 |
Off-Campus Studies | |
||||
| Admitted Students | Current Students | Parents | Faculty & Staff | Alumni | Churches | Donors & Friends |
| Admissions | About Us | Academics | Student Life | News | Athletics | Make a Gift |  |
| |||||||||||||
 |
Mary We started off the day by attending the service at the church we are staying at. It was very much as I expected it to be -- complete with a choir, and organ prelude, and an extremely welcoming congregation -- overflowing with southern hospitality. After the service, we had some time to relax in the sun and catch up on some journaling. This afternoon, we piled in the vans and headed out to some of the hardest-hit areas. We saw foundations without houses and roofs without houses. And it's so easy to become numb to it after you see house after house and debris everywhere. But I keep reminding myself that for someone, this is home. And if you look closely, you can see glimpses of the people that once lived there...a teddy bear poking his head out from the pile of debris...a photo album...a cement block with a hand print in it and the words "Daddy and Aly" carved in it. But then there are the eerie things too...forests of trees that have been dried out by the wave of sea water -- with clothes and sheets hanging in the branches. They look like ghosts hanging in the trees. And then there are the steps leading to nowhere -- hinting at the homes that once stood there, but now are no longer in sight. It's hard to imagine that a house once stood there -- but actually I think it's easier to look at a fully demolished building than a half-demolished one. If it's half-demolished, you can tell what was there originally. "I only wish you could have seen it before," said the woman who was showing us around. Katrina only lasted eight hours, but the rebuilding process, which has only just begun, could take 30 years.
Back to Off-Campus Studies >> Online Travelogues >> Gulf Coast Study Program >> |
|
