Life of Recent

Well it's been a while since I've done anyhting on the website, so here's an update. Winter quarter flew by and before I knew it it was finals week. I can only imagine how fast spring quarter will go. Finals week was interesting because I had 4 finals over about 36 hours. And me being the ambitious person I am, made a schedule of things to study for the 7 days leading up to the exams. But then the much bigger procrastinator in me came out and I never looked at the schedule or bothered to start studying until the day before my exams! What makes it worse is that I didn't let myself embrace the procrastinator in me so I would tell myself 'okay, just 3 more games [on my xbox] and then I need to start studying'. So instead of spending a couple of days relaxing and intentionally not studying, I spent them in constant limbo between all sorts of little fun things and studying. But it all worked out and I did fine on my finals.
I got a good night of sleep after finals were done and then the next day I packed up my car along with 4 other Ohio State Campus Crusaders and I drove from 10:30 pm - 8:30 am to go to New Orleans for a Campus Crusade for Christ spring break trip. My friend Kyle Davis finished driving and we arrived at our camp in the Ninth Ward of New Orleans at noon. The camp was a warehouse that had cots setup for about a thousand students. We had tent showers, port-a-potties and relief food as ammentities. Monday - Thrursday we drove to assigned houses in New Orleans and worked in a team of about 9 men and women to gut the house. This usually consisted of tearing down all the interior walls and sometimes the ceilling as well. Oh and while we were working we wore respirators and when necessary eye protection. I couldn't believe the scale of devastation that was down there. And even more shocking is how little of the city, outside of the downtown area, has been untouched almost 7 months after the disaster happened. I made an album of pictures taken during the trip here from my friend's digital camera. Here's a day-by-day breakdown for those who want more info:
Day 1) We unloaded the car and then I headed off with another group to help our another camp like ours. We helped pick up trash, serve dinner, move hundreds of unused cots and chairs, among other things. That was about it for work, the rest of the night was spent hanging out with the Ohio State crew.
Day 2) I went along with a group of students from Taylor Tower and other Ohio Staters to church Sunday morning, which turned out to a Methodist church. It was an honor to be there and witness a community of believers trusting the Lord after a catastrophe. Afterwards some us went to downtown New Orleans to sightsee because we were not going to begin working until Monday. We ate on Bourbon Street and met this guy who tied balloons in the streets while he evangelized. He was a cool guy. Oh, and I feel I should mention that the group I was with was 13 Ohio State women. I didn't see it coming, but somebody has do it. And as always, we returned to the camp for the night to spend with the rest of the Ohio State crew.
Day 3) Our first day of actual work on houses. The house my team got had a flood line across it that was about a foot or so from the ceiling. I am not sure if the owners took all their stuff before or after the flood but there was nothing in it except an aquarium and a dish washer (no refrigerator or kitchen sink). In the backyard a giant 60 foot tree had been uprooted, either by the hurricane or flood. There was even flood water in between the two glass panes of the windows.
Day 4) On Tuesday we worked to finish the house by removing the bathroom sink and tub and pulling the nails from the wall studs. When we finished removing all the molded parts of the house all that was left was the exterior walls, the interior wall studs, most of the ceiling, the floor and the toilet.While we were working this man who had lived across the street would come over and talk to us. He had lived in New Orleans his whole life, had lived in that house across the street for 50 some years and was 72 years old if I'm not mistaken. Everytime we talked he would try to give us directions to this place that made "the best roast beef sandwiches in town." The directions went something like "take a right at the end of this street, you will come to city park, turn left when you get through it, go down to the bayou and turn right, follow the bayou and it will be behind a funeral home." We decided after finishing the house at lunch time on Tuesday that we had to try to find the place because this man had raved about it so much. Needless to say we made a lot of u-turns and asked for directions a couple of times along the way, but we found it. It was a great little restaurant and the roast beef sandwich was amazing. The second half of that day we helped out another team who had been assigned a nightmare of a house. It was twice the size of ours, had 4 feet of junk and mud throughout the house and had a backyard and gargage full of junk too. We ended up having a crew of guys put on Tyvek suits to protect us while we removed the wet fiberglass insulation. I believe the team we assisted finished the house by lunch the next day.
Day 5) On Wednesday we were assigned this house that was really nice, much nicer than either of the other 2 houses I had been in. It had nice kitchen cabinets, a nice plaster finish on all of its walls and all of its exterior walls were brick. We removed the kitchen cabinets, kitchen counter, sink and dishwasher and took out a few plaster walls up to a about a foot above the water line, which was about 6 feet from the floor. We finished the house in half a day. We went back to camp and got lunch, which ended up being some kond of rice and Chip Ahoy cookies. We got our final assignment, which ended up being an apartment building with 3 or 4 apartments. The second half of Wednesday we spent tearing down walls. Kyle Davis and I put on Tyvek suits and worked on getting insulation out of the exterior walls and the ceiling.
For dinner we took one bite and decided to eat out. It was white rice served on a hot dog bun. We had been driving past a Church's Chicken to and from our work sites so a group of guys loaded up in my car and we drove out there. It turned out that at around 6 o'clock they were closed. Apparently it is too hard to find workers in the 9th Ward to keep the place open through dinner. So we continued driving down the street and found a Rallies. We got in line at the front of the restaraunt and 50 minutes later got our food. It was definitely better than the volunteer food.
Day 6) On Thursday we got 2 other teams to help us out (a total of 27 people) and we finished the apartment building in a little over half a day. It's amazing what a small army of Buckeyes can do in half a day, whether it'spulverizing some Wolverines or demolishing an apartment building. I had a Tyvek suit on for almost the whole time that day to get the rest of the insulation out. We had a formidable pile of debris on the street when we finished.
Afterwards we showered, and went to downtown New Orleans for some hang out time and dinner. CNN ended up being at the camp when we got back and Anderson Cooper reported live from our camp for his show (he made a blog entry himself about us here entitled "Trading Beer Bongs for Sledgehammers").
Day 7) We left Friday at about 8:30 am and arrived back in Columbus at 11:30 pm to snow! What a bad welcoming back from a spring break trip. Ohio weather gets crazier every year.

I have to say that everytime I spend part of an academic break with Crusade I always get that feeling at the end that many of us have had after a youth convention or retreat where you wish that you could spend your life in a setting like this, living with your Christian friends. I can't believe all the amazing opputunuties Campus Crusade for Christ has provided me with to give my time and effort to the Lord, and the amazing community that I get to experience through it. I know that Crusade has impacted my life in more ways than I am even aware of. It has definitely shown me what an awesome blessing it is to live with others who want nothing but seek and bring glorify to the Lord.