Day 1 in the Botanical Gardens
Today I worked in Greg’s group at the City Park Botanical Gardens. When we first got there, everyone was a little confused about what exactly we were supposed to do, but instead of sitting around looking at the gardens, we dove right in and started weeding the gardens. It was a gorgeous day and I was very happy that I could be outside in the beautiful weather.
After about an hour, the volunteer coordinator for the park, Lisa, came out and spoke to all of us. She explained to us that, while unknown to most, City Park in New Orleans is actually bigger than Central Park in New York City and commands an annual budget of over $10 million a year. The park was completely flooded during Katrina, under almost two feet of water. Not only that, but the water stayed in the park for over 3 weeks, killing any and all living things.
Lisa explained that after that the park finally drained, it was taken over by squatters and because the local authorities had much bigger problems to address, these squatters stayed for a long time, trashing an already extremely damaged park. Before the storm, City Park had four 18 hole golf courses, a conservatory, children’s park, Botanical Garden and amusement park. Even after the storm, Lisa told us that almost 2,000 children come to the park each weekend.
After weeding in the children’s park for about four hours, I felt as though I was working in my own city, making small but necessary improvements to a park that thousands of children will enjoy in the future. It was a small change, but a small change in the direction of bringing this city not only out of the destitude that Katrina left it in, but restoring it the full height of it’s beauty before the storm, maybe even making it a bit better.