THE OTHER SANTIAGO

I never thought I would ever travel to Santiago. Not even in those five months where we have helped pilgrims. LINK: PilgerHilfe. Now I had to go there, for I couldn't afford not to do it. For the PilgrimNetWork Santiago is indispensable. I thus drove from Portugal straight to the North, until I arrived in Santiago

Virgen de Montserrat
Madonna of Catalonia
(Copy)

It is more interesting than I thought. Quite alive and international. There are many restaurants and shops. The most important thing is obviously the cathedral. Personally, I don't like Gothic churches, for I have always the feeling that its monumental style has to do with power and dominance rather with religiosity. Thus from the beginning I concentrated myself on my mission: taking pictures of Green Men...

"Virgen del Pilar"
the most famous Madonna of Spain

After a while the first "classical" faces.Truly a joyful discovery, for Santiago is the third largest Catholic bulwark in the world (after Jerusalem and Rome) and you may then imagine that they have removed all "impurities". Apparently not in Santiago. That this was only a small beginning of my later "triumph", in this moment I couldn't surmise...

In another corner of the church I found a whole bunch of beautiful masks

Also these two, who still originate from the Gothic period...

In the mean time a group of pilgrims had gathered. Together with a music group that took care of the feeling. They even employed the convincing power of a bishop. He spoke Spanish, so I couldn't understand it well. He said something like "if you truly remorse, then Jesus will save you"