Screaming hordes invade Lisbon

How close have you been to the Pope?

On our very first trip to Parque Eduardo VII, one of the biggest parks in Lisbon, wayyy back in July 2022, Scott pointed out a ginormous sign advertising something. World Youth Day, coming in 2023. Amy said uhuh, no bandwith for that right now, and ignored it. She proceeded to ignore it each. and every. time he pointed it out over the next 11 months.

Suddenly, and with no warning whatsoever, World Youth Day (WYD) is here. Who knew?

Lisbon is a great size. There’s so much to do, so much to see. And all of it densely packed in a gorgeous, European city with fantastic public transportation. If you are truly committed to spending a good while at it, and you’ve built up leg muscles for the seven steep hills, it’s also incredibly walkable.

How big is it? Great question.

2022 population of Portugal: 10,467,366

Lisbon urban area population: 3,001,000 people, making it the 3rd largest city on the Iberian Peninsula

Population of Lisbon city: 545,796

Lisbon also plays host to lots of events. Little stuff: small music festivals, local film festivals, tons and tons of local festas.

And big stuff. International film festivals out the wazoo, tall ship races, famous book fair. Last year’s World Web Summit’s 71,000 participants added so much delightful energy. And so on and so forth. If you are bored here, it’s your own fault.

This summer it’s WYD, organized by the Catholic Church.

A few definitions are in order here …

World: there will be pilgrims converging on Lisbon from every country in the world but one.¹

Youth: ages 14 - 30. If your first thought is prime-get-into-trouble-age, you’re not alone.²

Day: WYD runs from August 1 - 6.³ So, more like Week.

Apparently, it’s rather a big deal. How big?

1.5 Million People Big.

Let’s look at those numbers again.

Lisbon: 545,796 people
WYD: 1,500,000 people

A little back-of-the-envelope math - ok twice because you don’t believe the result - Lisbon’s population will TRIPLE QUADRUPLE.

You’d think that such an impact on a population would automatically remove a city from the running, wouldn’t you? Well, here’s the thing about how the host city for World Youth Day is chosen: Who, you ask, picks each city blessed to host a World Youth Day? The easy answer is the Pope. On the last day of the the event, he announces where the next WYD will be. Presumably, he’s not just throwing a dart at a map or saying, “it’s been a while since I’ve seen cousin Joe in East Podunk, Iowa, population 129.” At least not anymore. Now, the diocese of a hopeful host city puts forth the name to the Pope and the Vatican office of the Laity. One thing that helped Lisbon get chosen was the Portuguese government’s involvement.

How, you ask (this is good - you are curious!) does a city prepare for an event like this?

If you ask the event planner of the two of us, poorly. ;-)⁴

Someone (no doubt a committee) decided that rather than put the best possible face of Lisbon forward for all these visitors and throw every resource we have⁵ at the main areas the “Youths” will be, all transportation will be prioritized in areas of the city that do not have any of the 500 events associated with WYD.

That means that the city has been divided into zones of red, yellow, and green. We are in the red zone. Without even telling you what that is, does this sound good to you? This is the:

• no metro

• no busses

• no private cars

• no taxis/uber/bolts

• no bicycles

• no shared scooters

• you may walk

zone.

Naturally, the people who live in Lisbon are not necessarily excited about the upcoming invasion. Imagine the havoc in getting to work! Assuming work is open - one of us had an appointment during this time. And a phone call came in to change it. They’re closing the office. It’s just too hard to get to in, both for staff and for clients. Just recently another appointment change came down the pike. This time the closing wasn’t voluntary - the building is being closed because they are too close to the activities.

Then we started hearing from friends who are asking us what our plans are. About half of our friends are planning on being out of town. The rest plan on sheltering in place. It has a very apocalyptic feel to it. We’re in the latter group. We’ve done the big shopping trip and we’ll see how it goes.

We have not directly touched on the fear of this event. We suppose anytime 1.5 million youths are descending on your city, well, unless you know what that looks like (Lisbon has not hosted this event before), you’re going to be pretty trepidatious. The rumor mill is working overtime:

• As many people as are signed up with a place to stay are people showing up with no place to go, figuring it will all work out.

• Restaurants will all be closed because they are afraid of what will happen if they run out of food. Will there be mobs of youths descending on the small groceries, angry because there’s no food?

• They are closing the border to all traffic except those who are registered for WYD to stem the tide.

