"Oh lay, Oh lay, Oh lay, Oh lay...feelin hot, hot, hot!" The lyrics to this song really describes the type of week it has been starting on Sunday the 18th of May. The sun rays are surely shining down in the Gulf and southeast areas! What I mean is that New Orleans and our Habitat area has gotten to the point of average temperatures of 85 degree and humidity of at least 90! And when I visited Tallahasse, FL the temperature seemed to jump 10 more degrees! But all in all, it was super fun and relaxing.
Now onto the exciting work days we had this past week! With one rain day, we still managed to get the best out of everyday. I decided to be in the roofing group so I am hoping to become a master/professional roofer by the end of the project. To this day, we only have 2 weeks and 4 days until our mid-year transition back to Perry Point. It is insane how yet again this project seems to zip right by. By the time we know it, it will be time for mid-year and more trainings and then moving onto summer break for some, while the 30 crew leaders for S.O.S have to stick around Perry Point for to be transfered back to New Orleans for 4 weeks. I was one of the 30 selected to be a crew leader. The team assembled is wonderful and I know for a fact we will all get along just fine.
Below is the breakdown from this past week and what my team and I did...
MONDAY
- with the day off (since Habitat workers work from Tues-Saturday), we as a team went to the Audobon St. Park and relaxed
- layed down to attempt to tan and went to a coffee shop nearby
- walked around the downtown area
TUESDAY
- went back to work with the Habitat crew and staff, there are about 5 AmeriCorps teams at the Upper 9th Ward building houses
- got the orientation and tool safety training, and then in the afternoon we all split up into groups...half went to work on roofing and the other half helped with the siding and painting
- I chose roofing and had a blast...a little scared at first climbing on a roof, but I overcame those fears quickly
- I got to assist with working on the decking (this is when you put up 8 by 4 sheets of OSB board that are held together with nails and h-clips to secure safety and prevent heavy winds) with one of the 25 houses the groups are going to be putting together
- after work went to pick up teammate Bill from the airport and celebrated his 25th birthday as a team, he was very surprised
- came back from the day with an impromptu concert that night by seeing a Greenday side project band for 20 dollars called "The Foxboro Hot Tubs", very awesome concert!
WEDNESDAY
- woke up and arrived to work before 7 AM (got to sleep in 2 more hours than last week :)) and got put into 5 different permanent groups
- I stuck with roofing along with teammates Zac and Nicole...I love being on the roof and getting the tan, it is very rewarding, but yet steamy
- the other team members divided themselves out in the other 4 categories: exterior siding, interior work, interior painting, and logistics
- I am glad to be soaking up the wonderful Nahlins weather day in and day out!
- today I worked with the decking and sub fatia (the trim around the perimeter of the roof), now that is a blast, conquered my other fear today of balancing on a wobbly ladder AND reaching out and hammering nails close to the edge...hooray for me!
THURSDAY
- Habitat work yet again for a couple hours in the morning until it got rained out
- I left at 9:30 with a group of NCCC people to a focus group to talk about problems and concerns with SPIKE projects, as well as positives
- I ended up speaking up a lot about it and really enjoyed the gathering, we now officially can roll up our sleeves while we work :) NO more tan lines and farmer's tans!
- got back and relaxed the rest of the day, then with a couple friends went out and saw Indiana Jones (very bad movie, I don't recommend you seeing it)
FRIDAY
- a nice and hard 9 hour work day with roofing work and shingling and decking and tarpapering, it was a good time
- Scott, our site supervisor, put me in charge while he was gone...felt nice leading the 20 of us roofing
- preparing ourselves and learning as much as we could for the several volunteers coming in next week, roughly 300
- got packed up and cleaned up for leaving with Meghan to Tallahassee for the weekend!
- the trip took about 6 hours with a gas fill up and traffic jam...not too bad, arrived in FL at 12:30AM and met up with her friend from FSU
Saturday and Sunday consisted of relaxing in Tallahassee, going to St. George beach, and visiting a Nature Reserve boat ride and learned about the wetlands of FL...very entertaining indeed. I got super burnt from the beach and hurt all over. Tons of Aloe Vera needs to be put on constantly to prevent the aches and pains. Got back to Camp Hope today and just updating you people on what has been happening. This next week of work consists of several volunteers filtering in and out of Habitat building AND even the AmeriCorps people being put in charge of teaching the volunteers what to do. It should be a great week and full of happy people willing to help. I know I get more and more hyper everytime I get the chance to hop on the roof and work. There are 5 of us that are labeled Team Viper and we do this little mantra before and after work that is tons of fun, a close bond has been formed with me and some of the site workers. The Habitat staff is super nice as well, it is awesome to work with people that make the work fun! More to come and more houses to build. The goal that they want us to do is finish all the houses down in the Upper 9th Ward (which is about 25) before we leave for next round. It can be done...it WILL be done...I will guarantee it WILL get done :)!
Monday, May 26, 2008
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Jimmy Carter week was a HUGE success!
