|
World Youth Day - Australia by Catherine Riddiough
We were joining up with two other Loreto schools, Loreto St.Albans and Loreto Manchester. As other people were dreading the flight, I was actually looking forward to it, as it was my first ever flight. We arrived at Manchester Airport at 4pm and checked in. After being told our original flight was delayed, we switched to and earlier flight. This was also delayed, but would still arrive at Heathrow earlier. It was a smooth flight, but the trouble started when we landed at Heathrow. Once we had landed, it took half an hour for the plane to park up. This made us miss our flight to Australia. Khera, the chaplain from Loreto Manchester organised a hotel for us to stay at overnight. So we journeyed across London at 2am to the hotel. We were put on the waiting list for the next flight out, but it was overbooked already, so extremely unlikely we’d all be able to get on it. We spent the day looking at the sights in London, and went to Heathrow early on in the day. When we got there, we were told Mrs Beever, head teacher of Loreto Altrincham had arranged seats on Air Malaysia flights the next day. One flight was at 12pm and one was at 10pm. I hoped to be on the 12pm flight, but unfortunately had to wait until 10pm for the flight. We eventually arrived in Australia 2 days later than planned on Friday 11th July. We were staying with families from a Loreto school in Sydney called Loreto Kirribilli. The head teacher met us at the airport and straightaway we thought she was mad, as she was wearing a coat and scarf, while the sun was beating down. We went straight to school, where we met up with our host families. Then we went to cram as much sightseeing in as possible. We walked across the harbour Bridge, went to the Sydney Opera House and went to the zoo. You can’t visit Australia and not see a kangaroo! I stayed with a family who lived in a lovely part of Sydney called Manly. The beach there was beautiful and we walked along it and then had breakfast at a café beside the beach.
Opening Mass The Opening Mass
All the World Youth Day events happened during our stay at Loreto Normahurst. On the Tuesday it was the opening mass. This was the first time we experienced how big World Youth Day is. We caught a train to near Barangaroo, which was where the opening mass was being held. Then we had to walk down to the place itself. There were thousands of people walking and we found it very difficult to stay as a group. Some people were playing music from their native countries, while others waved flags.
After the mass there was a concert. The brother of our host family from Loreto Kirribilli was performing the World Youth Day song with the winner or Australian Idol at the concert. I was so disappointed that I wasn’t able to watch it, as we had to make our way back to the school. We went back to the school and went straight to bed as we were all shattered. We also had to get up at 5.30 in the morning to make our way to our first Catechisis session. As I was getting a cold (which I was none to happy about!) I was able to get up and have a shower with no bother. However when I knocked on people’s doors at 6am, they were all very grumpy! We set off on an hour and a half train journey to the church. Liverpool Diocese led the first Catechisis session. We got to meet a lot of people as well. People were mainly from Texas, as a lot of Americans attended World Youth day. The Catechisis session was then followed by mass. On the next day, Birmingham Diocese led the Catechisis session. On the Friday, it was our turn to lead the Catechisis session. We went into the Church to practise after the mass. Khera arranged for a few people from Birmingham Diocese to help with the music, as I was the only musical girl along with one teacher. No one was pleased to find out that we had to get up even earlier on the Friday, as we had arranged to be at the Church for 7.30am to practise the music with Birmingham Diocese. Everyone got even grumpier when they showed up at 8am to practise!
The Stations of the Cross
 On
the same Friday, it was also the Stations of the Cross. It took place
around
Sydney. It ended in Barangaroo where
registered pilgrims had gathered. The Stations of the Cross was one of
the highlights, as it was a very moving re-enactment.
We had to make sure we had a good nights sleep that night as we had a 5k walk followed by the overnight vigil the next day. We also had to pack our bags, as after the overnight vigil we were returning to our host families for the last two days. We set off from north Sydney, with all our sleeping bags and warm layers strapped to our backs. From the very start, I started complaining about walking. We stopped off half way at Darling Harbour and had lunch and a rest. Then we set off again and didn’t stop until we got to Randwick Racecourse where the sleep out was taking place.
Pilgrimage Walk
 This
was a personal highlight for me, as it was nice to be with all these
people, but in a quieter and reflective mood than we had been for the
past few days.
The Evening VigilAs we all woke up, not feeling our best, it’s fair to say, we had to prepare ourselves for the closing mass. This was a moving occasion as it meant our trip to Australia was coming to an end. The Pope drove round Randwick racecourse, and we all managed to get a decent view of him.
 After
the mass had ended we set off only to be told we were walking half of
what we had done yesterday! No one was in the mood for it at all! After
on girl started to feel ill, a group of us fell behind. We begged Cath
Cainen, the Chaplain for Loreto Altrincham to let us get the train, but
she wasn’t having any of it.
Once we had the ok to get on a train, we were so happy! We went back to Kirribilli and stopped off to have some food, as we were starving due to the lack of decent food over the weekend. We met back with our host families, and the first thing I did when I got back to the house was have a shower!
 Monday
was our last full day, and we went to Manly to buy souvenirs and gifts
for families and friends. In the evening, one host family held a
barbecue for all the girls. No one wanted to leave that night and we all
told the teachers weren’t turning up to leave in the morning!
I stayed up until 1am with the Australian girl we were staying with, and we then decided to get up at 5am to do a bit more sightseeing before we left. I did so, very reluctantly and went and had pancakes and did more shopping and sights, before we met at Loreto Kirribilli to leave. We said bye to our Australian families and once on the bus a lot of started crying. We didn’t want to leave and even on the plane journey home we were still saying we didn’t want to go home. World Youth Day 2008 is an experience I’ll never forget and to have it in such an amazing country was great! I would recommend everyone visit Australia, and will definitely be going back in the near future. I will also be going to World Youth Day 2011, which will be in Madrid. I hope to see many of you there as well, as it is something I would DEFINITELY recommend!
The Final Mass
|
