They say that your “camino” starts long before you set foot in Spain. And for me this saying really held water. A couch potato who these days prefers to be holed up at home, I was forced to start “training” or at least get used to the idea of walking 10,000 steps everyday before I set off on my Camino de Santiago pilgrimage.
And so for a month or so prior to boarding my flight to Madrid, I began walking around my neighbourhood in Subang Jaya, Selangor – setting off on foot, “circumnavigating” SS14, SS15, trudging through parks, meeting and making an effort to chat with Subang residents for the first time since moving here in 1991! I started making new friends and forming fresh connections with senior citizens and children who are often in the parks walking, exercising and playing. I started reading again, looking up various blogs and posts from people who had done the walk, savouring How To Walk by Thich Nhat Hanh and poring through 1980s Brat Pack actor Andrew McCarthy’s wise exploration of his relationship with his son in Walking With Sam . But let me start at the beginning.
Some time in November last year, the germ of an idea to go on the Camino de Santiago took root in my brain. “Camino” is Spanish for path, road or journey. I’d heard about this long distance walk from friends and relatives, and I began to take a keen interest.
Since the pandemic, I had very little motivation to move. As trite as it may seem, exercise had been reduced to switching ch.
