"If you see a need, meet it."

Me on the job! Bangs temporarily eliminated due to outside work in the morning.

It's been quite a week: Physically and emotionally exhausting, but well worth it. I'm really enjoying my new volunteers-in-the-morning, newsletter-in-the-afternoon schedule. The exercise (both mental and physical) is good for me. I sleep well at night.

On Thursday, my Colorado Springs volunteers and I headed to clear a resident's yard. When showing us where her property lines were and what grass she wanted cut, she mentioned as an afterthought that she would like it if we could level her back yard. It was clear why: her contractor had left the soil in huge, solidified mounds, making the entire backyard a series of hard, lumpy hills. We made quick work of the grass cutting and had about two-thirds of the yard leveled by the first day. The group was only going to be there for two hours the next day, so I hoped that with a little luck we could finish the rest. I arrived late to the site Friday due to our weekly staff meeting. I couldn't believe my eyes. The yard was leveled.

We spent the last hour clearing the back yard of debris and leveling it even more precisely. When the resident came out, she was stunned, saying that she had already thought it was beautiful the day before and that this was more than she had ever expected. She cried as she hugged each and every one of us. I was previously unaware that, due to physical limitations, she had been entirely unable to walk in her backyard in the state it was in before. Now she can. It's so easy to underestimate the impact that fifteen people with a couple of shovels can do, and yet. . .There it was.

The resident repeated the phrase, "you can't know" over and over. Finally she explained, "you can't know unless you've lived through it," she told me. "But those with heart will try to imagine. Those like you all." I can't even explain what that moment did to me.

That afternoon I went out with my coworkers Burke, Ken, Lubaina, and Jessica (all in the Architectural Design studio) to The Bywater Restaurant and had my first catfish of the trip. $5.95 for perfectly fried and seasoned catfish, fries, and 'slaw can't be beat.

The Colorado Springs volunteers were kind enough to invite me to a cookout they were having at the church they were staying at. It was a wonderful, warm event and reminded me bittersweetly (bitter because I miss them; sweet because they're awesome) of my own church and youth group. It was hard to say goodbye to such an incredible group of volunteers, but I feel certain that they'll all be returning to New Orleans some day, and that helps a lot. The title of this entry is something that one of the youth group leaders, Julie, told me as we reflected on our week. It's a simple, pure philosophy that I will certainly take with me.

Later that night I hung out with Morgan, Petra, Alex, and Megan at our friend Matt's, who goes to Xavier, place. It was a nice, relaxing end to the week.

I did squat for most of Saturday, and that needed to happen. That night Petra, Balint, and I had a picnic in Audubon Park (across from Tulane and Loyola universities) with our program leaders, Stephen and Yoni, and their respective girlfriends and dogs.
Yoni and Bunny, the dog from hell (in a good way).

Later Balint, Petra, and I splashed (illegally?) around in the park's fountain and just walked around in the warm summer night. My favorite kind of weekend, really. I woke up covered in bugbites. Worth it.

Balint and Petra on the fountain's edge.

A mildly insane day.

In a flash of inspiration this morning, I realized that I wanted to do my final research paper for the Urban Geography of New Orleans on a memorial that stands at the entrance to the Lower Ninth Ward (pictured above). The memorial has always been a source of interest for me since I was informed that it was built by a "bunch of rich white people" and that the Lower Ninth Ward residents unanimously hated it. I've been looking into it more recently, and it turns out some of that information isn't correct. For example, several articles seem to imply that the designer, David Lee, is a person of color (they don't specify of what origin). One article also mentioned many residents crying in appreciation at the unveiling of the memorial. Still, I've spoken to a resident who related that she avoids the memorial at all costs because it reminds her of the friends she lost to the storm. This brought me to an interesting question: How do Lower Ninth Ward residents react to this memorial? Does this piece of artwork change the way they move about their neighborhood? And thus, a question for a research paper was born.