"Hey, hey, hey!" (the beginning words of my voice mail answering machine on my cell phone). What a week! There was tons of excitement, humidity, sunshine, rainfalls, windyness, and of course meeting a couple famous celebrities in the process. This past week consisted of the Jimmy Carter Work Project 2008 that took place in New Orleans, LA. The area of focus was the Upper 9th Ward where there is still so much devastation and destruction. The project had roughly 800 volunteers from all over the US, including parts of Canada came down for the 6 day build. The goal was to build 7 blitz houses (houses that the keys were going to be given to the home owners) and another 16 houses that would be dry walled in. In future weeks, our team and other AmeriCorps members are going to go back and finish up the already started houses and see how much we can accomplish with 4 weeks remaining. I got the chance to meet several of the volunteers and everyone I ran into was high spirited and excited to be working and making a difference. Some even were complimenting us hospitality team for giving back they way we were, even though we did not actually get the opportunity to build.
Our tasks consisted of: waking up and arriving onto the work site no later than 5:30 AM (that meant setting the alarm for 4:30 to assure that we would arrive on time...Raven 3 is NEVER late!) re-filling the water jugs, helping set up breakfast and lunch, taking out the garbage, making sure that all port-a-potties were stocked clean with TP, assist with the bands that performed at lunch time and basically accomplishing any job that Elise or Elizabeth wanted us to do. There was also the perks of being in the hospitality group, that was receiving a ton of Habitat merchandise: t-shirts, keychains, pencils, tool bags, etc., gettting the chance to meet Jimmy Carter and Rosalynn Carter and even Harry Connick, Jr. Connick was there because he is the spokesperson for the house being rebuilt in the Musicians Village area. Him and Dave Matthews have partnered up to help. The Musicians Village was hit hard from the hurricane, but is slowly getting back to normal...all that needs to be done is making the road smoother.
The week was tons of fun, here is a play-by-play description of how this past week went...
SUNDAY
- arrived to the work site around 1PM to properly get golf cart trained; we are going to be using the golf carts to deliver supplies, water, and TP to the 23 houses in the neighborhood area
- Jimmy Carter Kick Off started and our team headed towards a park downtown where we checked in volunteers, boosted the morale of some of them, got the chance to talk to some of them and get there backgrounds
- we assisted with the setting up of dinner that was catered by a nearby hotel, listened to some wonderful jazz music
- got to bed early because we knew we had to awake early the next morning
MONDAY
- got up at 4:30 AM and headed to the site
- helped with registration with our sponsor and then some of us helped with parking
- later in the morning we helped the Salvation Army set up lunch for the workers, we had to unload the truck with all the food and utensils
- we left for the day around 2 PM since they did not have anything for us to do
TUESDAY
- woke up and arrived to the scene around 5:30 AM and began doing the same things we had done the day before
- more hecticness today with more and more workers signing in
- Raven 3 yet again was working and doing as much as we could to assist with jobs that made our Habitat sponsors lifes easier
- we then were mentally preparing to meet Jimmy Carter and Harry Connick tomorrow
- also, i ran into a girl named Ashley Johnson who was the character Chrissy Seaver on the Growing Pains...got a picture with her!
WEDNESDAY
- woke up again and headed to the site where we anticipated in meeting the former president; we set up for breakfast, made our water runs, saw the progress of some of the houses, and then came back to watch the news/press conference
- JC talked about future and past Habitats and tried to reach out to the media in order to spread the word about the non-profit organization
- we ended up leaving for the day at 1:30 PM but had to come back to help with the dinner celebration at the Marriot Hotel
- we came back at 5 PM and led the volunteers in a 2nd Line while they waved their brightly colored bandanas
- arrived at dinner where there was oysters, clams, rice, and very yummy food!
- President Carter said a speech with Rosalynn AND Harry Connick, Jr. sang a little bit, then he convinced Mr. President to sing When The Saints Go Marching In...great vocals
THURSDAY
- came in the morning for hospitality crew but about 8:30, the downpour rain came and flooded all the workers site's/houses; they sent everyone for cover
- not only were there massive ammounts of rain, BUT there was also huge amounts of wind that blew over a couple of the registration tents
- Raven 3 made the best of the situation by providing the rain entertainment and creating a slip-n-slide with the black trash bags...TONS of fun and also great PT!
- the day was cancelled due to the rain which was unfortunate, but it was nice to go back and catch up on sleep
FRIDAY
- seemed as if Friday was like Thursday with the rain day; it started pouring at 8 AM this time and everyone fled for cover; the rain delay lasted for a couple hours and then volunteers went back out in the drizzle to finish the blitz houses (all of the houses on Law St. were Blitz houses and everything was done at the end except the carpeting)
- it was amazing to see the dedication of a majority of the builders even when it was drizzling
- later in the day we came back and set-up for the catered dinner provided by Texas Roadhouse, we helped and also helped the band Ricardo Crespo
- overall a very strange, but fun day
SATURDAY
- today some of my team, and a couple people from other teams got together and performed an ISP at the Children's Museum downtown
- we got to monitor the kids, dress up in the mascot costume, plaster shoes with them...it was crazy insane there with 9 different birthday parties going on at once
- they said that they loved our help and would love to see us back helping again
So all in all, this was a very entertaining and wonderful week with all the fesitivities that went on. I had loads of fun with helping as hospitality and I am looking forward to actually getting the hands dirty and building some of these houses. We start this coming tuesday and have a tuesday through saturday work day. The Jimmy Carter Project went well other than the rain. He is a very nice man. Other side notes include...the Cubs are happily in 1st place :), a couple of us AmeriCorps people from Perry Point are trying to get tickets to go to Game 7 and watch the Hornets tomorrow night. They need to win to continue on in the playoffs. So if you have time, look for me on TV.
