World Youth Day Festivites Have Officially Begun!!

Putting aside the buzz created from our media interview yesterday, the more important note is that the World Youth Day festivities have officially begun - Cardinal Pell opened the event with Mass at the Barangaroo (they have some great names for things down under!) for about 150,000 pilgrims. We were seated in section G4, which was one section back and about 4 sections left of the stage - of course, these are large sections!!

Despite the largeness of it all, we managed to run into several familiar faces sitting around us. It seemed that we were in the Michigan section, although, there was no such thing. Behind us were the St. Gerald's crew from Farmington Hills and the St. Francis of Assisi from Ann Arbor. In front of us was the crew from DeLasalle in Warren. Besides the Michiganders, we seemed to be surrounded by Italians - actually, no matter where we went, we were surrounded by Italians!

We arrived at the Barangaroo around 12:30 PM for lunch, and the opening Mass was not until 4:15 PM. After securing a nice spot in our section that afforded us a clear view of the screen (since the stage was clearly out of the question!), we headed off to pick up our lunches, which all in all was not a horrible experience. There was a little waiting, but after a tip from the staff, we moved to a different food tent which had no waiting at all! God bless the staff!! :)

Our next order of business was to try to find Jerry a large American flag - it seemed that was the one item we left behind. Believe it or not, they were selling them at the venue...however, it seemed they sold out by the time we figured that out. As people were relaxing after lunch, Laura and I went in search of our seating assignment for the Papal arrival. When we were walking around, I saw the same group Jerry and I had seen earlier - they had 4 flags to themselves, and I decided to ask first where they got it, and then offered to buy one off them for what they paid. End result - Jerry now has a large American flag.

The opening Mass was quite a production - it was difficult to feel like we were at Mass, since we were outside with about 140,000 other folks. It was definitely an experience to see all the national flags waving throughout the crowd. Our own flag was neatly tucked away...or maybe Jerry was wearing it, but nevertheless, we managed to maintain a workable sightline to the screen in front of us. I got some decent photos, but will have to post them upon returning to the monastery.

After the Mass, dinner was sheer chaos. 140K trying to get their meals from three foodstations was an utter disaster. The shoving was what particularly mystified me - especially after just celebrating the Mass and receiving the body of Christ. Arguably, thousands of hungry people not being fed can inflame the tempers, but after almost 2 hours, I did finally return with our dinner bags. Of course, by now the boys had left to try to get Fr. John Martin back to the Opera House to register as a priest so he can concelebrate Mass with the Pope.

The girls headed out of the Barangaroo to try to see where we could go to catch up with them, and then realized that catching up with them would take a sheer miracle. After having used a miracle to get our food, I thought asking for two in one night might be a bit greedy! So we sat along the harbor and had dinner while we tried to figure out the logistics of how to get back to our host families. In the end, the ferry won out, and because of a delay, we got to stay and watch the fireworks.

Our host families have been just amazing. After our trying evening at the Barangaroo, our family picked all the girls up at the ferry and drove us to our respective houses. The boys' host dad has been doing the same when needed, and all host families have been very willing to drop us where we needed to go at any time.

That said, it is getting late and though a day behind on the posting, we do have another long day tomorrow, so I'll try to perhaps catch up a bit in the morning. Good night, and God bless!!
Rakhi