A mass exodus of Poles from cities, towns, and villages all over the country began on Tuesday, with up to two million determined to get to Rome to witness the funeral of the only Polish pope.
Their arrival in Rome over the next 48 hours will place the city, its police, transport and accommodation systems under even more strain in hosting the largest event in its long history. As many as two million Italians are also expected, as are representatives from many other nationalities.
Achille Serra, the prefect of Rome, said on Tuesday night: ”The funeral of the pope is the greatest event ever to have taken place in Rome — multiplied by 10. The biggest difficulty comes from not knowing who will be arriving, when and where.”
On Tuesday night, an estimated 600 000 people were queuing up to 12 hours to see the body of Pope John Paul II, lying in state in St Peter’s Basilica for a second day.
In the first day more than 500 000 people are thought to have filed past the body, hustled at a brisk pace by officious stewards allowing no time to pause or say more than the briefest prayer.
Outside in St Peter’s Square, impromptu shrines have been established.
With 200 world leaders expected to gather for Friday’s funeral, Italy instituted stringent security precautions. The skies over the city will be closed from today for all but military and official traffic, and Nato Awacs planes will provide security radar cover over a 400km radius to deter a terrorist attack.
But the Polish pilgrimage is the most extraordinary. Tour companies have laid on special buses from all corners of the country. Four special trains have been ordered from Warsaw to Rome and another two from the southern city of Krakow, where John Paul spent most of his life.
Pilgrims have been queuing at Warsaw’s central station all week hoping to land a coveted seat on the trains leaving today. LOT, the national airline, is struggling to cope with the demand and Poles are said to be buying tickets for any destinations heading south that may get them closer to Rome.
Polish media reported on Tuesday that up to five million people — nearly a seventh of the country’s 38-million inhabitants — might try to attend the funeral.
The Polish foreign ministry, basing its guesswork on a less than scientific survey of Polish travel agents and tour operators, said on Tuesday it thought two million Poles could be on the move.
Newspapers published copious how-to guides in an attempt to forestall some of the chaos and disappointment that looks inevitable in the mad scramble. Where to park in the city; where to find a bed; how to get to St Peter’s; and advice on the fastest routes and best maps of the 1 790km trip from Warsaw to Rome, passing through the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Austria.
The train trip, costing about R1 100 — a week’s wages for many Poles — takes up to 25 hours. The special trains will leave on Wednesday and arrive in Rome late on Thursday or early on Friday morning. LOT has scheduled five planes to the city on Wednesday, four more than usual. Regional low-cost airlines such as Wizz Air, Centralwings and Skyeurope in neighbouring Slovakia are also laying on charters from southern Poland.
In Rome, cardinals already gathering for the funeral, and the conclave to choose the pope’s successor that will follow it, announced more details about the arrangements on Tuesday.
Among them, to make sure that the puff of white smoke emanating from a chimney on the Sistine Chapel when the new pope is finally chosen is not mistaken, they have ordered that the Vatican’s bells should be rung to confirm the news.
They have not yet decided when the 117 cardinals aged under 80 and so eligible to vote will enter the conclave, though it is expected to be the week after next. The meeting has to be called within 20 days of the pope’s death.
In contrast to previous conclaves — made as uncomfortable as possible for the elderly men taking part in order to concentrate their minds and produce a swift decision — a hotel-like building giving them their own rooms and showers has been built in a corner of the Vatican gardens since the last election in 1978.
”This time it will be a looser lock-up,” said Archbishop Piero Marini, the Vatican’s master of ceremonies. The cardinals will be prevented from using telephones, watching television, reading newspapers or contacting the outside world. The longest conclave in the last century took five days, and John Paul II was chosen in two.
Under the circumstances, the proposal by Walter Veltroni — the ex-communist former mayor of Rome — that the city’s main railway terminus should be named after Pope John Paul II may form an appropriate monument. — Guardian Unlimited Â