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I thought this picture was funny, it says in large letter "Everyone's invited. Everyone's Welcome", but then below it, it says NO ENTRY.

There weren't many really harsh criticisms on World Youth Day, but for things like Merchandise and paraphernalia, where does the money go to? Charity? Where will the money gained from WYD go?  There was one issue I had in regards to the Merchanidise shop, and this occured during the Opening Mass and most probably during the Papal Mass. Now in the bible, there is a story where Jesus gets angry and fed up because there are markets selling things in and around the temple of God, and he gets so angry and he goes around destroying these stalls by pulling them apart and breaking items, he says something like, This is God's temple and you are desecrating it by selling things (not exact words, but something on the lines of that). During the Opening Mass I witnessed the Merchandise stall being open whilst Mass was on and pilgrims continuing to swamp the place to buy the latest Benedict T-Shirt or cap. Not only that, but there were ice-cream vendors and soft-drink stalls. Who eats ice-cream and drinks soft-drink during mass?

I personally think that the church should have made sure that the merchandise shops were closed during the Mass otherwise they wouldn't practice what they preach, on the other hand there argument would be that Catholics would test there faith by either resisting or succumbing to temptation, I wonder if they sold more things during the Mass or after the Mass? I thought this was highly inappropriate and should be addressed for future World Youth Days.

Another criticism would be more about logistics, now where I was staying at was a suburb called Mosman which is a northern suburb of Sydney, and after a event which occurred in Darling Harbour, the World Youth Day organisers decide to send everyone to Central Station, which meant that me and my group were heading south instead of north! This was really frustrating because A) we were forced to head the wrong way B) it was nearly 1am and we were buggered and C) they closed of all other exit points at Darling Harbour, which meant we had to keep walking down the riverside. I thought it was a bit stupid to send all the pilgrims to one location, which meant the train station was going to be packed to the brim and there would probably be a traffic-jam of people. Luckily for us after arguing and convincing a volunteer, he let us cross a road and continue our way to Town Hall train station, where we got off at Wynyard and finally caught our connecting bus back to Mosman.

Of course another criticism would have to be the food, but I guess the food they gave was better than nothing. We did survive on canned Tuna and baked beans for lunch for around 3 days, dinner tended to be either weird tasting curry or Beef stroganoff which always looked like slop, some days we just bought McDonalds or KFC. On the other hand, our group was lucky, as I stated earlier we stayed at Mosman, which is regarded as an upper class suburb of Sydney, and they gave us fruit and other extra food, whereas other pilgrims which I talked too, never got fruit or any other extra pieces of food.

Overall I think some of the things I have highlighted can be resolved in time for Madrid and future World Youth Days, whereas catering for 400,000 people was never meant to be easy, and I guess a better pilgrim management plan should be in place for the future.

Image originally uploaded by Bababooobie

Hey Fernando! From your blogs, It sounds like you had an amazing experience at WYD. I hope everything is going well for you at the moment. It's been a while since I've checked my blog (or anyone elses!) so it's nice to hear about what you've been up to lately. Anyway, keep up the good werk :)Lots of Love and Peace, Morgan xoxo