My first post from Dulac:  Rain, rain, and more rain!  We are getting a good taste of it here!  Today we were supposed to be back at our two houses in Houma and Golden Meadow, but the regular schedule has been cancelled due to spotty flooding all over southeast Louisiana.  Schools closed or opening late, roads impassable, and even some homes flooding.  The region has had so much rain in the past few weeks that the ground is saturated. So, any rainfall pretty much has nowhere to go.  This kind of flooding happens often here.  It doesn’t take much to saturate the ground since the water table is so high.  In New Orleans, people just have to wait for the city pump system to do its work.  In the small towns, you wait for it to drain away — usually pretty quickly.

We have no flooding here in Dulac at the moment and the sky is quite bright.  Our dorm is built about 15 feet up on stilts, so we are in no danger.  Plenty of food, lots of games and puzzles and even a TV with cable [new this year] should keep us busy. And, we also have access to the computer lab in the main community center building.

I’m hoping to get us up to Houma midday so that we can at least finish drywalling one of the houses.  The challenge is mostly to get the drywall sheets from the warehouse to the house without getting them wet.   

Students are all back in bed for the moment… some much needed sleep.  We’ll stay safe.  The showers are supposed to let up by later today… stay tuned for more… Jan

As I sit here after a day painting in beautiful 70 degree weather, it is hard not to feel a bit guilty about the 10″ of snow I hear we had back home in Schenectady.  Students are working hard and learning a lot. 

We’ve had more than our share of technological challenge:  a 7 hour delay in getting here while Delta flew both a part and a technician to Albany to repair our plane and a really pitiful internet connection with AT&T.  So, you probably won’t hear as much from us on the blog this year as in the past, at least for now.  I finally remembered that they have free WiFi at the Rue de la Course cafe down the street… so I’ve just hastily published about a dozen posts students have written over the past 3 days.  I’m hoping that the internet in Dulac will be more reliable!  Friends and relatives, please be patient!

Lots has improved here in the year since I was last down…. but still so much to be done!  And contant challenges.  Last night PNOLA’s warehouse was broken into and some of their good tools stolen.  So, we had a late start this morning as the staff hustled to find new tasks for us at the same time as they dealt with the police and doing an inventory of just what they had left.

I’ll publish things as often as I can get over here… perhaps we should think of this as an object lesson in moving to Louisiana time… slower and more patient!   bye for now….

Our first posts will be about our thoughts as we head to Louisiana for two weeks…

A week and a half has passed since our trip, which has given me time to reflect and share stories with friends and family. Jan forewarned the group that many of us might feel a disconnect from our home life or not feel satisfied when explaining to others what we experienced. I still struggle with the latter concept. I’m normally comfortable with settling back in from trips, even when I was abroad in Vietnam for 3 ½ months. I found it easy to get back into routine habits, but difficult to share how my trip went with those who inquired. While my immediate family was comforting, understanding, and well aware of Louisiana’s current condition, friends and relatives did not seem to fully grasp what I was explaining to them. It seems as though they wanted a quick, joyful story and not be bothered with real issues that Louisianans face. This became very frustrating the more people asked about the trip, because unless they probed further about the current situation (which fortunately some have), I felt reluctant to share my entire experience. On a more positive note.. I am so glad I was able to work in Ms. Barbara’s house in Dulac. She was a wonderful, light-hearted woman, who always had a smile on her face. Whether we sat down and made fun of a talk show before packing up for the day, or discussed her memories of the flooding, I enjoyed conversing with her. She had a very positive outlook on life, and did not seem to have dampened spirits by her situation, which was refreshing and showed a lot about her character.

