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hansgrego
Tuesday, July 12, 2016
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Saturday, Sunday etc.
I will post The last 3 or 4 days of the trip later on this weekend or next week. We are getting ready to leave today (Thursday) for a family trip, We basically came home washed cloths and packed em again, so we can leave this afternoon.
We will have the Youth Service outside on the Patio behind the church on Sunday August 9th at 9:30. I think there is a pot-luck to follow, but I'm not positive of that.
Also the Stock-holders dinner will be Friday August 21st at 6:30.
Hors Devours at 5:30.
Slide Show and stories at 7:30.
We will have the Youth Service outside on the Patio behind the church on Sunday August 9th at 9:30. I think there is a pot-luck to follow, but I'm not positive of that.
Also the Stock-holders dinner will be Friday August 21st at 6:30.
Hors Devours at 5:30.
Slide Show and stories at 7:30.
Loading the bus (counting off)
Loading the bus (counting off)
Traveling with a group of 60 comprised of mainly teenagers can be a bit challenging. At any stop, it takes a long time to get them all back on the bus. If there is junk food available, they all need to get a candy bar, or the giant bottle of Mountain Dew. We’ve found that we even need to remind them to go to the bathroom. At almost every stop, 1 hour after we are on the road someone comes up and says when will we be at the next rest room. When I ask if they went when we stopped, they say “well I didn’t have to go then”.
One thing we do on bus trips is give everyone a bus number. You count off every time we have everyone on the bus to make sure no one is missing. Your number is the same throughout the trip. You’d think that after everyone gets the hang of it, it would take a minute or so to count off. It usually took 5 minutes to get through 60 numbers. It did get faster, because the kids that never seemed to remember their number would be reminded by those that were next to them in numerical order. It is a good system, because we don’t have to count heads, or ask if anyone is missing. It did work, because at one stop we would have left one of the kids in the bathroom, but his number didn’t come up, so we knew we needed to wait. So if you are in casual conversation with someone and your child is within ear-shot, and you happen to say the number that comes before your child’s bus number they just my shout their number out, because that’s what they were conditioned to do.
Traveling with a group of 60 comprised of mainly teenagers can be a bit challenging. At any stop, it takes a long time to get them all back on the bus. If there is junk food available, they all need to get a candy bar, or the giant bottle of Mountain Dew. We’ve found that we even need to remind them to go to the bathroom. At almost every stop, 1 hour after we are on the road someone comes up and says when will we be at the next rest room. When I ask if they went when we stopped, they say “well I didn’t have to go then”.
One thing we do on bus trips is give everyone a bus number. You count off every time we have everyone on the bus to make sure no one is missing. Your number is the same throughout the trip. You’d think that after everyone gets the hang of it, it would take a minute or so to count off. It usually took 5 minutes to get through 60 numbers. It did get faster, because the kids that never seemed to remember their number would be reminded by those that were next to them in numerical order. It is a good system, because we don’t have to count heads, or ask if anyone is missing. It did work, because at one stop we would have left one of the kids in the bathroom, but his number didn’t come up, so we knew we needed to wait. So if you are in casual conversation with someone and your child is within ear-shot, and you happen to say the number that comes before your child’s bus number they just my shout their number out, because that’s what they were conditioned to do.
Friday July 24th
Sleep in day! It was great for everyone to sleep in till 8:30 or so. Everyone needed it. Today we went to the learning center. The learning center has activities and projects designed to look at Faith an Service from a different perspective. Many of the activities were geared at showing the kids how one person could make big changes in the world, How they can make a difference. After the learning center, we decided to take the trolley on a sight seeing tour of the garden district of New Orleans. No one we talked to knew anything about the trolley. Could we buy passes somewhere? Do you have to have exact change? So many people had no clue, or gave us wrong information. Sheri finally found a person that knew that we could buy 22 tickets at once, and didn’t need to have $22 in Quarters for the $2.50 fair. We got to a stop, and waited for a trolley. Most o the times we waited for one they passed our stop by, because they were too full to take us. We saw one coming and as it stopped for us decided that we should walk to the next stop, so we wouldn’t miss and of the city on the tally route. While waiting at the next stop a local man drove up and told us thanks for being in he city, and informed us that we were at the wrong stop. The next trolley coming was packed and we wouldn’t get on. He told us to go back to the previous stop and wait there. He was right, and the next trolley came with enough room for us. It was a very hot wait, but finally out of the sun with a bit of a breeze, we felt a little cooler.
