7 Days - Reprise

So, six months later I am again seven days away from departing on another research adventure. In seven days we set off for London (with a three day stopover in New York), and on September the 9th I fly to Lyon. I should begin walking the Camino de Santiago de Compostela (chemin de Compostelle in French) from Le Puy on the 11th of September.

Much has changed since I wrote the first entry of this blog (the first '7 Days' post), and yet much remains the same. I hold many of the same feelings about my upcoming research. I am apprehensive about my body (it suffered so in India) and the endurance test it is about to undergo. The Camino from Le Puy to Santiago is over 1500km, which really is a hell of a long way to walk. Yet, as before I feel elated that I am about to, again, get to do something long in the dreaming and planning. I'm nervous that I won't find enough people to interview, though that is tempered somewhat by the experience I gained in India, particularly the willingness most people had towards participating in my project. And, I'm curious about my own emotional journey on the Camino. It, like India, has a reputation for challenging its patrons in many often unforeseen ways. I look forward to meeting them.

And now for another wanky symbolic photo:


My boots so I can walk, guidebooks so I can find the way, my notebook and pen to try and capture to torrential flow of ideas that comes with fieldwork, and my voice recorder to forever capture those magic moments of expression from other pilgrims. There is no lightbulb this time. India taught me that they are given me by those I speak with (or they at least let me write in their light for a time). And I know now that I don't need my glasses to see.