I am currently applying for Teach for America, so I have been busy over break. After being on this trip I have seriously considered volunteer work based in New Orleans or Dulac, if I am not accepted into the program. With all the privileges most Union College students have received throughout their life, I think it would be great for many of us to give back to those less fortunate. As we discussed in our final session, we are all most likely volunteer oriented and have a similar mindset, so I think it is important to encourage our peers to experience the mini-term Union offers. Looking back on this trip, I’m glad we had to take a class and are required to write a research paper. While volunteer work is great, I think the combination between applied work and becoming educated about the issues really supplies us with the proper knowledge and experience to share with others. I am so grateful to have experienced a trip with such a great group of people. I’ll admit I had a few doubts on how well we would internalize the experience (before we left Union), but after listening to everyone during our group discussions in New Orleans and after we returned I am convinced we all took a lot away from this trip. Our group really seemed to get it, and every person had a unique and original perspective to add to our discussions. During these discussions individuals brought up aspects of the trip I had not thought of and encouraged me to further digest our experience. Others responses inspired me and reaffirmed feelings I had, which made me feel comfortable that I was not the only one contemplating various issues. It was a true delight to be on the trip with this crew.

I hope everyone is enjoying their last few days of break and spending lots of time with loved ones. I look forward to seeing y’all when we return!

As we travel around Dulac there seems to be substantially more damage and less recovery work than in New Orleans. I am currently working in Barbara’s house in Dulac. She has a great personality and is very friendly and kind to all of us working in her home. We first replaced her toilet and part of her bathroom floor. We also put up siding and trim throughout her living room. After having several conversations with Barbara, I am reminded of several class readings depicting southern Louisiana residents. She has a positive outlook on life and is so grateful for our help. When she spoke of previous hurricanes and the impact they had on her life, she used her stories as an educational tool to stress what she considers the important part of life. This was very refreshing because she did not dwell on what she had lost, but instead looked forward to what she still have to experience in life, such as watching her grandchildren grow up. She constantly spoke about her family and I can tell they mean a lot to her. Yesterday, I was lucky enough to meet two of her grandsons. The grandsons came over to help their grandmother and keep her company during the day. They seemed to have a special bond with her and the ease of conversation that flowed throughout the day exemplified their strong sense of family structure. I am looking forward to getting to know Barbara even better as we continue to work on her home.

Living and working in New Orleans has been an amazing experience. While I have only been here a week, I have learned so much. Before embarking on this trip I was somewhat concerned about our group presence in Louisiana. I was worried our group would get too caught up in the idea of helping people and not internalize the larger theme of spreading awareness about the long-standing effects of Hurricane Katrina. My worries quickly dissolved after I listened to each student’s reflection about our trip in a group discussion a few nights ago. After this group meeting I am reenergized and even more enthusiastic about our contribution towards New Orleans during our stay and after we return home.

Our group has made large strides both tangible and perceptual ways. We helped build a playground for Gentilly Elementary school in just six hours. We have also worked on three separate homes where we painted, put up sheet rock and laid flooring through a few step process. After listening to residents ongoing concerns about housing and staggered relatives throughout the country, our perception has not quite changed but seems more aligned with the true concerns of the locals. When we visited the lower 9th ward with Jim, it was a very emotional experience that I am sure we will all remember for the rest of our lives. I am looking forward to the work we will continue to provide for the next week and the more educated we will become about residents’ issues. I think we have a great group dynamic and our teamwork and positive attitude will ensure our best work is still to come. As we are packing up and heading out to Houma and Dulac I am eager to work alongside a few residents and hear more about their stories.

We’re starting a new category of posts for some local vocab we are learning.  First is gutter punk.  Jim offered a new take on this to mean ‘rich kids from up north who come down here, live on the street, and live dirty on purpose’!  One of the students encountered a couple of such folks on the street, playing homemade instruments.  Jim doesn’t have much respect for them, as you might guess. This is a variation on the usual definitions of gutter punk that you’ll find at urbandictionary.com.

Perhaps I should add cuban cupid [thanks, Jasmine, I knew better, but the brain failed]shuffle, for those of you, like me, who’ve never heard the song!  See the link at the right to one of many YouTube videos, this one by Cupid himself.

