COVID 19

My last night at the "Movement to Power" workshop

24 hours later the beginning of COVID 19

For some of us the sixth of June, is a date of significance but at the present it only marks the end of the workshop, and my Nadedet camper van is energetically making its way back down the hills to Valencia and then to France and Germany. I want to get to Germany as quickly as possible because I want to take Nadedet to the garage that will give her the attention and love she needs and hopefully bring back into our world the lost sixth gear.

I dictate my desired destination to the camper van app and soon we are back on a sunny highway heading to a night time parking area on the outskirts of Valencia. This place is a combination of wooden cabins and surrounding parking spots for campers, where you can connect to electricity for a fee and walk fifty meters here or there to the public restrooms and showers.

Let’s say that I already have some experience, so I reverse quite smoothly into the special facility where I will empty my gray water and fill my water tank with fresh Spanish water. There’s no doubt that the expertise I’ve developed since I left Erlangen just a week ago gives me a tremendous sense of satisfaction. I open the valve at the bottom of the chassis and a stream of gray water flows into the sewer. While the gray tank is emptying, I take out the rubber hose from the camper's backside, connect one end to the faucet, push the other end deep into the opening of the fresh water tank, and turn on the water. Oh, how professional I am.

When the water business is finished, I find a shaded parking spot under a tree. When you live in a camper you learn quickly about sun and shade. Everything is fine. I am not thinking about the workshop even for a second, and only a few WhatsApp messages remind me that there was something related to the movement and empowerment of bananas and avocados.

The shower room is a bit gross, but the nakedness, the hot water, and the shampoo and conditioner in a private space are definitely uplifting. Freshly showered and fragrant, I hop over to the not-so-far-away supermarket and buy my favorite foods - eggs, sliced bread, and cheese. At the checkout, exhaustion hits me. I think to myself: "this empowerment workshop has drained me of all my energy," and by eight in the evening, I close all the windows and doors of Nadedet, do the dishes, brush my teeth, and curl up in the most comfortable bed in the world. It seems that before my head even touches the pillow, I’m already deep in sleep.

Around eleven at night, I wake up feeling I am suffocating. I mean, air is coming in, but it feels like there’s no Oxygen in it. It’s very, very, very scary. And all of this in a strange parking lot with all kinds of sleazy campers and various couples coming to spend the night in the wooden cabins, and only God knows what really is happening in them. In fact, since I’ve passed through a few of these camping parking lots, it has become clear to me that the world of camping and its visitors is a complex world, but this isn't the current story, so I won’t delve into it. In any case, tonight I realize there’s no one to rely on but me and my father in heaven, and so I say to myself: "first of all, let’s calm down." How in the world do you calm down when no air is going into your lungs?

You meditate.

I sit up straight on the bed, focus on my nostrils, and inwardly follow the air entering through them into my lungs and exiting through my mouth. Again, air comes in, passes through the hairy nasal vestibule, over the conchea and I feel it going down into the trachea and branching out into the bronchi. And so, for about half an hour, my entire being is air that is inhaled into the lobes of the lungs and exhaled into the van's interior space. Gradually, the oxygen is absorbed again into the red blood cells. After close to thirty minutes, a nourishing, relaxing, healing amount of Oxygen is circulating in my body, and I slowly slide back inbetween my sheets and sink once again into deep sleep.

A splitting headache wakes me up. I feel I weigh a ton. Getting out of bed requires all my strength. A blue flame is boiling water and ground coffee beans. I pour the hot drink into a cup and sipping this coffee slowly, slightly alleviates the pounding in my head. I want to go back and just lie down and not move, but I'm clinging onto the belief that I must get back to Germany as quickly as possible. The camper van urgently needs to be looked at by a gearbox expert, and while swallowing a couple of painkillers and drinking 750 milliliters of water, we set off.

Inside Valencia, in urban traffic, at traffic lights and intersections, I manage to stay alert, but when I hit the highway, the weight of my eyelids doubles, and I guess that for a few moments, my dear late father is holding the steering wheel while my eyes are closed. Not smart, not recommended, very dangerous, and completely foolish. I know that something is very wrong.

At the first rest area, I park the car, collapse onto the bed, and looking at my phone through slit eye lids, I see there’s some extended chat going on in the Movement to Power Group. Everyone is feeling unwell, and one of the girls confirms she's tested positive. “You’re always positive!” writes some avocado smart-aleck. Hahaha everybody laughs. In short, the workshop has given us all a virus that no strength or potential has yet succeeded in conquering - the Covid 19.

However, I must deal with the mechanical health of Nadedet, so on the way from Valencia to Girona, the city of Saint Francisco, I take it in stages. I drive for an hour and then sleep for two. The progress is very slow. The good news is that European June days are quite long, and daylight lasts until around nine in the evening. According to the algorithms, I should reach Girona before dark, find a parking spot, and rest until my body conquers the virus.

The parking lot I arrive at is indeed an urban parking lot—one where anyone can park—and somewhere there are stairs leading down to an underground parking. In the stair well there is a not very inviting toilet sink that are typical of parking lots. But outside there’s an electrical outlet that I can connect the camper to. I’m a mess, but I still manage to park the van at a relatively decent angle, and to my delight, not far from me, I hear the owners of another camper van speaking German. If there are German speakers here, it means the place is relatively safe. I’m going to sleep.

This is what Girona Vayreda Autocaravana looks like off season - when I was there

This is what Girona Vayreda Autocaravana looks like in the middle of the summer

The "Vayreda Autocaravana" parking lot is located on Massaguer Street (Pasaje de Massaguer) right at the edge of La Devesa Park in Girona. It’s one of the best locations in the city, and when it comes to its cultural heritage, everything is right here, just meters from the parking lot: the cathedral, the Jewish quarter, the Arabic baths, the Rambla de la Libertat, the Wall, and Devesa park in all its glory. I almost feel as if I am in Jerusalem. But I only learn all of this in retrospect because during this whole second visit to Girona, for about sixteen hours, I am battling my brave battle against COVID 19 and my body throws me time and again into a deep, breathless sleep.

I don’t know why, but even though when I wake up I still have the same headache, I feel I have to find a laundromat and wash all my clothes and sheets. I also think it might be a good idea to pop into a pharmacy and buy a testing kit, masks, and some recommended medicine.

When I feverishly gaze at the map, I see that there is an automatic laundromat which seems quite close to the parking lot. I stuff all my clothes and everything into a mesh bag that must weigh at least ten kilograms, and burning with fever, I start walking through the park toward the laundromat. Well, what looks close on the map is not necessarily close on the ground. The path just isn’t ending, and with every step, the bag becomes heavier and heavier. I tell myself: This is it; I am going to die in Girona.

Of course, I arrive safely to where I am headed, and not only do I arrive safely, but at the laundromat, everyone is very helpful, and there is a pharmacy right across the street. The pharmacist is so stunning that I have to restrain myself from proposing to her. She gives me the masks, sells me a testing kit and more Paracetamol and makes sure I understand that I have to take one every five hours and not to forget to drink, drink, drink. Water. Okay? Yes, yes, anything you say.

I stay another night in the urban parking lot. I swallow a pill every five hours, drink water non-stop, and sleep, sleep, and sleep. The next day, I am healthy. Good-bye, Girona.