Crowds roar, blessed, with goose bumps

MANILA, Philippines–Happy. Blessed. Goose bumps.

The tens of thousands of Filipinos who turned up behind barricades topped by iron fences guarded by policemen got only a fleeting glance of Pope Francis, but that’s his impact on most of the people interviewed by the Inquirer.

“I only saw the white robe and the top of Pope’s head, it was good enough,” said Emily Gono, who, along with her husband, children and mother, waited for four hours at the corner of Mabini and Quirino Avenue. “We are already happy and we feel we are already blessed,” said the social worker and teacher.

“It was fleeting but it’s worth the wait,” Gono said as the Pope’s convoy disappeared from sight on the road festooned with Philippine and Vatican flags.

At nightfall, as Francis’ white, open-topped popemobile zipped along the 11-kilometer route from Villamor Air Base to the Apostolic Nunciature, crowds called his name and snapped pictures. Francis waved at them.

The motorcade moved at a relatively fast clip, reaching the Nunciature, where the Pope would stay, in about 40 minutes.

The sun came out briefly at noon. There was a light drizzle at midafternoon. In the evening, there was a cold and humid breeze.

Teresa Peña, 78, who waited for the Pope on Quirino Avenue, said that she did not see anything when the popemobile passed because of the huge crowd in front of her. She had no complaints.

Applause said it all

“The applause and cheering of the crowd said it all, I am already happy,” said the woman who came with her niece.

Businesswoman Amanda Araneta brought along 200 friends and staff wearing Pope Francis shirts on Quirino Avenue.

“I want them to feel the overwhelming emotion of blessedness I felt when I accidentally caught a glimpse of the late John Paul II in this same place,” said Araneta, who owns a jobs recruitment agency.

Sharing miracles

She shared that she was on her way to a client’s meeting along Quirino Avenue in January 1995 and had no plans to see John Paul II when she was told that he was passing by.

“I decided to stay and I had goose bumps and I felt so blessed when I saw the late Pope that I want to share it especially with the people I care about,” she said, adding that her business has flourished since then. “Maybe the miracles that happened to me will also happen to my staff.”

A TV monitor at a street corner providing live coverage of the Pope’s arrival kept the crowd on edge, breaking into applause as his Sri Lankan Airbus 340 touched down in the fading light of day. The people roared as the camera caught the Pope on the plane’s porthole.

Church bells tolled in the distance.

They screamed with excitement when they saw the Pope emerge from the plane and yelled as his skullcap was blown away in a stiff wind and he attempted to snatch it. The crowd grew more boisterous when Francis boarded his white, open-topped popemobile.

Cell phones snapping photographs of the Pontiff twinkled like stars from the evening crowd all along the route.

“It was an overwhelming feeling seeing the Holy Father,” lawyer Tess Taran said outside Villamor Air Base. When the convoy disappeared in the night, she hugged her two kids tightly.

Tingling with excitement

“The aura is different. I was moved. Of course it was the Vicar of Christ in front of me,” said Ronald Magbalot, 33, a software engineer.

Tuesday Niu, a radio reporter, said seeing the Pope even from afar was a “hair-raising experience.”

“I felt my hair stand on end. If I didn’t tie my hair in a ponytail, it would have probably straightened,” said the reporter with frizzy locks.

A woman on a wheelchair who refused to be identified said seeing Francis was her only wish. “I was hoping to shake his hands. But there were too many policemen blocking our view,” she said.

“The Pope went here to be close to us. We are more than blessed,” Sophia Archangeles, 75, said.

Seeing a Pope for only the second time in her life is a blessing in more ways for Salvacion Infante, 73.

“I’ll wave at him and blessings will come my way. If he blesses me, I will be cured, God willing,” the former laundrywoman said as she waited patiently since the morning for Pope Francis’ motorcade to pass along Andrews Avenue from Villamor Air Base in Pasay.

Roadside seats

She is among many Filipinos who believe that just the sight of him will bring healing, answer prayers and grant blessings.

Infante, who attended a Catholic school, got a glimpse of Pope John Paul II in 1981 as he motored along Roxas Boulevard in Manila. She said she was too ill to get out of the house when John Paul II returned in 1995.

This time around she made sure she would to be with the group of 300 senior citizens and persons with disability (PWDs) who were given roadside seats by Barangay 185 so they can have an unobstructed view of Pope Francis in his popemobile.

Elena Giray, 42, an overseas Filipino worker in Canada, was feeling overwhelmed as she looked forward to seeing the Pope for the first time.

“I feel it’s a huge blessing. I’m having goose bumps,” said Giray who counted herself and her daughter Jaylyn, 17, lucky to catch a glimpse of the Pope before she returns to Canada on Friday.

She and her daughter did not mind spending the entire day waiting for the Pope even though it is her daughter’s birthday.

Some of the welcomers came as far as Sorsogon province, like Martin Gajo, 52, a fisherman who brought along his child with special needs. A week earlier, his 17-year-old child Marlon had gone missing for a week. Without any money, he apparently boarded a bus from Sorsogon aiming to reach Manila on his own.

Martin and his family sought the help of the authorities to find the child. “Employees of the Department of Social Welfare and Development found him aimlessly wandering in Naga,” he said in Filipino.

Inexplicable joy

Emma Ybañez, 55, a resident of Bacoor, Cavite, could not hold back her tears. “I am filled with this inexplicable joy and gratitude,” she said, with her daughter and two grandchildren in tow.

“I am standing here in good health and still able to see him. It is more than enough,” said Ybañez who also saw Pope John Paul II in 1981 when he visited Davao.–With reports from Dona Z. Pazzibugan, Jerome Aning, Julie M. Aurelio, Maricar Bruzuela and Nestor Corrales, Inquirer.net

 

 

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