Santiago de Compostela and Barcelona
finalize preparations for
'the year's most special visit'
by ANA MARTÍNEZ/ÁLEX GUBERN
Translated from
Nov. 1, 2010
In Santiago, hotels and lodging houses are almost all booked up (there are travelers who wait till the last minute hoping for an ultimate bargain offer).
The eight pilgrim pavilions (total capacity 2,000) are fully booked - free lodging for one or two nights for groups organized by parishes. And an unusual number of student housing and rooms in private houses have been made available for paying lodgers.
1,200 newsmen are accredited. Charter flights, buses and trains will start coming in Friday. And as many as 200 million worldwide viewers are expected based on foreign TV channels that have signed up for broadcast rights to the festivities when Benedict XVI comes to town on Saturday, Nov. 6 - perhaps the most famous of all pilgrims to come to Santiago during a Holy Year dedicated to St. James the Apostle (Santiago Apostol), patron of Spain.
Galicia and Santiago have prepared everything - except the weather. For now, meteorology experts say there seems to be a 60% change of rain on Saturday, but they won't know better until Friday.
Left, a Popemobile arrives in Santiago; CD handout with materials about the Pope's visit; and right, the welcome poster of the Xunta of Galicia, which says, 'Benedict XVI shares the Jacobean year with the Galicians [Gallegos]. Welcome to Galicia!'
Meanwhile, a Popemobile has arrived in Santiago (and another one in Barcelona) for the Pope's ride from the airport to the Cathedral of Santiago along a route that is expected to be lined by tens of thousands of faithful.
The Xunta of Galicia (the regional administration) has already spent 3 million euros for the preparations, but the city and its businesses expect a very high 'rate of return'.
For its part, Barcelona, Spain's second city, is a veteran host of huge events, including the 1992 Olympics - and the Pope's one-day visit is considered the city's biggest event since then.
Both the city government and the archdiocese are confident of laying out a grand welcome for Benedict XVI. On Sunday, when he dedicates Antonio Gaudi's Church of the Sagrada Familia, tens of thousands of faithful are expected to converge around the church for the Dedication Mass and Angelus.
The Popemobile route in Barcelona: From the Cathedral (left) to Sagrada Familia (eight).
In addition, organizers expect some 400,000 pilgrims to line the Pope's motorcade route from the Archbishop's Palace near the Cathedral in the city's medieval Gothic quarter to the Sagrada Familia, in the center of Barcelona's 19th-century extension.
[It would be quite a feat to register that many in a city which is Spain's most secularized. but even more than in Portugal, Catholicism has been so inbred into the Spaniards for centuries, that it is not unlikely. After all, 250,000 came to the papal Mass in Lisbon, a smaller city than Barcelona!]
Nowhere is the fervor for the visit more visible than at the Sagrada Familia itself, where they have just installed the panoramic elevator that will first be used by Benedict XVI.
This weekend, they started setting up 31 jumbo screens in strategic places to enable pilgrims to follow the rites on TV.
Buildings and house balconies along the motorcade route and around Sagrada Familia are festooned with the flags of the Vatican, Spain and Catalunya.
The banner reads, 'All together let us prepare for the Pope's visit', and 'Barcelona, make yourself pretty for the Pope!'
An Internet site called 'BARCELONA, POSA'T PAPA!', a play on a famous city slogan, 'Barcelona, posa't guapa!' [Barcelona, make yourself pretty!), has been campaigning for households to display flags and signs of welcome for the Pope and advertises distribution centers where these can be obtained for free.
The city expects to spend 370,000 euros for logistics - not including the cost over overtime for police and cleaning crews - but the one-day visit is expected to generate some 30 million euros in business.
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 01/11/2010 17:32]