The garden district passed by many New Orleans mansions, that I would compare to Summit avenue in St. Paul. Once off the trolley we decided to walk to the dome for the evening mass gathering. On the way two of the girls informed us that their water bottles stunk, and they didn’t have any water with. They just waited till 4 o’clock in the afternoon, when they were next to heat exhaustion to tell us. Sheri and Cindy stopped at a grocery store while we walked to get a couple of gallons of water to replenish their bottles, and we were off to the dome.
As we waited at the front of the line in front of the only gate they let people in the night before, a police man told us that a gate around the building was open and we should go there. After 10 minutes or so of him yelling at us in a mega-phone, many from our group decided to do as he said and start that way. I noticed another man jumping up and checking the crowd, and he told the police man that they would indeed be opening the gate…too late we had to re-group behind 2 or 3 hundred that got in front of us when the change was made.
Friday Speakers
The speakers again were all young people that were meant to show the kids one person could make a difference. All of the speakers had very powerful messages, on a seemingly small idea that grew into a growing ministry. Spencer West is a man who had no legs from the waist down, and talked about how he fought with God’s calling until he realized that instead of trying to fit in, he could do work BECAUSE he was different. Michael Chikawonie was abducted as a 5 year old boy into the Siere Leone conflict. He was drugged, had to shoot his best friend, and later escaped. He ran for 2 or three days straight, to get away from the rebels. Back with his family he became an advocate for peace. A powerful testimony of Hope against very tough odds.
Friday Night Life
After our long hot day, most of us decided to go home early, and try and hit the pool. We had skipped supper so I ordered Pizza for the kids. It was expensive, but good. Some did a bit of shopping before they came back to the Hotel.
Along our walks back to the French Quarter, there are lots of street musicians. Most are better than any others I've heard (on the street or in a club). Electric guitar blues and vocals, 3 person accapella groups. Acoustic (amplified) guitars, Brass Bands, Sax players. I still havn't seen any Zydaco (spelling?). Zydaco is the cajun, accordian players.
Sleep in day! It was great for everyone to sleep in till 8:30 or so. Everyone needed it. Today we went to the learning center. The learning center has activities and projects designed to look at Faith an Service from a different perspective. Many of the activities were geared at showing the kids how one person could make big changes in the world, How they can make a difference. After the learning center, we decided to take the trolley on a sight seeing tour of the garden district of New Orleans. No one we talked to knew anything about the trolley. Could we buy passes somewhere? Do you have to have exact change? So many people had no clue, or gave us wrong information. Sheri finally found a person that knew that we could buy 22 tickets at once, and didn’t need to have $22 in Quarters for the $2.50 fair. We got to a stop, and waited for a trolley. Most o the times we waited for one they passed our stop by, because they were too full to take us. We saw one coming and as it stopped for us decided that we should walk to the next stop, so we wouldn’t miss and of the city on the tally route. While waiting at the next stop a local man drove up and told us thanks for being in he city, and informed us that we were at the wrong stop. The next trolley coming was packed and we wouldn’t get on. He told us to go back to the previous stop and wait there. He was right, and the next trolley came with enough room for us. It was a very hot wait, but finally out of the sun with a bit of a breeze, we felt a little cooler.
The garden district passed by many New Orleans mansions, that I would compare to Summit avenue in St. Paul. Once off the trolley we decided to walk to the dome for the evening mass gathering. On the way two of the girls informed us that their water bottles stunk, and they didn’t have any water with. They just waited till 4 o’clock in the afternoon, when they were next to heat exhaustion to tell us. Sheri and Cindy stopped at a grocery store while we walked to get a couple of gallons of water to replenish their bottles, and we were off to the dome.
As we waited at the front of the line in front of the only gate they let people in the night before, a police man told us that a gate around the building was open and we should go there. After 10 minutes or so of him yelling at us in a mega-phone, many from our group decided to do as he said and start that way. I noticed another man jumping up and checking the crowd, and he told the police man that they would indeed be opening the gate…too late we had to re-group behind 2 or 3 hundred that got in front of us when the change was made.
Friday Speakers
The speakers again were all young people that were meant to show the kids one person could make a difference. All of the speakers had very powerful messages, on a seemingly small idea that grew into a growing ministry. Spencer West is a man who had no legs from the waist down, and talked about how he fought with God’s calling until he realized that instead of trying to fit in, he could do work BECAUSE he was different. Michael Chikawonie was abducted as a 5 year old boy into the Siere Leone conflict. He was drugged, had to shoot his best friend, and later escaped. He ran for 2 or three days straight, to get away from the rebels. Back with his family he became an advocate for peace. A powerful testimony of Hope against very tough odds.