Then there’s the bitterness - “why do I have to put up with it”-itis. That’s running high among most people we run into - especially Portuguese friends and acquaintances. That’s pretty understandable when you can’t get to work, when your pay may take a serious hit.

You might initially think 1.5 million people! What a boon for the economy! Well, maybe not. August is prime tourist season. The folks who normally come in and spend money are those with disposable income. In other words, those whose kids are out of the house. Rentals for expensive units have dried up. That means the higher end restaurants and stores will be having a terrible week. Their replacements, the many Pilgrims as they’re called, are often being hosted in homes or as our pharmacist mentioned, 300 of them are sleeping on the floor of a local school. All receive meal vouchers to a network of restaurants - mostly lower end chains and some grocery stores putting together take-away meals.

Meanwhile the costs to the city - and the local diocese, and no, we can’t quite figure out who is paying for which expense as there are many pockets involved - are innumerable. Some examples: extra garbage cans and people to empty them, 1,000 more police, and then there’s the altar.

Or, altars. It’s actually the closing altar that has received the most alarm, dismay and protest. Its cost of 5.4 million euros was a lot for people to swallow, given the average salary in the capital city is 3,755€ per month. After the big kerfluffle, it’s been pared down to 2.9 million. A veritable drop in the bucket.

For the how-can-I-make-this-work-for-me folks, in this nation of strikes⁶, everyone piled on. Long distance trains, commuter trains, metro/subway, all jumped aboard (ha! did ya catch that?) this once in a lifetime opportunity to get as much as possible, and maybe actually get some resolution.

Just recently the long distance train union buckled, we think for fear of looking bad. They basically kicked the can down the road. No strikes during the event, the usual spate of stoppages will resume in the fall.

And there are folks who are flat out angry. For any of a variety of of reasons, they are very upset this event is happening, and happening here. Many are from Lisbon or Portugal. As we get closer to the event, we expect we might see more from outside. Think World Trade Organization, which seems to collect protestors like Deadheads. Will we get some of those? We’ll see.

A week before the start, we began to notice an increase in the number of people around and about town. It is tourist season, yes. But tourists don’t generally gather in the thousands all wearing identical yellow “Volunteer” shirts. Perhaps the proximity of the school housing the youths is responsible for the change in our neighborhood audio landscape. On any given summer day we hear our bird who visits the trees outside our window, the evening drumming, church bells on the hour, the ocarina of the knife sharpener, and whatever music the people in the Airbnb in the building next to us choose to play. Each evening lately has been choral hymns, and mic checks from one of the many huge speaker arrays set up. That big altar above? It’s 1.7 km/1 mile away. With the huge speakers set up on stands and the auditory bowl effect we live in, it is possible we are hearing sound from that. Will we hear the Pope? Could be.

More recently we have begun to see changes to the area near us that is closer to where the Pope is giving two of his five public events.

At this moment, the city of Lisbon is like a party host who is scrambling to complete their preparations, to get every balloon tied and all the crepe paper hung, and taking a breath right before your guests come. And nervously biting their nails: Will they all make it?

We are currently in the Confusion Phase. What will it be like? How much will we actually see? Will there be people wearing diapers so they don't have to leave the line for 48 hours to see the Pope (as someone said a friend of hers who survived the Philippines WYD saw), will restaurants be open? Will we be cut off from lunching with a friend because we live on opposite sides of the tracks/Avenida da Liberdade?

One thing is for certain - we’ll let you know!

That’s all for know,

Love from Lisbon,

Amy & Scott

1. If you guessed Maldives, you are both correct and way smarter than we are

2. That’s a suggested age. If you’re outside that age range, you’re welcome as well.

3. Yes. August. You may be thinking, oof, it’s hot in August. How do you keep that many “youths” from dehydrating in the heat?
Or, you may be thinking, Gasp! August! Everyone will be on vacation! Yes. Precisely so. While everyone being on vacation is helpful, as they reduce the need for transportation/garbage/whatnot, it also means many metro/police/garbage workers will be on vacation. Hmmm.

4. I mean, hellooo, we’re going to need some serous portable toilets and tons of garbage facilities. Forget little garbage cans. We’re talking dumpsters here, people.

5. including metro cars “A train every two minutes is the motto!” could have been the, um, motto

6. We will absolutely write more on this topic when we feel we can do so even partially intelligently. It’s a very complicated and yet understandable topic that we are looking forward to getting our arms around.