Copyright 2011 Brian Murdock

2 The next question was easy: if I was so adamant about not going, what would possess me to engage in such an undertaking? Well, to begin with, not every year is a holy year. They only when the Feast of Saint James, July 25th, falls on a Sunday. The next holy year wouldnt be for another 11 years, not seven, due to leap year, and though I would like to imagine myself as still a spry and strong man in my early 50s, you just never knew what to expect by then. What made doing the pilgrimage on a holy year that much more special? First of all because its holy, and thats something to consider. But there was another factor too: The Compostela. That was the name of the diploma that they give you for meeting the requirements, so there was something to say for all of this madness and that is the by completing the pilgrimage. This was more than just one of those American meaningless feel-good certificates of achievement. Not one of those bumper stickers Mom puts on the back of her car saying My Son is a Pilgrim. It was far more transcendental. It was a kind of general pardon for your sins, all of your sins, and it was worth double on a holy year; kind of like scoring a goal as a visiting team in the Champions League in soccer. You see, traditionally, during a regular year, if you made it to Santiago with everything in order, the good people at the office there would produce a paper that reduces your stay purgatory by half. That may sound attractive, but considering all the sinning I had done up to this point in life (and I was sure I had a

near eternal life sentence waiting for me), I knew 50% wouldnt quite do. But if you complete the journey on a holy year, word has it they free you of all charges. Its like one of those Get of Jail Free cards in Monopoly. If I did it, I could keep the certificate for a future time like, for example, when I die. That way, if everything went according to planned, I could get this paper buried with me so that when I reached the Ministry of Celestial Affairs and I could say in a cocky tone, Heres my card, guys. Im going in. Let me through. Hallelujah! That should suffice. But just in case, I would bring along a copy of my Spanish Residents ID card, because anyone who had experience of any kind in dealing with bureaucratic work in this country could tell you that you always need a copy of your ID card. I am sure that whoever greets me at the desk worked as a public servant in government in his former life. But Ill be ready. In order to avoid the masses of humanity, we decided to skip the main route, known as the French route, and opted for the Portuguese way, which comes up from the south. The Portuguese route, as its name rightly indicates, starts deep in the neighboring country, as far down as Lisbon, but many set out from Oporto, a solid two hundred kilometers away. It enters Spain at a border town called Tuy and runs northward some 115 kms (thats about 70 miles) to the steps of the cathedral. That was our hope. Wed see with what and whom we run into on the way. My friends told me everything is going to be open and smooth, but with 250,000 people in mind

needing to go somewhere, I was not entirely convinced. Then came the great fear: what if we all thought of the same thing? Wed find out in just a few days.