After returning from the sprawling 12-day trip to Asia and Oceania with Pope Francis, I find myself in my usual post-papal-trip state.
Exhausted, flirting with a cold, while also completely edified – and all magnified by a hundred, as this trip was longer, farther and more intense than any done so far in the 11 years of international travel under Pope Francis.
In total, Pope Francis and those of us following in his wake belonging to the strikingly named VAMP papal press corps – Vatican Accredited Media Pool – took five international flights and changed time zones five times in 12 days, jumping from hot and muggy weather in Indonesia to sharp dry heat in Papua New Guinea and East Timor, and then to summer thunderstorms in Singapore before crisp autumnal weather upon arriving back in Rome.