That is all I have for now. Thanks for reading and I will be sending more updates very soon to tell how the 1st week of building went. Keep smiling everyone...because I am...I love this program :)
Our tasks consisted of: waking up and arriving onto the work site no later than 5:30 AM (that meant setting the alarm for 4:30 to assure that we would arrive on time...Raven 3 is NEVER late!) re-filling the water jugs, helping set up breakfast and lunch, taking out the garbage, making sure that all port-a-potties were stocked clean with TP, assist with the bands that performed at lunch time and basically accomplishing any job that Elise or Elizabeth wanted us to do. There was also the perks of being in the hospitality group, that was receiving a ton of Habitat merchandise: t-shirts, keychains, pencils, tool bags, etc., gettting the chance to meet Jimmy Carter and Rosalynn Carter and even Harry Connick, Jr. Connick was there because he is the spokesperson for the house being rebuilt in the Musicians Village area. Him and Dave Matthews have partnered up to help. The Musicians Village was hit hard from the hurricane, but is slowly getting back to normal...all that needs to be done is making the road smoother.
The week was tons of fun, here is a play-by-play description of how this past week went...
SUNDAY
- arrived to the work site around 1PM to properly get golf cart trained; we are going to be using the golf carts to deliver supplies, water, and TP to the 23 houses in the neighborhood area
- Jimmy Carter Kick Off started and our team headed towards a park downtown where we checked in volunteers, boosted the morale of some of them, got the chance to talk to some of them and get there backgrounds
- we assisted with the setting up of dinner that was catered by a nearby hotel, listened to some wonderful jazz music
- got to bed early because we knew we had to awake early the next morning
MONDAY
- got up at 4:30 AM and headed to the site
- helped with registration with our sponsor and then some of us helped with parking
- later in the morning we helped the Salvation Army set up lunch for the workers, we had to unload the truck with all the food and utensils
- we left for the day around 2 PM since they did not have anything for us to do
TUESDAY
- woke up and arrived to the scene around 5:30 AM and began doing the same things we had done the day before
- more hecticness today with more and more workers signing in
- Raven 3 yet again was working and doing as much as we could to assist with jobs that made our Habitat sponsors lifes easier
- we then were mentally preparing to meet Jimmy Carter and Harry Connick tomorrow
- also, i ran into a girl named Ashley Johnson who was the character Chrissy Seaver on the Growing Pains...got a picture with her!
WEDNESDAY
- woke up again and headed to the site where we anticipated in meeting the former president; we set up for breakfast, made our water runs, saw the progress of some of the houses, and then came back to watch the news/press conference
- JC talked about future and past Habitats and tried to reach out to the media in order to spread the word about the non-profit organization
- we ended up leaving for the day at 1:30 PM but had to come back to help with the dinner celebration at the Marriot Hotel
- we came back at 5 PM and led the volunteers in a 2nd Line while they waved their brightly colored bandanas
- arrived at dinner where there was oysters, clams, rice, and very yummy food!
- President Carter said a speech with Rosalynn AND Harry Connick, Jr. sang a little bit, then he convinced Mr. President to sing When The Saints Go Marching In...great vocals
THURSDAY
- came in the morning for hospitality crew but about 8:30, the downpour rain came and flooded all the workers site's/houses; they sent everyone for cover
- not only were there massive ammounts of rain, BUT there was also huge amounts of wind that blew over a couple of the registration tents
- Raven 3 made the best of the situation by providing the rain entertainment and creating a slip-n-slide with the black trash bags...TONS of fun and also great PT!
- the day was cancelled due to the rain which was unfortunate, but it was nice to go back and catch up on sleep
FRIDAY
- seemed as if Friday was like Thursday with the rain day; it started pouring at 8 AM this time and everyone fled for cover; the rain delay lasted for a couple hours and then volunteers went back out in the drizzle to finish the blitz houses (all of the houses on Law St. were Blitz houses and everything was done at the end except the carpeting)
- it was amazing to see the dedication of a majority of the builders even when it was drizzling
- later in the day we came back and set-up for the catered dinner provided by Texas Roadhouse, we helped and also helped the band Ricardo Crespo
- overall a very strange, but fun day
SATURDAY
- today some of my team, and a couple people from other teams got together and performed an ISP at the Children's Museum downtown
- we got to monitor the kids, dress up in the mascot costume, plaster shoes with them...it was crazy insane there with 9 different birthday parties going on at once
- they said that they loved our help and would love to see us back helping again
So all in all, this was a very entertaining and wonderful week with all the fesitivities that went on. I had loads of fun with helping as hospitality and I am looking forward to actually getting the hands dirty and building some of these houses. We start this coming tuesday and have a tuesday through saturday work day. The Jimmy Carter Project went well other than the rain. He is a very nice man. Other side notes include...the Cubs are happily in 1st place :), a couple of us AmeriCorps people from Perry Point are trying to get tickets to go to Game 7 and watch the Hornets tomorrow night. They need to win to continue on in the playoffs. So if you have time, look for me on TV.
