New Orleans-Part 2 Options

[Indybear57]

After a meeting Monday night and a good night's sleep (Brent House Hotel-a little older but very nice!) we rolled out for breakfast and our first day of work. A 'normal' work day should have been from 0800-1600 but we found out early on that the site supervisor and one of the assistant supervisors both live on Mardi Gras parade routes and if they weren't home by 1430 or so they weren't getting home! Lunch on Tuesday and Thursday was provided by a ministry called Loaves and Fishes. They come to the job site in a lunch wagon and provide cold meat sandwiches, PB&J, chips and fresh fruit. Wednesday we returned to St. Charles Avenue Presbyterian Church (SCAPC) for a lunch of Po' Boy sandwiches provided by our hosts at RHINO. RHINO (Rebuilding Hope In New Orleans) is a ministry of SCAPC that was started two weeks after hurricane Katrina. They work with Habitat for Humanity and, initially, rebuilt houses in the most hurricane ravaged areas. Now Habitat buys blocks of houses in the poorer areas of New Orleans, tears down the existing structures and builds new homes which they then sell. (I'll not go into a lot of detail about how Habitat works but if you want to know more let me know or check out their website.) After lunch on Wednesday we were given a tour of New Orleans by members of SCAPC. A guide joined us in our cars and away we went. We hit most of the high spots including the French Quarter. We were also taken to areas hard hit by the hurricane including the Upper and Lower Ninth Wards. The Ninth Ward, well, it's kind of hard to explain. There are many, many empty lots and lots with steps that lead to nowhere. Many of the existing structures still have the 'X's left by the search and rescue teams. There are lots of blocks that have only one or two houses. Theses are neighborhoods that looked like any other residential area prior to Katrina. It was a very sobering part of the tour. During our tour Frank, our driver, mentioned the condition of the streets as there were many potholes and rough areas. Calvin, our guide, said, "Frank, you've got to remember that a lot of these streets had 3' of water on them for six weeks and there's not much under the streets but sand!" Just one of those things you don't think about.