In other news, the person I work under was "let go" today completely unexpectedly. I have no idea why. This leaves me as the only person in my department. I also have very little information (for example, where my volunteers are supposed to be going tomorrow). This all happened in the last half-hour of my day, so I really have no idea how it's going to turn out. More on all of this later.

Work itself was great. My Colorado volunteers and I met our homeowner. She was incredibly sweet; she brought us cookies, chips, water, and juice to the work site and wouldn't cease telling us how grateful she was. We prayed with her and her sister at the end. I had the pleasure of sitting with her on her newly built porch as I waited for the project manager to pick me up. She told me about how she is at peace over losing her house (it was entirely uprooted and destroyed by the storm) because, after all, "it's just stuff." As I told my dad about this experience later on the phone, he remarked, "that's what you came for." Excuse my bragging, but the man is brilliant, and he was certainly spot-on in this case. (Dad. . .I miss you.)

I've had a great time bonding with the Colorado group. Their energy and curiosity often reminds me of my own youth group. I find myself getting a little motherly with them, urging them to drink water and shielding their eyes while I spray their faces with sunscreen. (Mom. . .I miss you.)

The newsletter is going much better. I've been consolidating what I've created while concentrating on keeping the essential parts of the newsletter there. It's difficult; I'm used to organizing words, thoughts, and meanings, but certainly not images. Though I enjoy color and images, I've never been asked to format them in a pleasing-yet-professional way, and it's certainly proved to be a new challenge.

I have returned! Sort of victoriously!

Above is a fountain that's in the French Quarter. Notice the woman and her little girl playing at the edge-- so cute!

Alright. I am back to regular blogging. There was a little lag there in which I was very tired and started watching Lost online due to Bryna's suggestion (read: mistake).

I literally did nothing last weekend. That is, homework, nothing by myself, or nothing in the sense of lying on Balint's floor with Balint and Petra for four hours in a row. It felt great and it needed to be done.

This week at work has been interesting. My boss is fairly busy, so it's been up to me to be in the field with the volunteers. My day is split in between taking the volunteers to the site, doing physical labor while directing them on how to do their own physical labor, coming back at lunchtime, covertly bathing myself in the bathroom sink, and changing into business attire before returning to my newsletter duties. I feel like a sweatier, less heroic Clark Kent in reverse.

This week's group is a thirty-member Presbyterian youth group from Colorado. Getting to spend every day with them has been awesome. I think it's hard to know the meaning of volunteerism until you see a bunch of high school kids clear six feet of grass from a lawn in half an hour while enduring 100-degree weather. They go into their work with enthusiasm, smiles, and lots of intelligent questions, and it's great to be a part of it.

The newsletter has hit a snag, unfortunately. While one higher-up approved it fully, another has now decided that it needs to be reformatted in order to be mailed out. This makes my job fairly complicated, as neither higher-up has spoken to the other and both are too busy for me to speak to either of them. The story is incomplete for now, so I'll refrain from saying more. All I can know for sure is that there will be a NENA newsletter, and it will be good.

A kitten ran into work today. The Job1 kids were terrified of it; I think they thought it was a rabid stray or something. I picked it up, if only to stop them from yelling, and it immediately relaxed in my arms and started purring. Needless to say, I took an inordinate amount of time "putting it outside." Worth it.

It was 107 degrees today with the heat index.

My glasses fogged up immediately when I went outside.

Unfortunately, I am exhausted right now and really can't bring myself to write. I promise this will be the last entry (at least for a while) that basically says nothing. . .But a big one will come tomorrow!

In the above picture is me, Balint (from Budapest), Will (from New Jersey), and Buttercup (from my bed). Will and Balint work at the Broadmoor Improvement Association and are also in the program with me.

This entry coming to you from a very sleepy girl

Long day. The ones with work and class always are. I was up quite late last night chatting with a certain older brother, so my energy is very limited at this point.

