Me and Tony in Lourdes

Monday
             You might not believe this, but Lourdes is a great place to go on holiday, especially if you're a catholic kid. I went when I was fifteen with the school and when I was seventeen with folk from St Coumbus parish down Viewpark. Tony was dead keen. I had to be convinced, but Tony told me the priest who was taking the trip was a great guy and there wouldn't be any hassles from him. Tony also pointed out that it looked like there would be three times as many girls as boys.So I went. The party was mostly teenagers and a few young adults, and a Virgin Mary crew of grown up women around the priest.
              After three days on a bus, we arrived at the hotel in Lourdes and by ten o clock that night the corridors were full of drunk pilgrims, girls staggering about the place having discovered how cheap the brandy carry-outs were. One guy had drank six pints of cold lager, but he hadn't eaten for three days since they tried to feed him all this froggy food when all he could eat was fish suppers. He was having some kind of convulsions and folk were holding him down on the bed. Apparently, this can happen if you have six pints of cold lager on a completely empty stomach, so don't try that one at home, kids.
              Lourdes is very romantic. Tony and I got off with two girls from Kilwinning and went a walk down by the Grotto. There's a huge basillica on top of the rock the cave is in and there's a river and a nice promenade place down by the side of the basillica on the way to the Grotto where the Virgin Mary was supposed to have appeared. We went down there with these girls. I was sitting for ages on a park bench rather close to where the Virgin Mary appeared snogging this girl. Romantic and ironic at the same time. What more can you ask for?
                The next day we were trying to get them into the hotel and met the Virgin Mary crew of responible adults in the lift. An awkward moment. But they didn't say anything. I'm rolling my eyes at Tony across the total silence.I think Tony and I were sharing a room, but we got the loan of someone else's room and went our separate ways for the ten minutes it took for the girl I was with to think that my intentions might not be completely honourable though, in fact, they were. Almost anyway.
               The next day the girls showed up as our bus was going away to see us off. Our bus is parked and then there's a space of maybe fifteen yards till the next bus. By the time I was walking passed that bus on the way out of sight, round the back of it, Tony and his girl were trying to suck each others teeth out. This was in full view of our bus.
                After I finished snogging the girl round the back of the bus, I said cheerio and started back to our bus. Tony and the girl were still snogging. Every eye was on me or them, mostly them, as I went back to the bus. Then I'm sitting on the bus watching this snogging. Someone should have thrown a pail of water over them. The bus driver is waiting for Tony. We all were. Finally, he gets on the bus.
               It wasn't Lloret de Mar we went to next. It was Fuenterrabia. The priest called a meeting and wanted everyone to attend. For some reason, Tony managed not to be there. How convenient! I can't remember what his excuse was. The priest wasn't a happy bunny. So he's belling everyone off about getting drunk and whatnot, but what he's really annoyed about is what Tony and I were trying to get up to with these girls. He's threatening that any future shennanigans like that would result in some people being put on the next flight home, and I'm sitting there black affronted and wondering where the hell Tony is! It wisny me! Honest! I was round the back of the bus!!
                We went to confession in Lourdes. Usually, the priest would tell you to say five Our Fathers and five Hail Marys as a penance, but I suppose since it was supposed to be a pilgrimage, he gave me and Tony both five full rosaries. This is an enormous amount of Hail Marys!! Like, fifteen decades or something like that. And he told me not to worry about it before he laid the penance on me. Told us both we'd be okay once we got married. Aye right!