We are half way through our adventure in Louisiana, having moved to Dulac this morning. Today I am asking the class to blog their thoughts on two questions:
- What did you learn this week about the situation here in New Orleans that you didn’t expect or hadn’t thought about or were surprised by?
- What have you learned this week about service? What kind of volunteers do the groups we’ve worked with need? How is good service distinguished from just ‘volunteering’?
This week in NOLA I didn’t expect the race issue to be as big as it was. I previously felt privileged to have grown up in the BEST city in the WORLD NYC (BROOKLYN) and after this week I now feel fortunate. This week we learned about all the failed systems in the city of NO and all I can say is that without my mother and family making the sacrifices that they did my life could have been very similar to those of the “failed” people. I wasn’t surprised by anything we heard this week and the fact that I wasn’t is quite upsetting. Growing up black is an experience that at times I wish I never had but after this week I feel that its a badge of the realities of the world that we all live in. Class and skin color still play a major role and many forget this which leads to more problems then solutions. Attending Union has been a roller coaster that started to give me confidence in the world but this weekend totally shattered that and brought be back to earth. This week was swift smack in the face and now that feel reawaken I have no clue whats next. Although this isn’t the best way to feel I know that I’m not alone and maybe together we can change the world.
Service is a powerful thing that doesn’t happen in a day or a week. Service takes time, commitment, dedication, will power, and tons of faith. Service is hard. I learned that service is never what you expect it to be. You can go into a service project with a clear mindset and have your world rocked in a matter of minutes when you start to really absorb the reality of the conditions and areas in which you are conducting service. With this is mind the kind of volunteers that the groups we’ve worked for need people who don’t know the meaning of quitting. They need to have the courage to stand up and challenge the status quo. They need to be ready to sacrifice the wants to achieve greatness for the groups that they work for. Good service is different from ‘volunteering’ because service involves truly being committed to the betterment of a community while the latter only encompasses helping short term. One will enact change that will affect generations while the other only affects the next few months before things go back to “normal.”