That is all I have for now. Thanks for reading and I will be sending more updates very soon to tell how the 1st week of building went. Keep smiling everyone...because I am...I love this program :)
Saturday, May 10, 2008
Jimmy Carter week coming soon!
Hello all! Here I am again with yet another wonderful and happy update on how things are going in good ol' Nawlens (New Orleans). Week 1 of Camp Hope is in the books and we are now preparing for weeks to come and especially prepping for the Jimmy Carter build event that will be taking place tomorrow (Sunday May 11th). I am super stoked to be helping out with the event as being part of the hospitality team. As a team we have done numerous of things to get us ready and set for the week-long extravaganza. So far so good with living conditions here at Camp Hope. I am living in a communal room of guys from my team as well as another Raven team. Couple nights it was rough sleeping because of a couple people tend to snore very loud, but more and more it has gotten better which is a BIG sigh of relief! Everyone seems to be very nice and kind here which is good and no negative attitudes at all. I like being around the social aspect of this SPIKE just because we get to interact with a social society compared to our first project with being isolated on an island. No complaints, only smiles :)
This past week was filled with doing the small chores that will lead up to bigger things down the road. We were preparing for the Jimmy Carter Event all this week. We were told that 7 blitz houses (located randomly on streets in the Upper 9th Ward) were going to be completely built and the home owners would be getting their keys on Saturday...then all the volunteers were going to completely dry wall 16 houses. So that makes a whopping total of 23 houses in 7 days! It is definately do-able with all the outside help that is coming is as well as us AmeriCorps NCCC teams, AmeriCorps Vista teams, and AmeriCorps Direct squads (this group is a composite team gathered and their specific area is New Orleans for a set number of months).
So now onto the detailed information on how this past week went...
SUNDAY
- our team and Raven 7 team gather for a tour of New Orleans with tour guide John; he took us to the Lower 9th Ward, Musicians Village, and gave us the history of the city
- get to bed at a decent hour getting excited about working again
MONDAY
- meet our site sponsor, Jaime, who is awesome and super nice; she is in the AmeriCorps Vista program helping out with the New Orleans Habitat
- went to the work site and shoveled a huge pile of sand underneath the foundation of a house; brutally hot today
- then we got the tour of the blitz houses that we and the other volunteers will be working on in the upcoming week
- Jaime buys the whole team ice cream when we were shoveling sand which was amazing, she said "welcome to Louisiana and Habitat"
- in the afternoon we drove to the Habitat warehouse and picked up giant, colorful, flower stickers to cable tie to the park fence; the park is where the Jimmy Carter event is going to be at
- of course today was Cinco de Mayo, so a couple of us went out to celebrate the Mexican holiday :)
TUESDAY
- found out disturbing news that our Unit Leader's Dad passed away this morning, all the Raven team leaders gather and plan on leaving together for the memorial service/funeral, TL's will be gone for 5 days
- went to work @ the Habitat building by making goody baggies for all the participants; we put together roughly 800 of them that included things such as: water bottles, pencils, postcards, tool belts, etc.
- this was the initial beginning of the prepping stages of the event; the event marks the 25th (silver) anniversary of New Orleans, LA Habitat for Humanity existing
- after work we got to drive down to the Lower 9th Ward and realize how devastating all the houses looked and how more help is needed; it was sad to see because all that there was left was the stairs and even some of them had Mother Mary statue still standing
- found out we get the day off tomorrow since we will be having a lot of long hours head of us AND that we will be working 9 days straight!
WEDNESDAY
- got the day off and got to sleep in which was nice, gathered up the team and headed down town to the IMAX theatre to see a movie about Katrina; very detailed and it surely opened my eyes
- after movie the team split up and got to tourist around New Orleans for 4 hours; Stan and I stopped at many places including Jackson Square and French Quarter area...very beautiful
- I ate my first PO Boy sandwich that was delicious! Roast Beef is the choice to go.
- will be posting pictures from the experience soon
THURSDAY
- solid work day today with the temp hitting 85 degrees, really starting to feel the humidity at this point; some kids even got heat exhaustion due to the humidity AND lack of water...I make sure to carry my half gallon water bottle with me all the time to avoid that
- we found out that colorful signs we put up a couple days ago were falling down because of the vicious wind; the method we took was stapling and that seemed to be the ticket! (Sorry Dad, cable ties are not used for EVERYTHING!)
- while some of us worked on the stickers/posters, the other half of the team put together signs with stakes to stick in the blitz house's yards
- met our sponsor Melissa, she is very bubbly and super cool; it is awesome we are getting fortunate with sweet sponsors
FRIDAY
- woke up this morning feeling really icky and sick to my stomach, probably from the food the other night...
- didn't go to work today because of an upset stomach and huge migraine, i rested at home and took a SIQ (sick in quarters)
- found out that today was very humid and more people suffered from heat exhaustion and ended up coming back early
- team was very pleased about the amount of work that day; we like how there is not a set task we have to do since we are considered the "do-it-alls" because I know I like to keep fresh and not do one thing over and over again!
- we inch closer and closer to Jimmy Carter project!