Today: Finished newsletter mock-up and submitted it for review. Oriented surprise volunteers from Georgia. Took Job1 kids out to pick up trash. Entered various data. Discussed the term "snow bunny" with Will. Made fun of Morgan's abysmal high-fiving skills. Taught Balint how tall a six foot person was (Hungarians suck at non-metric measurements, apparently).

Good night y'all.

Existentialism on lunch break

This morning I was making the rounds with the volunteers. If I've met them already, I usually greet them, ask them how their day was, etc. We have three groups at the moment: Eight undergraduates from Berkeley, ten folks from a Baptist church in Ohio, and ten high school and undergraduates through the Job1 program (which, as far as I can tell, is a decades-old initiative run through the local government to employ youth during the summer).

I was talking with a middle-aged man from the Ohio church. He told me how he had met the homeowner at the house they were working on the day before, and how he'd had a long talk with her about her recent experiences moving back in. We agreed that listening to a homeowner's story is just as important as tiling or sheetrocking or flooring their house. I commented that I believed that the silver lining of Hurricane Katrina (I believe I referred to it as "the beauty of the storm" in a speech I gave in my freshman seminar for a certain favorite professor) involved the interaction of people across the country-- and the globe-- who otherwise never would have met. He immediately began nodding, and related that he felt that that was God's work. I found myself saying, "I agree."

My thoughts on God are complicatedly simple. I believe I spent most of elementary school liking that being, most of middle school angry at it, and most of high school and college being unable to believe in its existence but unable to discount it either. (Sorry for referring to God as "it," but the whole gendered deity thing throws me for a loop.) An idea that struck me while talking to that tattooed stranger was that God is what makes us do what we believe is right. That necessitates that God is in everyone. It also opens up a lot of wormholes and maintains the complicatedly simple quality of my beliefs. I'm not sure if this is an idea I'll accept, reject, hold onto. . .But it's the first one that's made some sense in a while.

- - -

I've begun work on the NENA newsletter. I became quite excited about it the more I worked on it. Spreading information is one of the critical things that is necessary to help people recover from the storm. I hope to do that with the newsletter and, ideally, have people come to NENA and receive its service as a result.

We got about ten Job1 kids who started work for us today. Job1 is a government-run program focused on employing New Orleans citizens. As far as I can tell, it employs any youth who applies in an organization of their interest for $8.00 an hour (75 cents above the current Louisiana minimum wage; the minimum wage will actually be changing to $7.50 in October). In any case, the kids who are now working for NENA are awesome. Today I chaperoned them as they took censuses for the 9th Ward Beautification Program and got to watched as they charmed 9th Ward residents. They added a hefty number of applicants to our list and did it with incredible spirit. . .In the 105 degree weather.

Two silly and unrelated things:
1) I now understand the stereotype of Southern women having large hair. My hair is about four times more voluminous here than in Massachusetts.
2) Strangely, instantaneously, unbelievably, I stopped biting my nails (literally for the first time since I mastered the ability to chew) upon arriving to New Orleans. It was entirely subconscious. Now, however, I've started grinding my teeth. Problematic. (Suggestions?)

The setting sun

I stood up from my bed to take a shower and gasped out loud in amazement at the orange of half-sun that stood on the horizon. Hey, Angela was playing and I stood with my palms on the windowsill while it dipped lower, slower over the city until it was gone. I knew watching it that I was happy and that I am supposed to be here and that I miss the people I love but that they're here with me in this place that I need to be.

---

Today was good. I finished my Excel manual, which was a huge weight lifted. I wish I knew that it was as good as my Word manual, but I'm almost as new to Excel as the people I was writing it for. A group of girls from a Catholic school in Baton Rouge arrived unexpectedly, so we put them to work clearing the NENA-owned yard that happens to be next to Fats Domino's house. They did a fantastic job. It's incredible what ten people can do in two hours.

Tonight my classmates and I had the pleasure of watching a panel discussion between Trisha Jones, the founder and president of NENA, and the president of the Holy Cross Neighborhood Association (Holy Cross is a section of the Ninth Ward). Both were brilliant but reserved, passionate but resolute. It became clear that it's people like them who prevented neighborhoods like the Ninth Ward from becoming the city's drainage system after Katrina, which, I'm sure, mattered worlds to both people I work with every day and hundreds I'll never meet.

