Postcard No8

We are in a village in the way to Sarria called Triacastella (Three castles). The castles are long gone but this wee church remains in use. In many of the villages it is the wee stone built church that survives, through constant use and occasional repair.

In one village we attended a Vespers service with Gregorian chanting by some Benedictine monks (2). But what concerned me was that the ceiling was beginning to fall down and the right hand wall had two big gaps where stone used to be and now the remaining wall and roof was supported by lumps of 2 by 4.

I wondered why European Cultural fund money wasn’t being spent on repairing it.

Someone reminded me that the church had loads of money.

The true cynic may have said the gaps and obvious repairs were being left not because the two above options were unavailable but because there are hundreds of gullible pilgrims who walk in weekly and say “Oh, poor wee church, in a poor village, they mustn’t be able to contribute to the repair fund. Mabel, let’s put a hundred dollars in!”

Nb: not all people who work in dollars are gullible.

I do believe that there are ‘pilgrim prices’ most places we walk through. I had to buy ibroprofen gel today, with stick on felt (moleskin) and some TigerBalm… €27! The pharmacies here do have a monopoly as they are the only shops allowed to sell drugs. Not like supermarkets at home selling Ibuprofen for 30p.

We would say “them shops had big windies!”*

* Big windows, all the better to see the gullible approach. (Read as you are telling the story of the wolf and Little Red Riding Hood!😀 “My! what big windies you have!”)

I felt that I hadn’t had much opportunity to sketch and was keen to do something about that. I quickly sketched (with a Pentel brush pen) the church and graveyard and coloured it in about 45 minutes.