Friday Night Life
After our long hot day, most of us decided to go home early, and try and hit the pool. We had skipped supper so I ordered Pizza for the kids. It was expensive, but good. Some did a bit of shopping before they came back to the Hotel.
Along our walks back to the French Quarter, there are lots of street musicians. Most are better than any others I've heard (on the street or in a club). Electric guitar blues and vocals, 3 person accapella groups. Acoustic (amplified) guitars, Brass Bands, Sax players. I still havn't seen any Zydaco (spelling?). Zydaco is the cajun, accordian players.
Thursday Work Project The Ladybug Lady (Cindy)
Thursday Work Project The Ladybug Lady
We never got her name, but the Ladybug Lady came out of her shop offering the kids candy from the pink plastic basket she was carrying. The Ladybug Gift Shop was in a small strip mall in St. Bernard’s Parish where we were busy picking up litter in the hot sun. There was an apparently closed up gun shop next door and we had found handfuls of empty gun shell casings on the boulevard. I had been wondering about the neighborhood we were cleaning.
The Ladybug Lady thanked us over and over, saying that they appreciated all the volunteers more than they could say. She started her story with “before the storm.” She told us that St. Bernard’s had been like a big family. It took you 2 hours to get milk at the store because you ran into so many people to talk to. Many families had lived there for generations and everyone knew each other. “After the storm” many families left, because they were not able to rebuild in the Parish. “Before the storm” the Ladybug Lady and her husband lived in the 3000 sq. ft. home where they had raised their children. When the levee broke with Hurricane Katrina, their house was flooded by 8 feet of water. When Hurricane Rita hit just a few weeks later, they were left with 13 feet of water in their home.
They spent the first months after the storm in a FEMA trailer. She said they would go back to the house and look, but couldn’t seem to do anything when they were there. She said it wasn’t until the volunteers came and started working that she realized they had been so depressed that they couldn’t get started. She said that all she could do was to cook big pots of food in that little trailer to feed the volunteers. She tearfully told me how they had helped her literally sift through the remains of her home looking for anything valuable or sentimental that could be salvaged.
We mentioned all the shell casings we had picked up and she told us that “things happened” after the storm. They had friends who were firefighters, EMTs and police officers. She said they had stacked up wrecked cars to make a wall between St. Bernard’s Parish and the hard hit 9th Ward, but that there was still a lot of looting. She told us that their friends still would not talk about the things they had to do after the storm. Many chose to find a new line of work after the storm.
We asked about the spray painted markings we saw on so many damaged homes. The Ladybug Lady explained that the National Guard went through every home. They made coded marks to tell officials which Guard group had checked the homes. They spray painted numbers representing the numbers of bodies, of both people and pets, found in the homes. She said her daughter has tried everything, but couldn’t remove the spray paint from the brick on her home. She has decided to keep it “as a souvenir.”
The Ladybug Lady and her husband are still not back in their home. They are living with one of their sons and his family. Their house has just gotten running water and a bathroom that works and they hope to get back in it soon, even though there are still no walls. She said her husband is looking forward to two things: sleeping in his own bed and being able to change channels on the TV remote without asking anyone else.
The Ladybug Lady came offering much more than candy to share. She shared part of herself and her story with us.
We never got her name, but the Ladybug Lady came out of her shop offering the kids candy from the pink plastic basket she was carrying. The Ladybug Gift Shop was in a small strip mall in St. Bernard’s Parish where we were busy picking up litter in the hot sun. There was an apparently closed up gun shop next door and we had found handfuls of empty gun shell casings on the boulevard. I had been wondering about the neighborhood we were cleaning.
The Ladybug Lady thanked us over and over, saying that they appreciated all the volunteers more than they could say. She started her story with “before the storm.” She told us that St. Bernard’s had been like a big family. It took you 2 hours to get milk at the store because you ran into so many people to talk to. Many families had lived there for generations and everyone knew each other. “After the storm” many families left, because they were not able to rebuild in the Parish. “Before the storm” the Ladybug Lady and her husband lived in the 3000 sq. ft. home where they had raised their children. When the levee broke with Hurricane Katrina, their house was flooded by 8 feet of water. When Hurricane Rita hit just a few weeks later, they were left with 13 feet of water in their home.
They spent the first months after the storm in a FEMA trailer. She said they would go back to the house and look, but couldn’t seem to do anything when they were there. She said it wasn’t until the volunteers came and started working that she realized they had been so depressed that they couldn’t get started. She said that all she could do was to cook big pots of food in that little trailer to feed the volunteers. She tearfully told me how they had helped her literally sift through the remains of her home looking for anything valuable or sentimental that could be salvaged.