Picture from: http://images-0.redbubble.net/img/art/size:large/view:main/2971608-2-sun-setting-on-a-louisiana-rice-field.jpg

Weekending!

Above is one of my favorite architectural characteristics of New Orleans: Plants spilling over beautiful balconies that are attached to pastel houses. Mmmm, the Big Easy.

This weekend was great! Friday at work was pretty typical: I met with my boss, worked on my Excel manual, caught up on our 9th Ward Beautification Project (the free plants and trees initiative I mentioned a few entries ago), and entered some volunteer data into the system. I found out that I'll be assigned to creating the first ever NENA newsletter. NENA feels that part of the problem with rebuilding the Lower Ninth is the lack of distribution of information, so this seems like the obvious next step. I'm thinking I'd like to interview as many Lower Ninth Ward residents for the publication as possible; doing so would service both my interests and the integrity of the newsletter itself.

On Friday, some group members and I were invited to a Shabbat dinner by a friend of a friend. The group of people at the dinner represented a wide swath of America; there was literally no region that was not represented. Strangely enough, it was still quite a small world in that house-- I ran into one of my coworkers and met two people from my (fairly small) hometown! The unebelievable connections between people in New Orleans are one of my favorite things about the city. Unfortunately, while the dinner was supposed to be a potluck, almost everyone brought beer. Needless to say, it was unlike most Shabbat dinners I have been to.

Before hitting the city on Saturday, I decided to check my mail on a whim. Inside my mailbox, I found a package from Bryna:



(Jenna-
The murder rate is only high in New Orleans because of the gators.

Look out.
Love, B)





















A friendly warning and gator socks. I have the best friends.

We left for the French Quarter in order to attend the combination seafood, tomato, and Zydeco festival that was happening that day. The streets were bustling with good food, good music, and sweaty, stinky humanity. It was wonderful. We ate at The Gumbo Shop (I forget the street name, but it's right near the Cathedral near the French Market). My roast beef poboy was indescribable. A few pictures from the day:



Morgan (sideways!) enjoying some spicy crawfish rice. . .














Tents with delicious, delicious seafood beneath them. . .




















The Zydeco band, complete with voluntary dancers. . .



















And Alex and Oleg (stubbornly sideways) with a new friend.

Two days together

The last few days haven't been entirely eventful, so I thought I'd just lump them together. Yesterday I wrote an entire manual for Ninth Ward residents to learn how to write a business letter. I also started a Microsoft Excel manual, which I continued today.

My Urban Geography of New Orleans class was fascinating; we learned about how New Orleans was founded and why it was created where it was. Interestingly, it was almost a Spanish or British colony at different times, but the French won out in the end.

We also spoke about what our research papers might be on. I'm thinking about studying how a town or city (either in Lexington, MA or Athens, Greece) formed around a historical landmark.

Today an all boy's Catholic school (I sense a theme!) from Philly arrived. They and another group from Berkeley did yard clean-up. I spent the rest of the day working on the Excel manual.

Outside all day

We had a group of 30 volunteers from an all-girls' Catholic school in Sacramento come in today. We bonded over the whole all-girls'-school thing. They were great to work with; they went at their jobs with such determination and vigor. I worked with them all day clearing three lawns (one was NENA's, two were homeowners). Lawn-clearing is actually more important than it sounds because the city imposes a tax if grass and weeds grow above eighteen inches. Needless to say, this is very stressful for a homeowner who is already barely making ends meet for the rebuilding process on a home they can't even live in yet. It's nice to know that we helped alleviate that anxiety, at least for a while.

Back at Xavier I went to my class about performing race and gender through architecture. We spoke about the manifestation of race and gender in public spaces, particularly through railway cars, theaters, and drinking fountains. I appreciated having a class that was half white and half students of color and a professor of color; unlike virtually all of my high school and college classes, I was able to get a non-white perspective on the issues.

