2008 Service Trip to New Orleans

Finally home after the long 14 hour drive yesterday I have found time to reflect on my experience in New Orleans this past week. Last night as I sat around with my friends I attempted to explain all that I saw and did this past week, to say the least I don’t think I did it justice. Going on two hours of sleep and lots of coffee I jumped from story to story. As other students have said this past week does seem like a blur, the days seem to run together and trying to explain everything that we did seems daunting.

What I want to do is to begin to explain the stories of last week that are not as exciting or funny, not the stories that I rattled off to my friends but the stories of the people that I met that deserve serious reflection. As many students have said, New Orleans is still hurting; nearly 3 years after the disaster people are still not yet home. The love that the people of New Orleans have for their city and culture is unlike anything I’ve experienced in any other city. The pride they have for their culture is inspiring and experiencing the city first hand I felt my self swept up in it as well. The city motto of “la joie de vivre” ( joy of living) is truly unique to New Orleans, the people there really enjoy life and I am not just talking about Mardi Gras and Bourbon St, they embrace life each day in all the neighborhoods.

This being said, to have this city and culture that they love so much, destroyed by the hurricane is a devastation greater than I feel I can comprehend. It was reiterated by countless people that I met that people do not leave New Orleans or move away, families stay for generations because its more than home it’s a way of life. My heart goes out to those who had to leave during the storm or move away and have yet to move back to their great city. I met many people who are still living in FEMA trailers waiting for their houses to be rebuilt. And this rebuilding, by the way, is not being done by the government its being done by volunteers. Yet as others have said the amount of help untrained volunteers like us can be is minimal because most houses have moved passed the gutting phase and need trained professionals to reconstruct their homes.

I think some of the saddest stories of the storm are those people who are still struggling to come home. One specific story that stands out in my mind was at the St. Bernard Community Center I met a woman as she was coming in to get information about housing. We started talking and I asked her about where she was living and she told me that before the storm she lived in an apartment in the area but had to move to Alabama in the aftermath. She is still living in Alabama. Her apartment, she told me, was one of the first things to be rebuilt in her area but the rent of her apartment literally doubled, making it so she could not afford to move back. For two and half years she has been trying to come back to New Orleans, to her home but she can’t and has received no help in this. Her story is the story of thousands of people who just do not know how to get back to their lives before the storm. The thing that touched me most about talking with her was that I think I may have been the first times in awhile at least that she had even had anyone to talk to about her story. She had a 13 year old son with her, who was extremely uninterested in any of her problems and obviously did not understand even his own situation. The children affected by the storm are another issue that will be present for years down the road because the psychological damage they have experienced is immense.

I could go on and on about different encounters with people I has last week but to conclude I will attempt to point out the hope in the area. New Orleans is on its way to being rebuilt. The French quarter almost seems as if nothing ever happened, it is as vibrant and fun as am sure it always was. The city is healing and as much as it needs volunteers to come help it rebuild, it needs tourists to come and enjoy the city. So go to New Orleans and see what is there, I promise you will not regret it.

And lastly I want to thank the trip leaders, Devin and Kapy and our amazing advisor Jen for giving us all the opportunity to see New Orleans and for working so hard through so many setbacks to make the trip an amazing experience for us all. Also a huge thanks to all the Wake Alumni and Wake families that took us in and truly made us feel welcome in their great city, thank you for your hospitality! And finally a big thanks to the organizers of this blog, Kim McGrath for creating this page for us to share about our trip, without it so many opportunities and reflection would not have been possible. And thanks to everyone on the trip, I’m glad I had such good people to share such an amazing week with!

I guess we are about half way through the trip now and I have really fallen in love with the city of New Orleans. Today was sort of a different day, we went to the St. Bernard Community Center for about 2 hours in the morning but then at lunch we met with an amazing lady Kathy Vogel , who is a parent of a Wake Forest student. She is awesome, she paid for us to go the aquarium and see the IMAX hurricane of the Bayou, a film about the hurricane before and after in relation the erosion of the wetlands. The film itself was really well done, I felt, and the stories of what people lost in the hurricane were extremely touching. So much of what went on was never covered on the news and being here and hearing stories of people who are still just trying to come or move back into their house is shocking. The amount of emotional distress that these people went through is devastating and something that is very overlooked I feel. Most people really just need to talk and express their stories. And that is not something that has an easy solution or fix. It just needs people willing to listen and show that someone cares. I can not imagine losing everything like so many people did. Even though its just material possessions, it is people’s homes and memories.

We went to dinner at Kathy’s house and she cooked us an AMAZING dinner, I learned how to eat an artichoke. We also went to the aquarium which was so fun. We saw penguins, sea otters, jelly fish. We all basically acted like 5 year olds it was great. Even though we didn’t do much volunteering today I feel like it was a really great experience to just enjoy this city. Learning about the culture has been an awesome part of this trip. I really love the atmosphere of this city with all the live music and the attitude its just very laid back. I can’t wait to see more of the city!

My name is Amy Bachman, and I’m a sophomore at Wake Forest. I had heard about the Wake Alternative Break trips as a freshmen but didn’t really know too much about them, but then as I got involved with Volunteer Service Corps this past year I learned about the planning process. I heard about the New Orleans trip that Devin was planning since we’re both involved in the Corps.

I have never been to New Orleans before and always wanted to go. When Katrina hit, I really wanted to go down there to help out, but I just never got the chance. Like everyone else I was glued to the TV watching the events unfold. I did what I could to donate money and organize fund raisers at my school, but I still felt that without going there I was not doing enough. Two summers ago my church went on a mission trip to the Gulf Coast region, but because of a previous family conflict, I could not go. I was really upset as I have loved the 3 mission trips I had been on with them in the past.

I feel though that going now, nearly 3 years after the hurricane hit, is just as significant as going there in the weeks following. Although the need may not be as urgent or critical, there is still a need. The problem is not gone. It is just not on the news anymore. America and the world has effectively moved on. And I think this is awful but so typical of our society. There’s a new tragedy every day and the old ones get forgotten. The victims of Hurricane Katrina are still suffering and I am so glad that I have gotten this chance to do SOMETHING, however small it may be.

I truly do not know what to really expect as I have never been there nor have I been to an area recently affected by a major disaster. I’ve been abroad twice to do service and I am really excited to be staying in the United States. Because as much need as there is other countries and as much of a passion as I have for reaching out to that need, the need in my own country is not something I can ignore and I feel like it is something I forget about. I want to go on this trip to remember this need and finally make my contribution to New Orleans after all this time.