We mentioned all the shell casings we had picked up and she told us that “things happened” after the storm. They had friends who were firefighters, EMTs and police officers. She said they had stacked up wrecked cars to make a wall between St. Bernard’s Parish and the hard hit 9th Ward, but that there was still a lot of looting. She told us that their friends still would not talk about the things they had to do after the storm. Many chose to find a new line of work after the storm.
We asked about the spray painted markings we saw on so many damaged homes. The Ladybug Lady explained that the National Guard went through every home. They made coded marks to tell officials which Guard group had checked the homes. They spray painted numbers representing the numbers of bodies, of both people and pets, found in the homes. She said her daughter has tried everything, but couldn’t remove the spray paint from the brick on her home. She has decided to keep it “as a souvenir.”
The Ladybug Lady and her husband are still not back in their home. They are living with one of their sons and his family. Their house has just gotten running water and a bathroom that works and they hope to get back in it soon, even though there are still no walls. She said her husband is looking forward to two things: sleeping in his own bed and being able to change channels on the TV remote without asking anyone else.
The Ladybug Lady came offering much more than candy to share. She shared part of herself and her story with us.
Thursday July 23rd (New Orleans)
Thursday July 23rd
We struggled to get up at 6 am. We had to walk to the dome a mile?? away to get on a bus for our work project. One or two people could walk the distance in 25 minutes, but with 22 people we left the hotel at 7 am to get there by 7:45. As we walked, we noticed people walking toward a pick-up point near our hotel and I wondered if The Gathering hotel people had talked to the people scheduling work projects.
Walking with the kids and keeping them together, I compare to herding cats. We walked for a while and had to stop and wait for the dawdlers to catch up. Sheri realized that the gloves for the work project (and all our cash) was left back at the hotel, so she and I ran back to the hotel to get them while the others went on. While I waited for Sheri, I talked to the doorman. It was the first of many encounters we would have with the New Orleans residents. He told me how he was happy we were in the city helping out. I was going to call and check on Sheri’s progress finding the gloves and mumbled, I had better not call…..that will just create problems. He said “how long you been married? must be a long time to know her that well.” We talked about how important it was to work hard on marriage and it takes a lot of work. I thought it was interesting that he was happy that we came to New Orleans even though the tips for him this week would be much less than when a normal clientele would be at the hotel. Sheri and I decided to take a cab so we could catch up to the group instead of running to try to catch up. We found the gloves caught a taxi, and boarded the bus at 7:45. It took a while to get going and once we got to the staging area in St. Bernard Parish, The Gathering person informed us she had no idea what we were going to do, and that the people in charge were not there yet. So we “hurry up and waited” until 9:30 when they decided we could pick up trash.
I wanted to do some “substantial” work like build homes, etc, so I was grumbling at first about it. Nick said, “This is a job no one wants to do and we are able, so it needs to be done and it’s a good moral booster for the residents. We spread out on a relatively busy street to go to work. We had a wheelbarrow full of water follow us to replenish our water bottles. Many people would drive by and wave, honk their horns, say thank you and give us the thumbs up. Three or four people stopped to thank us personally for our work. Two of them came and gave us ice cream, popsicles, and cold water to drink. It was obvious they genuinely appreciated our help. At the end of the day as we waited for the bus to pick us up by a snow cone stand, I ordered snow cones to let the kids share. I noticed that they were living in the stand and I wondered about their Katrina story. The lady did not speak very good English, so I didn’t attempt to talk to her much.
It was a hard day picking up trash, but we could really tell we did make a positive impact on the community. We were dreading the 45-minute walk to the hotel and Sheri was talking to the driver and talked him into dropping us near the hotel, so our 45-minute walk turned into a 10-minute walk. We decided to go late to the Superdome and not sit on the floor, so we could have more time to relax.
Thursday Speakers
Thursday speakers were Jay Baker, son of Tammy Faye who talked to the kids about God’s grace. Viola Vaughn who started an education program for girls called 10,000 Girls, completely self-funded and run by kids. She commented that she is still the only adult. Becca Stevens started a ministry for women on the streets, called Women of Thistle Farms. All the speakers started with an idea that blossomed into a growing ministry. What struck me is that Viola wasn’t really interested in starting a ministry. God kept calling her further and further into ministry. All God inspired projects that were meant to enlighten the kids that one person can make a big difference in the lives of others.