We also presented our photo projects. Mine is too large to post on here, but it told the story of my frustration with the tension between bureaucracy and accomplishing humanitarian goals. I began the essay with a series of photographs around the office. I concentrated on blank and vacant spaces, taking pictures of empty desks, blank whiteboards, and unused meeting tables. I moved on to houses of increasing decay, from those which had been halted in the rebuilding process to those blocked my FEMA trailers to those which had been untouched since the storm. I ended the essay with a picture of a controversial memorial which stands in front of the Ninth Ward and a picture of graffiti in the French Quarter, which simply reads "LIES." To me, the memorial is an image of shallowness: from what I've heard, it was built by rich people from outside of New Orleans and is largely unwanted by Lower Ninth Ward folk. Rather, it seems to stand as a gruesome, unwelcome reminder of the storm. The "LIES" component is fairly obvious; it's to represent the accusations of those who haven't benefitted from relief organizations. Both photographs are pictured above.

Happiness and frustration

Above is a particularly beautiful house we saw on our six-hour tour.

Work was interesting today. We got a group of volunteers in from UC Berkeley. My boss decided that we had little for them to do today and that we could just have them cut the grass around NENA headquarters. Though last week was basically a learning curve, this week I decided to be proactive. I remembered a woman who had said she needed grass cutting when I surveyed her, called her, and organized the volunteers to head to her place. She was very happy. Needless to say, it made my day.

Unfortunately, NENA really liked my work on the Microsoft Word manual, so now they want me to make two more on Microsoft Excel and how to write a business letter. Ugggggh.

I had a tense moment with someone today when he informed me that "women are softer than men." He was surprised that that proclamation offended me. Perhaps I've been in the women's college bubble too long, but I'd forgotten how statements like that can sting.

Getting back on the wagon!

I fell off the blogging wagon for a few days, but I have returned! It's hard to keep up with it Friday and Saturday nights because my group members and I usually go out, so I'll probably be skipping those days in general. Not incidentally, above is the view from my dorm.

Friday at work was strenuous. I learned that the Microsoft Word manual I was writing was meant to be for ten forty-five minute sessions for residents who had rarely or never used a computer. I spent almost the entire day writing the manual. It certainly wasn't interesting work, but it felt good to know that it would be useful for those who will learn from it. That night we headed out to the French Quarter and then back to the dorms just to hang out and chat.

We were outside of the dorm at 9:45 on Saturday for our six-hour tour of the city with Professor Rich Campanella. It was really a gift to experience such an in-depth look at the city. Though we went to many places that I've already spent time in, such as the Ninth Ward, St. Bernard's Parish, and the French Quarter, we also visited several places I had only heard of or didn't know existed. It was fascinating to see the vibrant Vietnamese areas of the city, several areas undergoing extreme gentrification, and the little-known truck highway. Here is Professor Campanella with his mic:


Some parts of the tour were emotionally draining. Though I've been in the Ninth Ward several times, the unparalleled destruction in the area never ceases to shock me. All of us also grappeled with the fact that we were sitting in a comfortable, air-conditioned, twelve-passenger van to view one of the worst tragedies in American history. It's a good question to ask oneself: is the awareness gained from viewing the devastated areas of New Orleans worth the embarassment or anger of those citizens who are being watched?

That night we headed to the Central Business District in order to see the art gallery openings along the famous Julia Street. The art ranged from the extremely realist to the staunchly abstract; the forms included paintings, installations, sculptures, jewelry, collages, and more. Seeing all the art was wonderful, but I was particularly interested in the responses to Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath, of which there were many. One particularly interesting piece involved separate pages of a woman's journal post-Hurricane Betsy, all dyed variants of pink and red, neatly hung on the wall in ascending order.

