More reflections

I have always wanted to help when I saw Hurricane Katrina on the news,for that matter any natural disaster.
We feel so privileged to have gone on this building mission with piles of great like minded people.
Eric & I both appreciate the efforts that Cam & company went through to help us make this a great successful mission.
We truly enjoyed the friendly hospitable people of New Orleans and plan on attending again in the near future.
I love trying new foods,alligator is awesome and mustard greens were good to,the peach cobbler was out of this world.
We raised we praised. Destroyed & rebuilt floors & painted a beautiful house pistachio green 110 feet long.
Brings it to life a little more realistic when you see an X on a house with the deaths listed on it.
Did lots of plumbing,boarded up house window holes & wood trim work. Its all of the little things that we did that made a huge difference in their lives. We all seemed to mesh very well together as a group.Even awesome bus drivers.
We cleaned back yards and saw geckos & birds. There was a strange sense of feeling in cleaning up the daycare centre and finding shoes from people that had landed there. I could hardly imagine 12 feet of water consuming our house and living in the attic for 1 & 1/2 days.
Its interesting the differences locals had in meeting us some honked,said thanks for caring,knelt down,some said get lost.
We were proud to wave a Canadian flag on site and to have found & talked to other people from organizations that have been there to help for the last 2 years. It is improving.Nice to learn that local church groups were cooking meals for the homeless that lived on cool concrete under the over passes.
Cool to have met the mayor in person and also see the beautiful garden district of very fancy homes.
Lots to do there is a casino,jazz clubs,shopping from $1-$7000.00 or a nice ride on the street car.Very nice from the every day life here.
If your up for an adventure I'd sure recommend trying it out just once, you'll be hooked too.
Its like Ollie said when your doing God's work you don't get tired even at 80 years young.

Deb & Eric Donkers

Since you asked

http://www.wdsu.com/video/14574293/index.html?taf=no

We're back

Below are some reflections from our weary travelers on the way home. Later in the week we'll get y'all some pictures and more of a commentary on what we were up to all last week, so come back, hear?

It’s tough to type on a bus, so bear with me. This is my second trip to NOLA, and I was affected by what I saw this time as if it were my first experience there. People who live there tell us it looks better. I don’t think it does. I read a book on the long drive back to Ontario called “1 Dead in the Attic”, by Chris Rose. He is a columnist for the Times-Picayune, who spent a lot of time documenting and reflecting on the emotional toll Katrina had on the residents of New Orleans. I want to take a quote from his moving observations. “A time will come when someone asks you, ‘What were you doing about it?’ You can’t tell them, ‘I was just watching it. I was just an innocent bystander.’ Let me tell you something: There are no innocent bystanders in this.”

I am so proud of all of the volunteers from all over North America who came to New Orleans and helped out after Katrina, and I am thankful that Aylmer Baptist Church and our community supported those of us who went there. We weren’t innocent bystanders, and we will never forget.

~Sue Helm~

The best thing about this time in New Orleans was seeing all the birds, insects, dogs and children. We heard children laughing while we were painting Vera,s house for her. People are returning. Anne Foster

We are now only 1 ½ hours from returning to our comfortable homes and safe environments. We were totally unprepared for the assault on our sense of fairness and equality. The vast expanse of devastation was overwhelming. We can all look back on how this experience has changed our lives in so many ways – from new friendships made and old friendships strengthened, to the work accomplished, to the stories we heard. Thanks to all involved for this wonderful opportunity to serve.

Lyle and Sue Jillard

Dave & Lorraine – It was an awesome week, some tears, laughter, new friends in NOLA.

A huge thanks to Cam for all his hard work getting us there and back

safe and sound.