More:

neutral ground — up north this is what we call the median , the stretch of grass going down the middle of a highway or boulevard.  In NOLA, it is neutral ground because Canal St, which is a broad boulevard, used to be the dividing line between the French quarter and the rest of the town. Hence, the median really was ‘neutral’ ground.

hurrication — a trip up north to avoid a hurricane, aka an evacuation, that becomes a holiday.

contraflow – when they make all lanes of a highway go out of town to facilitate rapid evacuation of more people faster

shotgun house – no, not a house filled with shotguns, but a common style of home in NOLA.  In the original shotguns, you could stand in the front door and shoot a gun through the house and out the back door without hitting a wall.  Many houses are double shotguns, i.e., side-by-side duplexes each of shotgun style. 

Jenny Riskin, Union ’08, who took this class last year, is now working for City Year here in New Orleans. Jenny joined us last night for dinner and went to the Rock N Bowl with us.  Her story of what it’s like to try to support kids in the NOLA schools was heart-wrenching, but I’ll let students share their thoughts on that.  For now I just want to point out that today’s NYT had a great article on these issues — I’ve posted a link to the right.

Sorry it’s been a couple of days since we posted.  I’ve been having a heck of a time getting this blog software to let us post pictures.  I’m working on this as I sit in the van, while the students are hard at work putting in flooring in one of the houses we are working on.  They are doing awesome work and having a fantastic time doing it.  Hopefully, over the next day, you’ll begin to see their posts, illustrated!

Our Housing in New Orleans 

Carrollton UMC are our gracious hosts here.  They have been housing out-of-town volunteer groups ever since Katrina.  We are in one big room on the second floor, sleeping on bunk beds in our sleeping bags. The Carrollton Church [see link to their website at right] did not flood during Katrina, although many members’ homes were damaged.  The church is near the foot of S. Carrollton avenue, very near the Mississippi River.  You can’t see the river from here, of course, because it is behind the levee!  Carrollton Ave is a beautiful tree-lined boulevard, down the middle of which runs the St. Charles street cars, now back in service.  The homes in this area are old, classic southern style and you feel transported back in time to see them. 

A word about the neighborhood and crime…

We are close to some familiar landmarks from home — a new Rite Aid two blocks up the street one way and Walgreens two blocks the other.  So far the students’ favorite though is the French pastry shop which sells great gourmet coffee.

The students also go running in Audubon Park nearby.  The zoo is there, plus golfing,  and a running track.  They’ve been great about sticking together in groups.  

Jim Coningsby, our program director, did a good job of clarifying the safety issues here for them.  In many ways the crime here is as in any big city — you have to be street smart!  There is more crime here than in many other US cities, as you’ve heard, but for the most part the real situation is not as the media hype describes.  What the media leaves out is that virtually all the crime is done by folks with criminal records against others with criminal records.  As long as we don’t do stupid stuff like wander the streets alone, we are as safe here as we are in Schenectady.

Food!  

We have the run of their kitchen, which has about everything we need.  We just provide the food — Molly and her crew stocked up with $600 worth Wednesday nite and we’ve already made a big dent in it. We are divided into 7 work teams for cooking, with different teams doing set up, cooking and cleanup each night.  We each make our own breakfast and sack lunch.  So far it is working great. Carl Winkler’s team served up a tasty pasta dinner last night.

Oops, I’m running out of battery power — more later!!!

Please feel free to comment on our posts — the students grumble about being embarrassed, etc, but they really do love hearing from you all — me, too!  NOTE — please post on this page, not the Katrina page, ok?  That’s for another course!!!

bye y’all – Jan

Ok, we’re here and it’s great! 

 The flights down…

The flights went smoothly — layover in Charlotte and lunch at Chili’s — a nice break after our early 8:30 takeoff. 

 Most of us were wide awake, like Sarah and Kenny above, but a few of us, like Dave, caught up on sleep missed the night before…will he ever live this photo down???

We flew in over Lake Ponchartrain and marveled at how huge it really is…we were fascinated by the causeway. 

Jim Coningsby and Rachel Massey from PNOLA met us at the church for orientation –we start work bright and early at 9 tomorrow.  Surprise — the church has bunks for us this year, so we don’t have to sleep on the floor!  A quick supper at Felipe’s, Jim’s favorite Mexican burrito bar.  A crowd has gone to stock up the kitchen at Winn-Dixie…we start cooking for real tomorrow.  I’m off to bed early to get ready to really begin!