SATURDAY
- woke up and worked for about 7 hours doing more prep work for the event; on the eve of the event we got our tentative schedules for the week and further instruction on our responsibilities come time when the volunteers do arrive
- we put up more signs around the neighborhood areas and assisted other groups around the park area in whatever they needed
- we performed a lot of little tasks today in the slaving, warm heat...I believe it reached 89 today. I am still rocking my killer tan!
As we today are on the eve of the Jimmy Carter, I am so ready for it and thinking of the chance of actually meeting the former president who wore blue jeans in the office. All this prep work we did surely will be paying off. Next week is full of delivering supplies in golf carts, setting up lunches, delivering water to volunteers, helping out with the parking, and any other chores they would like us to do. The 8 of us can't wait to help and I will be sharing this experience with you all next week with taking TONS of pictures!! Another update will be coming at the end of the work week with many details. I am just willing to do whatever they need and give them a happy, supportive attitude with no 'huffing' or 'puffing'!
Mr. President, watch out because Raven 3 is heading your way!
This past week was filled with doing the small chores that will lead up to bigger things down the road. We were preparing for the Jimmy Carter Event all this week. We were told that 7 blitz houses (located randomly on streets in the Upper 9th Ward) were going to be completely built and the home owners would be getting their keys on Saturday...then all the volunteers were going to completely dry wall 16 houses. So that makes a whopping total of 23 houses in 7 days! It is definately do-able with all the outside help that is coming is as well as us AmeriCorps NCCC teams, AmeriCorps Vista teams, and AmeriCorps Direct squads (this group is a composite team gathered and their specific area is New Orleans for a set number of months).
So now onto the detailed information on how this past week went...
SUNDAY
- our team and Raven 7 team gather for a tour of New Orleans with tour guide John; he took us to the Lower 9th Ward, Musicians Village, and gave us the history of the city
- get to bed at a decent hour getting excited about working again
MONDAY
- meet our site sponsor, Jaime, who is awesome and super nice; she is in the AmeriCorps Vista program helping out with the New Orleans Habitat
- went to the work site and shoveled a huge pile of sand underneath the foundation of a house; brutally hot today
- then we got the tour of the blitz houses that we and the other volunteers will be working on in the upcoming week
- Jaime buys the whole team ice cream when we were shoveling sand which was amazing, she said "welcome to Louisiana and Habitat"
- in the afternoon we drove to the Habitat warehouse and picked up giant, colorful, flower stickers to cable tie to the park fence; the park is where the Jimmy Carter event is going to be at
- of course today was Cinco de Mayo, so a couple of us went out to celebrate the Mexican holiday :)
TUESDAY
- found out disturbing news that our Unit Leader's Dad passed away this morning, all the Raven team leaders gather and plan on leaving together for the memorial service/funeral, TL's will be gone for 5 days
- went to work @ the Habitat building by making goody baggies for all the participants; we put together roughly 800 of them that included things such as: water bottles, pencils, postcards, tool belts, etc.
- this was the initial beginning of the prepping stages of the event; the event marks the 25th (silver) anniversary of New Orleans, LA Habitat for Humanity existing
- after work we got to drive down to the Lower 9th Ward and realize how devastating all the houses looked and how more help is needed; it was sad to see because all that there was left was the stairs and even some of them had Mother Mary statue still standing
- found out we get the day off tomorrow since we will be having a lot of long hours head of us AND that we will be working 9 days straight!
WEDNESDAY
- got the day off and got to sleep in which was nice, gathered up the team and headed down town to the IMAX theatre to see a movie about Katrina; very detailed and it surely opened my eyes
- after movie the team split up and got to tourist around New Orleans for 4 hours; Stan and I stopped at many places including Jackson Square and French Quarter area...very beautiful
- I ate my first PO Boy sandwich that was delicious! Roast Beef is the choice to go.
- will be posting pictures from the experience soon
THURSDAY
- solid work day today with the temp hitting 85 degrees, really starting to feel the humidity at this point; some kids even got heat exhaustion due to the humidity AND lack of water...I make sure to carry my half gallon water bottle with me all the time to avoid that
- we found out that colorful signs we put up a couple days ago were falling down because of the vicious wind; the method we took was stapling and that seemed to be the ticket! (Sorry Dad, cable ties are not used for EVERYTHING!)
- while some of us worked on the stickers/posters, the other half of the team put together signs with stakes to stick in the blitz house's yards
- met our sponsor Melissa, she is very bubbly and super cool; it is awesome we are getting fortunate with sweet sponsors
FRIDAY
- woke up this morning feeling really icky and sick to my stomach, probably from the food the other night...
- didn't go to work today because of an upset stomach and huge migraine, i rested at home and took a SIQ (sick in quarters)
- found out that today was very humid and more people suffered from heat exhaustion and ended up coming back early
- team was very pleased about the amount of work that day; we like how there is not a set task we have to do since we are considered the "do-it-alls" because I know I like to keep fresh and not do one thing over and over again!
- we inch closer and closer to Jimmy Carter project!
SATURDAY
- woke up and worked for about 7 hours doing more prep work for the event; on the eve of the event we got our tentative schedules for the week and further instruction on our responsibilities come time when the volunteers do arrive
- we put up more signs around the neighborhood areas and assisted other groups around the park area in whatever they needed
- we performed a lot of little tasks today in the slaving, warm heat...I believe it reached 89 today. I am still rocking my killer tan!
