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After returning from New Orleans, the only thing I could think of was I wish I could do more to help these people. Their entire lives are ruined because of breaks in the very mechanisms which are supposed to protect them from this situation. The worst part about the entire situation is that the government is doing absolutely nothing to help. After listening to John (the bus driver) talk about how the government only thinks that the poverty stricken area got hit so they don't care if it gets rebuilt, I realized how based on class and color this society is. John also told us the hurricane didn't discriminate. It didn't choose what parts it destroyed by the color of the people in the houses.
Anyone can watch TV and see that New Orleans is devastated and say "Oh those poor people" and then flip the channel. People with those attitudes should be ashamed of themselves. Most of these people have lost everything. Their homes, parts of their families and worst of all their memories. Some of these houses were homes to fourth or fifth generation families and in the blink of an eye it's washed away, literally. These people don't want pity and sympathy, these people want and need help. And they should be given that because it's the least that America can do for them.
---S.G. (Fieldston student-Sophomore)
The first thing I want to say is my heart goes out to everyone who was affected emotionally and physically by Hurricane Katrina. This was a powerful storm that damaged a wonderful, exciting, and popular city. On my way down to New Orleans I felt enthusiastic and honored about helping and doing all I could do to change the look of the city and make it even better than it was before the hurricane hit it. But when I got down there, my heart began to fall apart because of what I saw. Houses crushed, automobiles squashed, and trees ripped from the ground on top of houses that have fallen. It was just so hard for me to believe that water and wind could do all of this destruction to a city.
When our bus driver, John, drove us all over the city, you can see how everyone was affected by this hurricane. It just wasn't the lower class or the middle class or the upper class, it was everyone. The lower class lost their whole house while the upper class were flooded out. All I could think about was, we needed to help all these people, especially when John told us that these areas were now called "Ghostland," because no one is able to go back and live there. But throughout this trip, what really affected me the most, was seeing the children's stuffed animals hanging from the fallen and crushed houses. I began to breakdown when I saw that. It just made me think about my stuffed animal, that I've had since I was born, being hung from a house that was destroyed during a hurricane. But I am proud to say that I came out of this trip feeling that I did make a change and difference in someone's life. This was such a powerful excursion that I went on and I want people to know about this so they can also help. I just can't wait to go back to New Orleans and continue to help all of the people affected by Hurricane Katrina.
-Ashley A. (Fieldston Student-Jr.)
When I returned home after the last student was picked-up from the airport on Thursday, I sat down and started to weep. I suppose that once my adrenaline stopped flowing, and I felt the weight of my exhaustion, the full impact of what I had seen in New Orleans took hold of me. Never in my life have I witnessed such devastation. Those of us who were just in New Orleans should be prepared for strong emotional reactions in the next days and weeks, and should feel comfortable sharing our feelings with friends, teachers, and family.
One thought that has profoundly upset me is that seven months after the levees were breached, 3000 New Orleans residents are still unaccounted for; yet during our time in the Lower Ninth Ward, a low-income African-American community adjacent to one of the four major breaches, I noticed that hundreds of houses that had collapsed in the onslaught of water have still not been excavated. How is it possible that with 3000 American citizens missing, the government has not sent search teams to uncover the corpses that are undoubtedly still trapped under all of that debris? As we walked through the neighborhood I felt as if I were walking through a graveyard, aware that not only had communities, property, and memories been destroyed, but that people had died mere feet from where I stood.
Our bus driver, a lifelong resident of New Orleans, commented that unless the media starts showing white, affluent people who have suffered losses as a result of the flood, the government will not act. This is certainly one explanation for why residents whose houses remained intact in the days following the breach sat on their roofs for days while the government hesitated about how to respond. In addition, nearly every resident with whom I spoke connected the tragedy in New Orleans with the war in Iraq, enraged by the fact that President Bush would spend so many billions of dollars on the war while a U.S. city with a majority African-American population falls to pieces. The blatant racism and classism that have marked the underwhelming official response to this tragedy, and the lack of preparedness for such a storm in the first-place, should not be forgotten.
I am so proud of the students who came with us this week, the parents who entrusted them to our care, and the teachers who worked so hard to ensure a safe and challenging experience. Over the course of the trip, we have encouraged two major service learning strategies: 1) Direct service, or the physical service that we can render as volunteers on rebuilding projects, and 2) the responsibility to use what we have witnessed as a springboard to advocate for the survivors of the hurricane and subsequent flood. Witnesses have a responsibility to act; however, in order to do so effectively we need to take care of ourselves emotionally. So please recognize that the week we shared in New Orleans was emotionally as well as physically exhausting, and we need to be open about the impact it has had on us.
This was just the beginning. I look forward to working with everyone as we move forward on this project. I hope that this site will become a forum for sharing our feelings, and for keeping New Orleans in the public eye.
Adam Gaynor- (TCI)
Posted by ChiaChee Chiu on 3/25/06; 3:49:44 PM
from the dept.
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