Day One in N'awlins!

Alright, so after thinking that our flight wasn't going to leave Houston until 12:30 this morning, but Continental got their act together and found us a plane, so we got into town at our regularly scheduled time, about 11 last night. Some of us climbed in Kevin's truck, some in the van Rob was driving, and I was in the latter. After taking the "scenic route" to People's UMC, we get to the church about midnight. After showers, unpacking, organizing, and all that fun stuff, most of us finally hit the sack about 1:30 in the morning. Well, we've got some early risers in our group, so everyone was up by 7:30 at the latest. Woo hoo!

So we all get up, get decent, and head out to the French Quarter for some grub. We go to this place called Cafe Du Monte, which has the best things in the world - beignets. I haven't had them before, but they're a little like Indian fry bread, only smaller and much better. So we all loaded up on sugar then walked around bit. Best part was that there was about an entire box of powdered sugar on every single plate, and somehow Tom ended up with about half of that on the back of his slacks. It was great. On the way out, we met this balloon guy who was telling all these random bible jokes. For example, where do you find the bible in baseball? The beginning (the big inning....ha ha. Come on, you know it was funny!)!!! He made rings for me and Jenn, proposed to Jenn, and when Tessa asked if she could go to the wedding, she was told, "Honey, you ARE the wedding." Quite hilarious.

After walking around for about an hour, we head back towards the car and stop at the Mississippi River for a minute to take some photos and admire the beauty. 'Cause it was gorgeous. So we all load back up into the cars and head back to church. We hung out for a bit before we headed into the sanctuary, and experienced a wonderful service. The church was upbeat and inspiring, the testament and gospel verses informational, and as it always is with Pastor Eunice, a lovely sermon about "dry bones" and how we all need to do our part. Following church the congregation had prepared an absolutely WONDERFUL meal for all of us with a variety of food ranging from shephard's pie (the best I have EVER had), fried chicken, baked chicken, barbeque chicken, green beans, potato salad, spaghettii, fruit, lemon pound cake, dirty rice, and hawaiian punch to top it all off! After that we all headed back to the Volunteer Center right next to the church and began various activities. Some people colored and drew a lovely picture of the work we will be doing this week (thanks, Jenn and Rob!), we argued over what is good music and what isn't, some did homework, and just chilled for a good four hours. It was amazing.

Then the time came for all of us to head to Wal-Mart to get some food for the week and to get anything any of us forgot back home. After a few photo ops (I need the pictures, Tess!), quite a bit of junk food, and not as many snacks as we need, we finish up. I get suckered into buying candy for a fundraiser and hand it out to the group. We head out and try to find Chris' friends from ECU, only to give up and head back to the church. We did some more computer/music debating, ate an awesome dinner of chicken enchiladas and salad (thanks, Kevin!), then played a few rounds of Catch Phrase.

Day one has been an absolute BLAST, and I cannot wait for the real work and commitment to start! We've seen some of the photos and destruction from Katrina, but it still hasn't quite sunk in with me the severity of the devastation, and while to say I'm looking forward to experiencing that is the wrong choice of words, I am anxious for the experience so that I personally have a better understanding and empathetic view of what all these people went through. So here's to a fabulous first day and an even more wonderful, enlightening, inspiring four more days!

written by

Joyce on March 9, 2008 from New Orleans, United States

from the travel blog: New Orleans Mission Trip

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