Thursday Night Life
Thursday after The Gathering, we decided to check out some of the planned evening activities at the Sheraton. People were elbow to elbow and it took 10 minutes to get into the door to meet. We sent the kids off and waited. For the second time, someone decided I looked hungry and gave us a whole pizza. It ended up being a mistake for the kids because there were so many people, they couldn’t do anything
We struggled to get up at 6 am. We had to walk to the dome a mile?? away to get on a bus for our work project. One or two people could walk the distance in 25 minutes, but with 22 people we left the hotel at 7 am to get there by 7:45. As we walked, we noticed people walking toward a pick-up point near our hotel and I wondered if The Gathering hotel people had talked to the people scheduling work projects.
Walking with the kids and keeping them together, I compare to herding cats. We walked for a while and had to stop and wait for the dawdlers to catch up. Sheri realized that the gloves for the work project (and all our cash) was left back at the hotel, so she and I ran back to the hotel to get them while the others went on. While I waited for Sheri, I talked to the doorman. It was the first of many encounters we would have with the New Orleans residents. He told me how he was happy we were in the city helping out. I was going to call and check on Sheri’s progress finding the gloves and mumbled, I had better not call…..that will just create problems. He said “how long you been married? must be a long time to know her that well.” We talked about how important it was to work hard on marriage and it takes a lot of work. I thought it was interesting that he was happy that we came to New Orleans even though the tips for him this week would be much less than when a normal clientele would be at the hotel. Sheri and I decided to take a cab so we could catch up to the group instead of running to try to catch up. We found the gloves caught a taxi, and boarded the bus at 7:45. It took a while to get going and once we got to the staging area in St. Bernard Parish, The Gathering person informed us she had no idea what we were going to do, and that the people in charge were not there yet. So we “hurry up and waited” until 9:30 when they decided we could pick up trash.
I wanted to do some “substantial” work like build homes, etc, so I was grumbling at first about it. Nick said, “This is a job no one wants to do and we are able, so it needs to be done and it’s a good moral booster for the residents. We spread out on a relatively busy street to go to work. We had a wheelbarrow full of water follow us to replenish our water bottles. Many people would drive by and wave, honk their horns, say thank you and give us the thumbs up. Three or four people stopped to thank us personally for our work. Two of them came and gave us ice cream, popsicles, and cold water to drink. It was obvious they genuinely appreciated our help. At the end of the day as we waited for the bus to pick us up by a snow cone stand, I ordered snow cones to let the kids share. I noticed that they were living in the stand and I wondered about their Katrina story. The lady did not speak very good English, so I didn’t attempt to talk to her much.
It was a hard day picking up trash, but we could really tell we did make a positive impact on the community. We were dreading the 45-minute walk to the hotel and Sheri was talking to the driver and talked him into dropping us near the hotel, so our 45-minute walk turned into a 10-minute walk. We decided to go late to the Superdome and not sit on the floor, so we could have more time to relax.
Thursday Speakers
Thursday speakers were Jay Baker, son of Tammy Faye who talked to the kids about God’s grace. Viola Vaughn who started an education program for girls called 10,000 Girls, completely self-funded and run by kids. She commented that she is still the only adult. Becca Stevens started a ministry for women on the streets, called Women of Thistle Farms. All the speakers started with an idea that blossomed into a growing ministry. What struck me is that Viola wasn’t really interested in starting a ministry. God kept calling her further and further into ministry. All God inspired projects that were meant to enlighten the kids that one person can make a big difference in the lives of others.
Thursday Night Life
Thursday after The Gathering, we decided to check out some of the planned evening activities at the Sheraton. People were elbow to elbow and it took 10 minutes to get into the door to meet. We sent the kids off and waited. For the second time, someone decided I looked hungry and gave us a whole pizza. It ended up being a mistake for the kids because there were so many people, they couldn’t do anything
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Tuesday We're On our way Home!
We found Internet at a rest area in IOWA. we will be back in the cities sometime after 5. We will call when we are closer. We have several stories that will be posted in the next day or so. As well we will post some pictures. It's been an exhausting trip, but everyone is doing well.
The 3 churches got along just fine, and the kids are all excited to tell their stories...I'd just give them a day or so to get their energy back.
Greg.
P.S. the St. Mark Stock Holders meeting will be on Friday August 7th. With the Trip Service on the back patio on Sunday the 9th at 9:30.
The 3 churches got along just fine, and the kids are all excited to tell their stories...I'd just give them a day or so to get their energy back.
Greg.
P.S. the St. Mark Stock Holders meeting will be on Friday August 7th. With the Trip Service on the back patio on Sunday the 9th at 9:30.
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