As we today are on the eve of the Jimmy Carter, I am so ready for it and thinking of the chance of actually meeting the former president who wore blue jeans in the office. All this prep work we did surely will be paying off. Next week is full of delivering supplies in golf carts, setting up lunches, delivering water to volunteers, helping out with the parking, and any other chores they would like us to do. The 8 of us can't wait to help and I will be sharing this experience with you all next week with taking TONS of pictures!! Another update will be coming at the end of the work week with many details. I am just willing to do whatever they need and give them a happy, supportive attitude with no 'huffing' or 'puffing'!
Mr. President, watch out because Raven 3 is heading your way!
Saturday, May 3, 2008
The days of final week of 1st Round, Transitioning, AND Camp Hope
Hey you all. Here I am once again for another update that has become WAY overdue! It has been nearly 2 weeks since last update and I figured to catch you up on the latest. One word to describe these last 2 weeks would be: overwhelming!! Yet I enjoyed every minute of it, beginning with the last week of work for 1st Round Jekyll Island SPIKE to traveling to Jackson, Mississippi for Corps Transition all the way to 2nd Round stint in Camp Hope, New Orleans. Tons and tons of events went down during that span and getting the chance to catch up with everyone at Transition was a great time. It was amazing that we had been separated from other groups for over 7 weeks...it definately did not feel like it was that long, but time is a flying! We have been in AmeriCorps for over 3 months now and it just seems like yesterday we were all packing the airplane and heading to Perry Point, MD. As we entered the month of May we have nearly a month or so until Summer break and Mid-year! INSANELY lightning quick this journey has been.
Ok...enough with the stalling and onto the detailed goodies. How I will operate this shindig is break down in paragraph format the overview of what happened the last week of our 1st SPIKE and then from there do a day-by-by detailed bullet point summary from this past Monday to the current day...hang on people :)
Last work week of 1st Round was a blast! It consisted of wrapping up the artificial oyster reef, throwing live clams into the creek, placing bamboo and PVC piping in 9x9 traps in 3 destinations on the creek, AND ended with yet again another oyster roast. First, the team and I continued building the reef by loading mesh shelled bags and palettes to the places along the banks that needed more planting. After all the bagged shell was thrown out during high tide, the total of bags in Beach Creek reached a whopping 10,000+! It was incredible that so many bags had been planted in the last 6 weeks and our sweat and tears being laid out in the humid, scorching Georgia sun. Physical work of the project was rewarding because it made us work out of our comfort zone and made us more toned looking. A lot of us overcame obstacles in the mud and other places that we thought we could never have done. Secondly, during the last week we were given 5,000 bags of live clams to throwing into the creek. We rode out in the Skiff boat with our sponsors and began unloading them and hoisting them into the blue, clear skies. On Wednesday of that week a couple that worked for the Brunswick Newspaper made a visit to check out our project. They wanted to write an article on what we were doing in the local area. The female journalist talked to me and 3 other teammates about the program, project, organization, location, etc. The photographer was photographing action shots of us carrying the bagged shell to the boats as well as hopping onto the boat and getting shots of the creek. Four Raven 3 teammates and I rode on the boat the first shift to dump half the load of clams. Sponsor Alan Power shouted to us to take a Sharpie marker and write down your name, a wish, or a moment onto the clam to throw in. The photographer happened to be sitting right next to me on the boat and actually captured a picture of my wish on my clam, which read "World peace". I ended up writing a couple more wishes, but that was my so-called "funny" wish that I wouldn't have thought anyone would see...more for laughs than anything. Because of that wish I wrote, the picture he took was then published in the following morning's Brunswick Newspaper. I was happy! Our whole team was glad that we had some media people come visit us. Our team goal before the project was to get on TV...and we indeed did that by making it onto the Brunswick News Channel as one of their top stories for Thursday April 24th. It was awesome to accomplish that goal and the team and I were ELATED! Next day, was back in the mud planting PVC and bamboo poles into the mud for future testing. These had substances like lime and concrete on them that would attract oysters. It was sad that it was our last day getting muddy because we had grown accostumed to it over the last 7 weeks. We enjoyed muddying up the clothes and being sandy! All mothers love their children getting muddy...right? :) Anyways, back to the final work week...on Friday we had to construct 36 PVC piping crap traps for the MAREX organization using high toxic fumes and electric saws. It was hard labor but rewarding once again. We got back early afternoon on Friday and got prepared for the 2nd and final oyster roast our sponsors were having for us. Not only was it an oyster roast, but it was a blue crab roast, a shrimp roast, and basically a potluck of several other yummy food items. It was a gathering of about 25 people celebrating the final day before travel. I never knew how delicious oysters and sea food really was. It is like that Dr. Suess book..."try it Sam I Am, I know you will like it Sam I Am!" We got the chance to see a slide show of pictures throughout the 1st round journey and then got a chance to see a sneak peak of our team's community meeting music video that Stan had edited. Very funny! Head sponsor Alan was so grateful of what we had accomplished in the last past weeks, he presented us a goody bag to take with us on our long van ride the next morning. Very thoughtful of him. Next day came and we loaded up Pippy Pompeo and headed on our way. During that week we had been working on ideas for the Corps community meeting we were asked to put on. Also teammate Joni was accepted to go to Vermont on the Dream Team building treehouses and clearing forest trails. Only 9 members got selected. Congrats Joni!