We did so much and at the same time, there is still so much left to do! Saying we’ve finished our job is not even close to true….we’ll be back! Mark, Paul, and Morgan

It is hard to believe that we are on our way home. Just a moment ago we left. It will be good to get back to family, but I feel everyone on the bus has become family. Lots of hard work, some tears and laughter. Meeting Mayor Nagin was great, although it would have been nice to ask him questions. Dr. Stephens took time out of his busy schedule to be with us several times – he is great. This is definitely a life changing experience. All the thanks in the world to Cam for his patience and attention to detail. Thanks to Aylmer Baptist Church Family. Although it will probably take years, New Orleans will come back. We hope we can help again. Diana and Bill Arthur. May Lynn Rochus-Firby

Anincrediblybusylastday

While some of us are determined to stay here another week, we know that part of that is that there is too much to do and we want to do more. But after a week we'll have enough stories to make you want to come here with us the next time.

In the meantime you may want, at 7 pm EST on Friday 9th, to log onto www.wdsu.com and look for a video link about us.

more later . . . zzzzzzzzz

Mt Ararat Missionary Baptist Church

Not much money, not many folks at the core of this congregation, but a vital ministry to the children of the neighbourhood---that's where their money goes. So we are fixing a washroom and part of the kitchen area.

Gifts given and received

This is the house next door.







On Sunday, after church (and church is another story entirely!), we toured around to look at the sights and make plans for teams/materials/etc. But first we stopped at Tammy's house, our small project from last March. She wasn't home, but her dad, Mr. Davis, was. The house looked much the same from the outside, but he invited us in. We wrote about her March 15. What a difference in her home. Those of us who had been there before had trouble seeing through the mist in our eyes, especially as Mr. Davis told us how happy they were and how difficult life continued to be for their neighbours. FEMA no longer picks up garbage, now you pay $800-900 to have waste from your gutted house collected (and no, your insurance does not cover this cost).

Finally a chance to update . . .

November 6 pm

It’s Tuesday and we’ve just returned from a daycare centre in the lower 9^th. Everything seems to be a jumbled mix in my mind, which is a bit reflective of what our group is experiencing. Some of us are having great experiences – some a little less great. You can see the strain on people. In many ways the city is continuing on even when so many are still stuck in post-Katrina mode – not in their homes, dealing with insurance, suffering depression; the list goes on. As expected, the group has been split up going different places to work. Some of are at Pastor Boutee’s house, some at Mt Ararat Baptist Church and some of us at a daycare centre. 50 children are ready to start at the centre as soon as it’s able to open. It’ll be awhile. There’s lots too be done. The last few days though, it’s been amazing how some things just seem to work out. Of course some things haven’t, but that’s for someone else to write about. Yesterday, working to board up a home, we had to find hydro (aka electricity in the US world) to be able to cut plywood. Our first idea, to use a neighbour’s didn’t work, but shortly afterward, a man came along the road & said he had a generator he’d bring back. While waiting for him, some of us started measuring, some started cleaning up the yard – hand mowing if you will. (Owners can be fined $500 for not keeping their yards mowed.) We also then met the back-door neighbour who said he would let us use some of his hydro. We needed a ladder – Diana ‘fell over’ one at the house…add those to a few other things that kept happening with amazing ‘coincidence’. Today, as we started to pile the debris from inside the daycare, a junkman and woman came along and were happy to take away all the metal piping, wiring etc. Cleaned up our pile and helped them as well. It’s amazing how things work. Is it God’s hand or the people of God doing God’s work? Christian Unity (or should I say Cliteal and Diane) are feeding us for the rest of the week for dinner – no small task, when you’re talking 29 people, but that will make logistics much easier (& tastier too) God’s hand or the people of God? Doesn’t matter! It’s still hard to see all of the devastation and I’m still angry – a little surprising because I thought I’d dealt with all of that last time. And life and hope are here; people are returning, businesses are opening, etc. But, there’s still so much to be done – and so many people dealing with so much loss and continued pain, so long after the hurricane. If it were me, I’d curl up in a little ball in the corner and not uncurl for a very long time. Either that or I’d lash out at anyone who came near. God promises “My grace is sufficient for you”. Guess it’s up to all of us to take that grace and do something with it. – Karen Hilliker

November 6, 2007

~Each day greets us with stories of the people that we meet – the people that make this work very personal. I can only share some of what I have gained from the few I have met:

Sunday I was touched by a woman who has now been home in New Orleans for two months but is apologizing for just making it back to worship with her home congregation at Christian Unity. She openly admits to suffering depression and just being too busy with the work of returning. As I can only imagine the many things that would be involved in this work and the overwhelming grief that must be a part of day to day living, I am inspired by her openness and willingness to admit the truths around her road home.

