Day 44: The End. No, an End. Santiago to Estocolmo (3 371,1k)
- Frida Stavenow
- Oct 20, 2022
- 4 min read
On my last day in Spain, I’m awoken at 5am by a thunderstorm of biblical proportions. The rain outside my window isn’t even coming down. It’s coming around, one second going this way, the next somewhere completely different. Roaring winds. Claps of thunder. Lightning exposing the imposing silhouette of the monastic tower opposite (oh yeah this is basically a monk school, btw) every few seconds.
In weather like this, there is no way they’re letting flights take off. I have two separate Ryanair bookings. One to London, then one from London to Stockholm. Four hours in-between. Good luck with that, I tell myself and fall back asleep.
But the skies clear. When I return to this realm of consciousness, the sun is even peaking out from the still-heavy clouds, however shyly. I eat some buffet breakfast. Say goodbye to some pilgrims who don’t really know me, but who knew Waffles. And then I go to the airport.
Everything goes well. I stuff half my belongings into my pockets and hide a fanny pack with all my heavies underneath my brother in law’s size XXL fleece, then casually join the NO PRIORITY – ONE BAG ONLY queue at Gate B14. I look like a box. No two ways about it.
But the smiling Spanish ground crew let me onboard, no questions asked, saving me the £69,99 at-gate, last-minute, sucker-punch fee that Ryanair has been threatening me with in every interaction we’ve had since I booked my flight. They even let on people with two bags! Like so many times on this trip, it turns out I could’ve just chilled. Been a chill pilgrim. Chillgrim.
No. No new blog. It over.
We all still have to wear masks on flights from Spain, which is just as well, cause I’m pretty sure I’m getting ill. I pop another ibuprofen and try to cough quieter, incurring judgmental looks from my fellow cabin-dwellers. Fair enough. Thankfully I have a window seat, so I put on my headphones and am beautifully ushered out of Spain by one of the most beautiful songs in the world: Recado da Mãe Divina by Chandra Lacombe, not a Spanish singer, but Brazilian Portuguese. Oh, well. Galician is close enough.
With its tinkly, hopeful magic (I can tell apart guitar and piano, on a good day, and that’s about it for my instrumental discernment) it’s the perfect accompaniment to the plane leaving the tarmac, flying above the cathedral and into the sky.
Oh, take-offs. Despegada in Spanish; to peel off, to become unstuck. Leaving and going in the same whoosh. How I love not being still.
About a half hour before landing, the cabin crew excitedly announce the “most generous moment of the flight, ladies and gentlemen” – the Ryanair scratch cards! Trust me, I’ve never even noticed the Ryanair scratch cards before. Are they new? Someone once told me “lotteries are an unofficial tax on the poor” and I’ve never really been able to forget that, but then also, I’ve never had such a clear vision of exactly what I’d do with CARS & THOUSANDS OF EUROS IN CASH PRIZES before. So, I reasonably reason, if manifestation is at all a thing, this would be a grand moment for it to reveal itself to me as such.
And so I buy one, since, believe it or not, nobody has given me $11,000 to become a legal acid-peddler yet, even though I suggested exactly this over twenty-four hours ago.
No matter. Opting for the just-as-realistic Plan B, I hand two euro coins to the ever-smiling, gel-haired Ryanair flight attendant. JK. Ryanair, like Sweden, only takes card. Tip, tap, scratch.
Here’s a photo of everything being possible.
And here’s a photo of destiny saying Sorry, no win but also saying I’ve won “entry” to the €1Million event draw? I mean, that would also do. It’s in February, apparently. And as we all know I’m not going to shaman school until Year 2, anyway.
One fact I love about Genghis Khan is that, for all his brutality, he was known as a pretty lax enforcer of his own spiritual views on the territories he conquered. Certainly in comparison to later players such as, oh I don’t know, The Catholic Church? (Sorry, Father Ernesto.) Basically, ol’ GK had his own suspicions about how God liked to be worshipped, but he also knew that he couldn’t be 100% sure. Pretty progressive, really, for a megalomaniacal mass-murderer. Further, like most nicer oppressors / high school teachers, he didn’t believe in points taken off for wrong answers. So the way he saw it, it was just smarts to have the citizens of his territories pray to a bunch of different deities. Much like having a diversified investment portfolio, I’m sure he presciently mused, this would make it more likely that he get at least some return. And so he let his people pray. Celestial insurance, it’s been called.
Similarly, I suppose there’s no harm in shooting a little extra cosmic energy in the way of this scratch card. Maybe it’s time for a vision board?
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