We were on the road again at 11:30 Saturday morning heading to Transition in Jackson, MS. It took us 11 hours to get there with all the stop and go's and the driver changes after every 2 hours and of course bathroom breaks. We arrived in Tuscaloosa, AL and spent the night in the hotel with 2 other AmeriCorps teams. We only had 4 hours more to drive and we were at Jackson. We left for Jackson on Sunday morning and off we went to get acquainted with old CTI friends and people you kept in touch with during first round. Overwhelming indeed!
SUNDAY
- arrive to Jackson, MS and get flooded with friends hugging and catching up; hectic set-up when we got there and very unorganized
- worked more on the team community meeting preparing for Monday and getting in front of 300 people
- I was then on that night preparing myself for my Summer of Service crew leader interview that took place on Wednesday
MONDAY
- delivered the community meeting and it was a HUGE hit, a lot of compliments from the staff, TL's and especially friends and corps members
- we were told ours was the best community meeting out of the 4 previous ones
- team collaborates and gets prepared for the 1st Round project de-brief to present to upper staff
TUESDAY
- in the morning we had our de-brief and it went very well, we were pleased on what happened
- began and tweaked up our team's brief for 2nd Round Camp Hope
- got the chance to catch up with all my home slices and peeps which was nice to see how their projects went
- the hotels were very nice and the beds/showers were very comfortable; my roommate and I got along which was nice
WEDNESDAY
- worked and finished briefing Power Point and were confident
- I had my crew leader interview and it went fairly well, I think I did well...I find out soon if I get the positions; a lot of the questions dealt with conflict and how I would lead a team of all African-American, low income children
- the program will take place in early July and will last until early August, how interviews broke down were 35 potential crew leaders and only 30 made it
THURSDAY
- performed the briefing for Camp Hope
- got packed for the van ride to New Orleans
- said goodbyes to people that left early, it was sad once again to see people leave but knowing we have a mailing system to keep in touch is GREAT!
- we had a going-away last dinner for Joni at a Thai restaurant
FRIDAY
- loaded the van and scooted on out to Camp Hope; had a team breakfast to officially say goodbye to Joni...it is going to be sad to have a teammate short this round
- arrived to Camp Hope at around 4 PM and got the grand tour of the facility
- we are currently living and sleeping on bunkbeds and it is communal...about 9 guys are in the room now and they are all AmeriCorps members from other teams, we got fortunate
- in the Camp Hope house there are hundreds of other volunteers and AmeriCorps teams from other campuses
- later after getting situated, some of the team either went down town to Bourbon St. or saw a movie, I headed down to tourist capital of the world...loads of fun!
So...there you have it! Now you know why these weeks have been overwhelming! But of course all positively and happy things that occurred and more to come. The latest update on what is happening these last 2 weeks. We have internet and computers here so I will be posting like I was before (once a week). It was just a hectic last couple days and I am so glad it is over with and the weight is off the shoulders. We don't know what is in store for us here at Camp Hope. All we were told that for the 1st two weeks we are going to assist at the Jimmy Carter Build. We excited :)! More to come on how the project goes this round. We start work on Monday and are eager! I can't wait. Until next time...you stay "classy" viewers!
Ok...enough with the stalling and onto the detailed goodies. How I will operate this shindig is break down in paragraph format the overview of what happened the last week of our 1st SPIKE and then from there do a day-by-by detailed bullet point summary from this past Monday to the current day...hang on people :)
Last work week of 1st Round was a blast! It consisted of wrapping up the artificial oyster reef, throwing live clams into the creek, placing bamboo and PVC piping in 9x9 traps in 3 destinations on the creek, AND ended with yet again another oyster roast. First, the team and I continued building the reef by loading mesh shelled bags and palettes to the places along the banks that needed more planting. After all the bagged shell was thrown out during high tide, the total of bags in Beach Creek reached a whopping 10,000+! It was incredible that so many bags had been planted in the last 6 weeks and our sweat and tears being laid out in the humid, scorching Georgia sun. Physical work of the project was rewarding because it made us work out of our comfort zone and made us more toned looking. A lot of us overcame obstacles in the mud and other places that we thought we could never have done. Secondly, during the last week we were given 5,000 bags of live clams to throwing into the creek. We rode out in the Skiff boat with our sponsors and began unloading them and hoisting them into the blue, clear skies. On Wednesday of that week a couple that worked for the Brunswick Newspaper made a visit to check out our project. They wanted to write an article on what we were doing in the local area. The female journalist talked to me and 3 other teammates about the program, project, organization, location, etc. The photographer was photographing action shots of us carrying the bagged shell to the boats as well as hopping onto the boat and getting shots of the creek. Four Raven 3 teammates and I rode on the boat the first shift to dump half the load of clams. Sponsor Alan Power shouted to us to take a Sharpie marker and write down your name, a wish, or a moment onto the clam to throw in. The photographer happened to be sitting right next to me on the boat and actually captured a picture of my wish on my clam, which read "World peace". I ended up writing a couple more wishes, but that was my so-called "funny" wish that I wouldn't have