Today was much more relaxed. I read a little of my book (The Autobiography of Malcolm X) before starting on my homework. I then watched the first disc (there are two dvds) of Spike Lee's documentary When the Levee Broke. The film is certainly emotionally draining, but I would recommend it to anyone who is interested in an intellectual, historical, and humanistic approach to Hurricane Katrina's origins, duration, and aftermath.

A Mixed Bag

Above is a picture of a house that I took from the car driving into the Ninth Ward.


Work today was different than usual because my boss, Nivan, wasn't there. As a result, I was assigned some busy work, namely calling a bunch of small business owners to ask if they'd like to come to a free seminar we're holding on how to increase their business. It took a long time, but it was nice to hear the excitement of some of the business owners.

I also typed up a list of instructions on how to use Microsoft Word for the business across the street. It was a strange experience; I certainly don't consider myself someone who is technically proficient. Still, my time here has taught me that it's a blessing even to have these small skills.

Work ended on a sour note when I spoke to a woman who was very upset with NENA's service. She was frustrated about all the documents she had to collect in order to get service. It's true, there are about fifteen things to be scanned, photographed, or retrieved in order to gain service from NENA, but most of them are reasonable. Even so, it was awful to hear the anguish in this person's voice. I spent much of the day trying to reconcile how I, as a low-level employee at a non-profit, could provide humanitarian assistance despite (necessary) bureaucracy. It's certainly going to be the subject for my first photo project for class. Below: My desk!



Tonight was fun. My friends and I hung out at the house of a few Xavier folks who were friends with someone in our program. Later, we went to the French Quarter. It was a typical French Quarter night: beautiful architecture, balmy weather, and scantily clad women practically throwing jello shots at us. Oh, New Orleans. Below is a beautiful alley in the French Quarter. My friend Petra took the picture for her photo project.

Out in the field

Above is a slogan that I fell in love with in the Ninth Ward. Unfortunately, the restaurant itself still isn't open.

Today was a business as usual at NENA. The beginning of the day was a little slow, so I called a few more folks I had hoped to survey before. With a little extra time, I compiled all of the spreadsheet data I had into graphs and pie charts. A word from the pseudo-wise: When in doubt, organize. That rhymes!

I went on to do research in order to publicize our Fight the Blight program. There were actually pretty fascinating RAND Corporation articles on the effect of blight and general uncleanliness on local business, public health, and youth violence.

At around 2:00, a local Salvation Army worker came to work with us on a neighborhood beautification program. It turns out that in late July we'll be receiving forty volunteers for four days. We plan to use the volunteers to provide free grass cutting, flower and tree planting, and other landscaping to ninth ward residents. We left NENA headquarters to walk around the nearby streets, surveying homeowners about what services they might like (if any). It was interesting to truly walk around the area; in my high school volunteering days I was always shuttered within one or two streets for fear of violence in the area.

It was difficult to accept the lack of change in the area. Though there were certainly vibrant, fully rebuilt houses on each block, countless others hadn't been touched since the storm. Our Salvation Army coworker described the effect of the area on her quite well, sighing, "it makes my soul weak." There were, however, a few gratifying moments when we informed the homeowners of our intentions. Some residents lit up at the mention of free beautification. Those moments were worth every minute of dispair. I'll be continuing to survey the area for those who want the beautification services as well as leading a group of volunteers when the day itself comes.

After we returned to NENA, I compiled a list of poisonous plants which are often mistakenly planet at homes. We don't want to get the residents sick after promising them a brand new lawn. . .

We just started our Urban Geography of New Orleans class. It seems like it will be fascinating. To introduce us to the concept of human geography, our professor showed us many maps which supposedly measured the density of a certain human factor and had us guess which factor they represented (for example, most males per country, most African-Americans per county, etc.). For now, I'm planning on watching When the Levee Broke, a Spike Lee documentary about Hurricane Katrina. Adios!

10 hour day

Sheesh. Work 9-5 and class 6-8:30. I'm fairly sleepy right now, so please excuse me if this is incoherent.

