Day 3 - 04.03.06

8404 Benjamin St.

OMG, everyone in our tent was up at 5:57am. I think all of you know how much I LOVE getting up early. Before I forget, here is a *forbidden* picture of our tent. (no photography allowed on campsite. I don't know.)



We met in our teams (GOLD #1!) at 7am (!) and boarded the busses for our worksite. Our team leader, Dan, informed us that we were going to be finishing up a house that was started last week. Typically teams get through 3-ish houses a week. Dan did a quick assessment of how long it would take us to finish the house: "about an hour". Yeah, RIGHT!


[everything is water damaged. All of the houses on this street were covered w/flood water. (L) Dan starting in on a bedroom; behind the archway was the bedroom which was untouched! (R) the closet in the bedroom; the clothes were still wet. You can imagine the smell.]

Around 10am, when we thought we were finishing up, someone looked up: "Is that an ATTIC?! full of STUFF?!" Goodness.

[(L) Sarah, myself, Susan in full PPE - Personal Protective Equipment. (R) Sarah in the attic.]

Around 2pm, I reminded everyone that it's GW's fault that we were breaking our backs down there. (he cut the funding for N.O.'s levees, so...). Pretty much everyone down here is Anti-W, so shouts of agreement echoed in the house. It was pretty ridiculous that things looked like this 7 months after the disaster...especially with hurricane season looming nearer and nearer...



A few hours later, drenched, drenched in sweat, we had stripped the entire place down to studs and nails. The project is to strip the houses so that the homeowners can rebuild. However, many of the houses have for sale signs (we're hoping they decide to stay after they see it was cleaned and rebuilding is possible), and no place in the Parish has yet been declared 'liveable'. And, as you can see above, the trash hasn't been removed yet. This is because...drumroll...FEMA cut the funding for the waste removal. Great. The Parish government is working on getting money flowing again. The Feds suck.


[(L) the 'after' shot of the closet!! (R) the 'after' shot of the bedroom!!!]

[(L) some valuables survived the flood! (R) Sarah and I in triumph at the workday's end.]

Tonight, we are going into the city for a couple of cocktails...I definitely need one, as I heard some not-so-good news re: something I will not post on *THIS* blog...

Day 2 - 04.02.06

Strolling the French Quarter, etc.

After rushing to the mess hall justintime to grab some breakfast, Sarah and I cleaned up to head into the city before out 3pm orientation. We drove through the Lower Ninth Ward, which along with St. Bernard Parish, was the hardest hit area – Katrina, Rita, storm surges, levee breaks, floods – you name it, it affected these two areas. Here are some pictures.




(I'll put all of my pics from the trip online once I get back)

Since it was the only chance we’d have in the daytime all week, we wandered the French Quarter and Bourbon Street for a few hours. This area is up and running, people living, working, and of course, playing, drinking, partying. Bourbon Street pretty much smells like beer mixed with urine 24/7. Mmm.



We ended up at the riverfront and wandered around a huge French Market/ Flea Market. And, I met ‘Fats’ Domino…just kidding.


After orientation, I drove around for a bit (rte 10E towards Slidell, LA! Never thought I'd end up there!) and found Lake Ponchatrain, the lake whose levee broke. This lake is HUGE. (For my Michigan friends, it'd be like Lake Erie just spilling over). Apparently you can drive over Lake Ponchatrain, it's a 25-mile bridge. I think I would have about 43 heart attacks driving over that.



I was in for the night after our meeting. I will leave you with a great t-shirt slogan I found today. Sums up quite a lot about the city!

Day 1 - 04.01.06

April Fool-who-missed-her-flight Day.

What was supposed to be a relaxing introduction to The Big Easy turned out to be a day-long airport nuisance.














(what I stared at most of the day)

Because NYC sucks, and there is always traffic and no signs pointing to LGA, I arrived at the airport at 9:30:00 am for my 10:00 flight. I thought this would be fine – pushing it, but fine – but because I arrived at curbside check in at 9:30:01, I was too late to check my bag. So, after blowing up at the gate agent like those people I always roll my eyes at, I was directed to a 40-min line to figure out what to do next and was put on a flight through Dallas arriving 8 hours later than originally planned. This sucks.

Then at the NO airport, the rental car guy tried to tell me my rental would cost $666!! Another fit of blowing up. After 30 min of being on the phone, he ‘figured out the problem’ and sent us on our way. (myself and a girl I met, Sarah, from New Mexico)

Of course. It’s April Fools Day.

We got to St. Bernard Parish around 10pm (after getting lost, naturally) and settled in the camp for the night.