purse.....then I follow signs to the grotto, the church that greets you as you walk in could be from disneyland it has that perky, bright, delicate icing look...... I go to the church first..it is almost tacky, it has new mosaic work depicting stories from Jesus's life....i should say this is the lower church on top of it in tiers are two more churches... inside the church there seem to be catholic tourists from around the world, I see Korean, Indian, I hear Spanish and Italian...someone with a small Polish flag is walking around..there is a youth group in yellow t-shirts from some christian college.. perhaps Ireland?
then I headed to the grotto..before the grotto, there are water taps where people fill their various containers with the miracle water... I filled my little tourist bottle and then for good measure my empty orangina bottle as well.. the water did taste very good...Here by the grotto, I stay for long time..i first get in line for the gauntlet that goes along the rock face of the Grotto.. people are touching the walls..and were the water is dripping they are catching it and anointing themselves... I copy them...i want to get my blessings too! .then I sit on a bench were you can watch the other people get their blessings from the grotto wall... a man is laboring over a big candle holder and cleaning old wax off it and putting in new giant candles that people buy an then donate in a bin near by..again I watch an international circuit come through..African pilgrims, Vietnamese, east European.... past the grotto are metal cages that hold more lit candles that people have left...again there are some men cleaning up the excess wax...this place is open 24 hours a day...and there seem to be groups everywhere doing their own special prayer services... and of course there are the sick or disabled people or the ones too old and feeble to walk..so there is a huge volunteer service mostly of school age children who push them around in rickshaw type wheel chairs etc....past the candle offering cages is the bath area, men and woman have separate baths... they are of the spring water that is considered holly..i was curious about it, but it was only during a few times a day and the lines looked long...i explored the tiered churches the middle rung, which was the 'primitive' one, at least that is what the french sign said.. I dont know what it actually translates to correctly in english..but it had low ceilings.. and felt more cave like and cozy then the other ones...I found out later that they have a piece of St Bernadette's rib bone in a side alter.. there was a friendly looking priest giving a teaching in spanish to some young men... then the top most church, which was almost empty, had depictions, in the stain glass some of the highlights of Bernadette's visitations with the lady named 'immaculate conception' which the church interpreted as meaning the Virgin Mary...(or perhaps it could also mean the stainless luminous state of dharmadatu? Sorry, trying to be funny in dork Buddhist sort of way)...i also saw what was called the museum of miracles..but only one story was in english, it showed the healed bones of a man who had not been able to walk before the miracle...the rest was just photos on the wall with french stories underneath.... there were a fair share of nuns with miracle stories....then I slowly meandered back out and had a lunch which was fries and salad and overpriced water.... then slowly back to tourist office where the lady called for me again at the gite.. I could go to gite in one hour..so 4.30... I slowly walked towards train station to retrieve my bag..I found one more church, it was in the town center, it too looked more modern and had a large group of Polish people in a tour visiting..the church too seemed dedicated to St. Bernadette...then I walked to the gite... bike guy tried to talk to me outside, I thought he wanted to stay at the gite too, ..but the sense I got is he wanted to share stories about pilgrimage and he was moving on from here, but i could not understand him..... then there was hippie guy, who I totally pre-judged because he was too perfect looking in his flowing outfit... eventually gite man shows up and we need to take a moment to look at church and pray or some such, outside..the gite did have a great view of the church bellow.... then inside..i do my chores.... I dont really talk to my room mate the hippieguy...some woman comes in and starts talking a blue streak in italain to my room mate...I try to ignor her but cant help noticing that she too has a special outfit on to denote her pilgrim statues.... there is another young woman floating around as well..eventually I warm up get friendly, even though I had started out feeling like I did not really need to meet new people and kinda wanted to crawl into my own head space...but at dinner, we all did start talking.... .. lots of blah blah mostly the flamboyant belgium lady...in french... I find out the man is italian but has lived in germany for a long time and therefore his other language is german I try to talk to him a little in german, because neither one of us speaks french and the conversation did not include us the flamboyant woman actually tried to shame us for doing so..when she talked, you had to listen whether you understood a bleeding thing or not..she was starting her pilgrimage here in Lourdes, so was the Italian...the other young woman who was french but could also speak fair german, and she was ending her pilgrimage here..she had started in Switzerland.. the italian man has walked the Camino three times ...the other older man running the gite is involved in the 'slow food' business, which I think has to do with locally grown organic foods...he produces honey and some concentrated product there-of... our food this evening was all healthy stuff including a homemade apéritif with pamplemousse, my new favorite french word meaning grapefruit...the talk starts cutting into the candle mass happening down at the church and grotto..our host gives me and the young french woman candles, she has decided to join me last minute.. he tells her in french the fast way down... we join the tail end of the candle procession as she talks about her plans for after leaving Lourdes... I pretty much new she was gay immediately... she was just too butch for the average french girl...She said she was going to visit Munich.. I thought that an unusual itinerary for her after the pilgrimage so I had to ask, why...she was going to meet her german girlfriend there...she met her while walking pilgrimage...
apparently the german girl speaks hardly any french so she has to polish up her mostly-forgotten ten years of school german....
Back to the procession: it was amazing to see all the people around us, now there really were crowds... we were snaking towards the front of the church and then slowly filled up the spaces...there were people here to herd us...Our candles were housed in paper holders with Virgin Mary prayers on it in several languages..there was the occasional fire-flare ups as the paper caught fire...it even happened to my friend.. I got a nice punch in the arm when I burst out laughing.....people in wheel chairs were being wheeled to the front of the stage ...then on stage priests and lay-people do the V.Mary prayers in all different languages, which was really nice...
I thought, even though the catholic church seems to be loosing constituents everywhere...based on what catholics are telling me...
and the younger generations in places like France and Italy not taking the church very seriously...it is still impressive to go to Lourdes... there is no sense here of a waning faith...i thought it a very special place...and the energy did seem warm and comforting... like almost maternal qualities.... ...then around ten we go back to the gite...we sit with the host and he makes us a calming and stimulating herb tea that does not interfere with sleep, he assures (later i looked it up, it was Linden flower tea, which seems to be used in spain and france as a cure all tea)... we are relaxing ... when the belgium girl shows up, she seems a bit put out because the italian had gone to sleep on her...everything switches to french... we are kind of trapped in the politeness game..then my young friend bolts upright in midstream of some belgium woman tangent to go to bed... I take her cue... it's way late... Lourdes is not proving the be much of a break from pilgrimage at all... I wake up a lot from dreams of Lourdes's churches and people...
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