From Australia: Our WYD Correspondent Writes

13 July 2008

The Clifton Diocese World Youth Day (WYD) communications officers, Rachel Manning and Antonia Fafiolu report direct from Australia.  
 
Wednesday 9 July
We arrived in Melbourne after an extremely long flight - 12 hours to Singapore; then seven hours to Melbourne! We were greeted with an amazing warm welcome from our host families, of St Simon's parish in Rowville. After such a tiring journey, we were all ready for bed!

Thursday 10 July
Today was the first day all the World Youth Day Pilgrims met and had a chance to chat with each other. The Jersey group had travelled the day before and so had already settled and met us at the parish church. We had a welcoming Mass and spent time sharing stories with one another and just getting to know everybody. We travelled to Bunjilaka (Melbourne Museum) and we watched some indigenous performers. The museum depicted the story of the aboriginal life in Australia and several indigenous artefacts were on show. We then went to see the St Vincent De Paul Youth festival held in Melbourne city. Christian music was played and hundreds of World Youth Day pilgrims from around the world celebrated together. A huge conga line was formed by the pilgrims and there was a great sense of unity and togetherness. It was a spectacular feeling!
 
Friday 11 July
We started the day with a continental breakfast in the parish hall. This was another opportunity for the pilgrims based at St Simon's to share experiences and to grow together as one. We explored our personal faith influences and considered the importance of Australian influences. We went to Melbourne city and visited the Mary MacKillop Heritage Centre. Mary was an Australian nun who founded the first refuge centre for the poor and needy in Melbourne. We also experienced a tour of St Patrick’s Cathedral. In the evening, we made our way to the Telstra Dome, where we were joined with 40,000 other pilgrims from around the world to celebrate the commissioning Mass of World Youth Day 2008. We sang songs and waved flags and again were united as one by our faith. The Mass itself was inspirational and very emotional. It was an incredible feeling to share Mass with 40,000 other people! We were absolutely blown away - yet, 40,000 is only a small proportion of the total number of people expected at Sydney!
 
Saturday 12 July
Today, we enjoyed a trip into Melbourne hills on a steam train called Puffing Billy! We were all encouraged to sit over the side of the train and dangle our legs! It was a good experience until we crossed an old wooden bridge with a 200ft drop with all of us dangling over the side of the train! We experienced amazing views of the Melbourne landscape. Later on, we participated within the community. The group were divided into smaller sections and each had a specific part to play within the community such window cleaning, visiting a nursing home and knitting clothes.  Both Antonia and I visited the fire station and learnt how the fire service works in Australia. We had the opportunity to get onboard a fire engine and fiddle with the controls! At the end of the day a celebratory disco was held in the parish hall. Everyone ate great food and had lots of fun!
 
Sunday 13 July
The last day in Melbourne! We received a final blessing from the Parish Priest and had a fantastic cooked breakfast. We were joined by all the host families.
 
We’ve taken loads of pictures.  Have a look at the image gallery on the right and our three other galleries below.  

Gallery two   Gallery three    Gallery four.

Rachel and Antonia’s previous WYD report.

This week’s Clifton Diocese event for young people who couldn’t make it to Sydney.

Keep with cliftondiocese.com for regular WYD reports from our young pilgrims direct from Australia and Maria’s diary.