pilgrims (but not indians)

(originally from 20 July 2008)

So this week has been World Youth Day in Sydney. How a day can last a week is a whole nother story; suffice it to say Thursday managed to stretch from Tuesday to Sunday this week.

Basically, the city has been overrun by thousands of young Catholic "pilgrims" here to celebrate, cry and, hopefully, catch a glimpse of the Popemobile’s famous rider. They’ve draped themselves in flags, painted their faces and donned matching backpacks. That’s right: nothing says humble pilgrim traveling from hither to yon in quest of religious epiphany like matching vivid red, yellow and orange backpacks. Welcome to 2008.

They’ve worshiped and sang and slept under the stars. Unfortunately, no one told half of them they’d need to bring sleeping bags. I was standing in line for my evening E68 one night when an African pilgrim approached me.

"Do you know where I can buy a sleeping bag?" he asked. We were in the middle of the city.

"Umm," I said.

"Someone told me there was a shop around here I could get one at."

"Umm. I don’t know. I’m sorry, I don’t usually buy sleeping bags here."

"But where did you buy your last sleeping bag?"

"In America," I said, then remembered that I’d actually never bought a sleeping bag before. L.L. Bean sprang to mind, but mail-order didn’t sound like what he was going for, particularly with overseas shipping costs.

"But you live here now, don’t you? Where would you buy a sleeping bag here?"

"I really don’t know, I don’t camp too much." There was the Warringah Mall, forty-five minutes away by bus and almost certainly closed. There was World Square, a twenty-five minute walk away, and not terribly likely to carry sleeping bags. There was, there was, there was – why was no one else in the whole line helping me? They’d lived here for years, for goodness’ sake! He stared at me intently, apparently wary of my utter lack of knowledge.

"What time do the stores close?" he asked. Reasonable question, but –

"I’m so sorry, I don’t know. I really don’t usually shop in the city at night. Maybe … um, I think they look like they’ll be open for a while longer. Maybe a couple hours, I don’t know."

"Someone said there was a shop nearby here. Near Margaret Street." There was something!

"Margaret Street, yes, you’re near Margaret Street, it’s right –"

The E71 pulled up, pulling the line ahead.

"There’s your bus," he smiled.

"It’s not actually mine," I said, striving for honesty as I was propelled forward. I smiled a weak goodbye, feeling ridiculously unhelpful as I sat on the bench to wait for the E68 to drag me away from the bedding-less man. I never saw him again.

He wasn’t the only pilgrim in trouble, but his was far less than the contingent of travelers who’d been mistakenly informed that Adelaide was a suburb of Sydney. They found themselves flown back by other Catholics who generously funded their lesson in Australian geography.

Most the pilgrims were quite friendly; one even asked if she could sit next to me on the public bus. Of course, I told her, and we chatted from Town Hall, where she’d boarded with 30 more people than the morning city bus usually held, to World Square, an amazingly short distance in which to learn she was from Minnesota (in the U.S., she added shyly, but perked up when she learned I was from Ohio), studied in Michigan and rarely got out of the UP these days.

It all got me thinking, though. I didn’t mind a few extra people on a bus or a sleepy soul trying to find a shop, but cities, it seems to me, should be for the people who live in them – the ones who have to come to and from work every day to support themselves and their families. And before it happened I was set to gripe and grump my way through the week, walking the extra twenty minutes each way to let the city commissioner (or whatever they call him here) brag to Melbourne that his city had hosted half a million pilgrims.

But then a funny thing happened. My bus came Monday morning. And Tuesday, and Wednesday, and, joy of joys, even Thursday and Friday! And in the afternoon, there it was on Monday. And Tuesday. On Wednesday afternoon the road was closed, so I walked. And I walked again on Thursday, but, actually, it wasn’t too bad. I’d made it through the day, I was happy, I was going home. And actually a little extra walk wasn’t that bad for me, especially if it helped half a million other people be happier and grow closer to Jesus. Maybe I wasn’t the most important one out there, after all.

Now, I still think that cities should be for the citizens, the commuters. Besides preserving historic sites and natural beauty, the people who live somewhere should take precedence. But Sydney actually let them, kudos to it. It was big enough for the Pope and for the people. Amen.