Work was interesting today, if fairly emotionally taxing. I did some form-making: questionnaires for residents who might want free landscaping from a NENA-Salvation Army partnership, surveys to see what goods or services homeowners are in need of in order to help NENA prepare, etc.

I used the latter survey to call one hundred (count 'em!) Ninth Ward residents to ask a) if they were living in their homes, b) how complete their rebuilding process was and c) what things were necessary to their immediate rebuilding needs. As usual, almost every person I talked to was incredibly kind and helpful. You know you're not in New England anymore when someone you've only talked to for a few minutes is referring to you as "sugar" and "baby."

Even so, some of the stories were hard to hear. Along with many residents who simply didn't have the time, money, resources, or energy to rebuild, many have suffered horribly from contractor scams. These scams have been rampant in the wake of Hurricane Katrina and are pretty much what they sound like: phony contractors requiring a down payment of several thousand dollars to supposedly fix a house before bolting with the cash. Quite obviously, losing this much money often makes it impossible for the homeowner to rebuild.

After work, we attended our first Creating Space: Race and Gender in Urban Spaces class. Today was very introductory, but we learned that our first assignment will be to create a photo essay of a space in New Orleans. I think I'll be using my photos to contrast the more run-down, neglected areas of the Ninth Ward with the few extravagant houses there. For example, the famous Steamboat Houses:
We'll also need to keep a weekly journal about the many readings for the class. Additionally, we have a photo montage of a space we've been working in (example pictured below) due once a week. Our final project will be a short movie about the place we've been working in. It should be a lot of work, but also lots of fun.

First day on the job

Today was my first day working at the Neighborhood Empowerment Network Association, or NENA. NENA's homepage (9thwardnena.org) best describes what they do:

"NENA utilizes an innovative resident-based approach to the comprehensive rebuilding of the Lower Ninth Ward, providing services and implementing sustainable programs in community outreach, case management, design and construction administration, home and school rebuilding, and economic development.

NENA has 17 staff members, in the areas of management and administration, Outreach, Case Management, Economic Development, Volunteer Services and the Design Studio. Its Board of Directors includes seven members, all of whom live, work, or worship in the Lower Ninth Ward.

In addition, NENA has ongoing partnerships the Loyola School of Law, Tulane University, Crescent City Alliance Recovery Effort (CARE), and numerous local and national organizations and supporters. NENA is the lead facilitator of the Lower 9th Ward Stakeholders Coalition, and is a member of the Greater New Orleans Disaster Recovery Partnership."

NENA has ten full-time employees (most of whom are from or live in the Ninth Ward).

I found out today that I'll be working in Volunteer Services, which is great. I've been a volunteer in the New Orleans rebuilding effort several times, so it will be wonderful to see it from the other side. I'll also be surveying houses to see how to best begin each individual building process.

Today was all about the learning curve. I shadowed the other Volunteer Services coordinator as he oriented a volunteer team from UC Berkeley. We took the group to the house where they would be dry-walling and introduced them to the homeowner and their NENA assistant.

I then did an inventory of NENA's extensive supplies for volunteers and Ninth Ward residents. In case anyone was wondering, counting a pile of rakes is very difficult.

I went on to create a backlog of all the volunteer groups we've had in the past few months. Predictably, months like May were very slow, whereas months like March and January have huge peaks in volunteers due to their school vacations. I happened to pick up a waiver filled out with volunteers from my church in my hometown, which was very exciting.

Just before leaving, I created a chart with which to assess the progress of each home in the rebuilding process. I then received my very own NENA t-shirt, which I apparently am supposed to wear every Friday.

NENA headquarters:

To be frank, the Ninth Ward is much as I remember it when I last saw it in 2008. Due to government neglect, few renovated houses stand in the middle of many, many dilapidated ones. Some homes are only half-redone as a result of their owners running out of the money or the energy to fix them. Often, what appear to be large fields of grass have, upon closer inspection, the grooves of lost house foundations. Needless to say, there is much to be done.