On Monday I met a gentleman who shared his continued struggles on the road back to “normal” life. He was rescued from the attic in his home “only a day and half” after Katrina. He now struggles to rebuild with the wood in his home that was sold to him with termites and ants in it causing repair on the repairs. During our conversation he was still able to laugh and make jokes with us which to me is an inspiration of dealing with life while maintaining joy!

Tuesday brought a gentleman to an intersection at the daycare as I stood taking pictures. He was very willing to share that his son was to have attended the daycare shortly after Katrina hit but since he is now 5 he is at school instead. He had briefly moved to Knoxville, TN but now spends time back here working there and returns to New Orleans to work on his home periodically. He wished us great success as we continued to work on the daycare and looks forward to the activity and laughter back in the neighbourhood.

Each day provides another opportunity for inspiration – I welcome the learning of the next few days and trust that I will be reminded of these friends whenever God sees a need to remind me of things in my life. ~ Deb Siertsema

We're here. The folks at the hotel, the woman in the restaurant screaming encouragement to the LSU Tigers whose football game was on the TV (they won), our waitress, thank us for coming and make us feel welcome. In our evening round of "good thing/bad thing some of us find it hard to come up with a bad thing. We are here with a good list of jobs to do and we are the thankful ones. Especially that with the change in time zones and the end of DST we get 2 extra hours to sleep.

November 3 am

Like all criminals, we prefer to travel by dark. Some of us sleeping fitfully, as though we might get caught and turned back, some of us adjusting better to the hypnotic thrum of the diesel. “Chicago” blurs into a “Little House on the Prairie” clone to be replaced by “A Prairie Home Companion” on the bus’s DVD player. Our minds play tricks on us as we drift in and out of sleep as our imaginations visit the US Midwest while we head south to the Gulf Coast. In Elizabethtown KY we stop so Jim and Mary, our Badder companions move into the Best Western for a well-deserved rest and Phil takes over piloting our bus. Some of us watch the sun rise out the left side of the bus. The rest are grateful to be shaken awake as we pull into Cracker Barrel for breakfast and another warm Southern Welcome. They count how many times we say “eh”.

Sometime Friday night, November 2

Who would have thought our presence would be so unwelcome? And after all the fun of filling out a permit with everyone’s personal information and submitting it to FEMA (thanks to Miriam, sister of Moses, for helping us navigate that process---I hope she gets a break from helping the folks in California) and then onto Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) who granted the permit and our paroles to enter the county.

Parole, what an interesting description for a group of people who fund-raised for 4 months, gave a week of their holidays and gave up time with their families to go and help their neighbours in New Orleans. I guess we comprise a new class of criminal element, volunteers.

So, we got paroled. Eventually. The powers that be at Port Huron CBP had the file immediately but that wasn’t good enough for them. We would all have to be processed individually. It could take an hour per person, and there had best not be anything in our past that would make them want to keep us out. But, gotta play by the rules of the game when it’s their park, right? One agent understood someone was doing a number on us, and kept things light, but still, the possibility of spending the night in their office was not, well, appealing. We called Miriam, and an hour later the power that was came to the agents and said more would be assigned to our bus and we were to be out of there in 30 minutes. They didn’t quite achieve their goal but we only spent 3 hours with CBP, instead of the projected 14. All of us kept our cool and were gracious, doing our best “Paul Gross as a Mounty” imitations.