thought anyone would see...more for laughs than anything. Because of that wish I wrote, the picture he took was then published in the following morning's Brunswick Newspaper. I was happy! Our whole team was glad that we had some media people come visit us. Our team goal before the project was to get on TV...and we indeed did that by making it onto the Brunswick News Channel as one of their top stories for Thursday April 24th. It was awesome to accomplish that goal and the team and I were ELATED! Next day, was back in the mud planting PVC and bamboo poles into the mud for future testing. These had substances like lime and concrete on them that would attract oysters. It was sad that it was our last day getting muddy because we had grown accostumed to it over the last 7 weeks. We enjoyed muddying up the clothes and being sandy! All mothers love their children getting muddy...right? :) Anyways, back to the final work week...on Friday we had to construct 36 PVC piping crap traps for the MAREX organization using high toxic fumes and electric saws. It was hard labor but rewarding once again. We got back early afternoon on Friday and got prepared for the 2nd and final oyster roast our sponsors were having for us. Not only was it an oyster roast, but it was a blue crab roast, a shrimp roast, and basically a potluck of several other yummy food items. It was a gathering of about 25 people celebrating the final day before travel. I never knew how delicious oysters and sea food really was. It is like that Dr. Suess book..."try it Sam I Am, I know you will like it Sam I Am!" We got the chance to see a slide show of pictures throughout the 1st round journey and then got a chance to see a sneak peak of our team's community meeting music video that Stan had edited. Very funny! Head sponsor Alan was so grateful of what we had accomplished in the last past weeks, he presented us a goody bag to take with us on our long van ride the next morning. Very thoughtful of him. Next day came and we loaded up Pippy Pompeo and headed on our way. During that week we had been working on ideas for the Corps community meeting we were asked to put on. Also teammate Joni was accepted to go to Vermont on the Dream Team building treehouses and clearing forest trails. Only 9 members got selected. Congrats Joni!
We were on the road again at 11:30 Saturday morning heading to Transition in Jackson, MS. It took us 11 hours to get there with all the stop and go's and the driver changes after every 2 hours and of course bathroom breaks. We arrived in Tuscaloosa, AL and spent the night in the hotel with 2 other AmeriCorps teams. We only had 4 hours more to drive and we were at Jackson. We left for Jackson on Sunday morning and off we went to get acquainted with old CTI friends and people you kept in touch with during first round. Overwhelming indeed!
SUNDAY
- arrive to Jackson, MS and get flooded with friends hugging and catching up; hectic set-up when we got there and very unorganized
- worked more on the team community meeting preparing for Monday and getting in front of 300 people
- I was then on that night preparing myself for my Summer of Service crew leader interview that took place on Wednesday
MONDAY
- delivered the community meeting and it was a HUGE hit, a lot of compliments from the staff, TL's and especially friends and corps members
- we were told ours was the best community meeting out of the 4 previous ones
- team collaborates and gets prepared for the 1st Round project de-brief to present to upper staff
TUESDAY
- in the morning we had our de-brief and it went very well, we were pleased on what happened
- began and tweaked up our team's brief for 2nd Round Camp Hope
- got the chance to catch up with all my home slices and peeps which was nice to see how their projects went
- the hotels were very nice and the beds/showers were very comfortable; my roommate and I got along which was nice
WEDNESDAY
- worked and finished briefing Power Point and were confident
- I had my crew leader interview and it went fairly well, I think I did well...I find out soon if I get the positions; a lot of the questions dealt with conflict and how I would lead a team of all African-American, low income children
- the program will take place in early July and will last until early August, how interviews broke down were 35 potential crew leaders and only 30 made it
THURSDAY
- performed the briefing for Camp Hope
- got packed for the van ride to New Orleans
- said goodbyes to people that left early, it was sad once again to see people leave but knowing we have a mailing system to keep in touch is GREAT!
- we had a going-away last dinner for Joni at a Thai restaurant
FRIDAY
- loaded the van and scooted on out to Camp Hope; had a team breakfast to officially say goodbye to Joni...it is going to be sad to have a teammate short this round
- arrived to Camp Hope at around 4 PM and got the grand tour of the facility
- we are currently living and sleeping on bunkbeds and it is communal...about 9 guys are in the room now and they are all AmeriCorps members from other teams, we got fortunate
- in the Camp Hope house there are hundreds of other volunteers and AmeriCorps teams from other campuses
- later after getting situated, some of the team either went down town to Bourbon St. or saw a movie, I headed down to tourist capital of the world...loads of fun!
So...there you have it! Now you know why these weeks have been overwhelming! But of course all positively and happy things that occurred and more to come. The latest update on what is happening these last 2 weeks. We have internet and computers here so I will be posting like I was before (once a week). It was just a hectic last couple days and I am so glad it is over with and the weight is off the shoulders. We don't know what is in store for us here at Camp Hope. All we were told that for the 1st two weeks we are going to assist at the Jimmy Carter Build. We excited :)! More to come on how the project goes this round. We start work on Monday and are eager! I can't wait. Until next time...you stay "classy" viewers!
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