Lift my hands and spin around, see the light that I have found..
My dead heart is now beating, my deepest stains now clean...from the grave you've risen, victoriously...Into marvelous light I am running, out of darkness, out of shame, by the cross, You are the truth, you are the light, you are the way...(from MarvelousLight by CharlieHall)
There are two separate world in New Orleans: One looked as if there were nothing happened. The other seemed like the flood was just dried out...
There are two separate world in New Orleans: One looked as if there were nothing happened. The other seemed like the flood was just dried out...
Myrtle Street, Metairie, downtown New Orleans
Right off of the I-10 East highway, a couple of blocks from Canal Street, the street were dead. Houses are empty, although sometimes there are RVs or mobile homes sitting on the front yard. Usually you'll see a mark of cross with signs on the wall near the doors, symbolizing the signs that the house had been searched, for how many human bodies found or animals found in the house after the flood. Last week was twenty months after the flood. TWENTY MONTHS. And the house we worked on hasn't been touched. Literally.
Almost similar scene we found around the levy, the Lower Ninth Ward and Upper Ninth Ward. The remain was one tree lined street. Sometimes we saw steps without a house, where there should be a house. Sometimes we saw a house, leaning forty five degrees toward the earth. One other time we saw a house, standing still, with a Do-Not-Demolish sign on it. And if there was a house, there would be a sign of rescue team leaving marks on the door informing if they found bodies or pets.
Bourbon Street, French Quarter, downtown New Orleans...
Three blocks from the river walk. Blazing music, people walking around with cups on hands. Possibly liquor, or beer. Laughing. Having fun. TWENTY MONTHS after the storm. There was no sign of after flood. All businesses had came back. Mother's, one of the most famous restaurants next to the Quarter had lines out to the front door.
I had a great time working in New Orleans, gutting houses with the people from MercyResponse.com. For one time in my life I had a blast on doing work for my love for God with the right motivation of just that, because I love God and God asked me to love my neighbors. But it doesn't mean that things didn't make me angry. The trip was not about me and about what I felt, but about God and how God could use my time to glorify his name. But my brain hasn't stopped processing the overwhelming sense of inequalities I breathed in New Orleans..
The poor was always the ones left behind. Although the flood affected all neighborhoods located under the water regardless of income (obviously), still, those who had more resources and access to resources such as flood insurance were able to recover sooner than those who were unfortunate. The first homeowner we worked with was an 81 year old lady whom we didn't see. We only saw her pastor prior to when we started working. We never knew if the lady would came back to the house, but what we did was the next step before she could even talk to the city to either demolish the house or to rehab it. One of our team members talked to a neighbor who had came back from Tennessee after a year because she was told that she could get grant money to repair her house. The one condition to receive the grant is to stay in the house for three years. She is now back to her damaged home but she can't cash the check because of red tape problems (The federal government had dedicated $10 million community block grant for the recovery effot, but red tape gets in the way for the money to get to residents). How could such thing happen to the world most organize/advance country? Is it because she was poor that she had less access to resources and had to wait until who-knows-when? Meanwhile, people (those planners!!) were talking about how New Orleans had such a potential to become a sustainable city. How could a place be sustainable without the people?? What is a city without its people?? What they need is a decent, livable house for the moment, while they are recovering from the lost, of memories, life, family members, friends, place, and everything else that was washed away from the flood.
In some ways I could understand how visionaries (like planners) would see this as an opportunity to rebuild the city as a better community, but...sometimes, we need to remember what's real and what's not. what's urgent and what can be done later...
A sense of hope came when some of us talked to a neighbor, who is a renter for the house across the street. He is an immigrant who was originally from Honduras. He said he made about $200 a day with his friends, just picking up appliances and metals from junk people thrown away everyday. The city hired contractors to pick up debris and dumps from houses that are gutted. Every contractor has their own district that they're in charge with. They responded very quickly. I felt that God is recycling the entire city. With the amount of despair in the air, there are hope where people from all over the country came down and helped. Anyone could help if you can breath. When the entire city is damaged, there was no neighbor left to cry to help to..
The second house we worked on was on South St Patrick, off of Canal Street, Metairie neighborhood. We sense that people were glad to see us. We had to wait for the homeowner because she was stuck in traffic, so we played softball with ball made of duck-tape and shovel as bat until someone gave us a real ball and a bat. Raffiel, a boy from the neighborhood saw us and joined with us to play. When the owner arrived, she told us that no one had played in the ball field since the storm.
A fire truck came by to check hydrants around us, and the chief came and talked to us while we were taking a break. He thanked us for coming, chatted with us and told us all about what happened after the flood. He lived in the suburb where the ground was higher that the damaged in his house was nothing compared to what this neighborhood had. I grasped more hope than despair after talking to the people. It is amazing how we "boxed" God into our own tiny brain that couldn't even comprehend the power that He has to move around suffering into joy, despair into hope, dark into light. God will use every flaw on earth and turn it around for his glory. I was coming back into my thoughts of how human being has a privilege to make a choice whether to bring hell or heaven on earth. We have the freedom to just choose and be God's hands and feet to make heaven happen on earth.
Right off of the I-10 East highway, a couple of blocks from Canal Street, the street were dead. Houses are empty, although sometimes there are RVs or mobile homes sitting on the front yard. Usually you'll see a mark of cross with signs on the wall near the doors, symbolizing the signs that the house had been searched, for how many human bodies found or animals found in the house after the flood. Last week was twenty months after the flood. TWENTY MONTHS. And the house we worked on hasn't been touched. Literally.
Almost similar scene we found around the levy, the Lower Ninth Ward and Upper Ninth Ward. The remain was one tree lined street. Sometimes we saw steps without a house, where there should be a house. Sometimes we saw a house, leaning forty five degrees toward the earth. One other time we saw a house, standing still, with a Do-Not-Demolish sign on it. And if there was a house, there would be a sign of rescue team leaving marks on the door informing if they found bodies or pets.
Bourbon Street, French Quarter, downtown New Orleans...
Three blocks from the river walk. Blazing music, people walking around with cups on hands. Possibly liquor, or beer. Laughing. Having fun. TWENTY MONTHS after the storm. There was no sign of after flood. All businesses had came back. Mother's, one of the most famous restaurants next to the Quarter had lines out to the front door.
I had a great time working in New Orleans, gutting houses with the people from MercyResponse.com. For one time in my life I had a blast on doing work for my love for God with the right motivation of just that, because I love God and God asked me to love my neighbors. But it doesn't mean that things didn't make me angry. The trip was not about me and about what I felt, but about God and how God could use my time to glorify his name. But my brain hasn't stopped processing the overwhelming sense of inequalities I breathed in New Orleans..
The poor was always the ones left behind. Although the flood affected all neighborhoods located under the water regardless of income (obviously), still, those who had more resources and access to resources such as flood insurance were able to recover sooner than those who were unfortunate. The first homeowner we worked with was an 81 year old lady whom we didn't see. We only saw her pastor prior to when we started working. We never knew if the lady would came back to the house, but what we did was the next step before she could even talk to the city to either demolish the house or to rehab it. One of our team members talked to a neighbor who had came back from Tennessee after a year because she was told that she could get grant money to repair her house. The one condition to receive the grant is to stay in the house for three years. She is now back to her damaged home but she can't cash the check because of red tape problems (The federal government had dedicated $10 million community block grant for the recovery effot, but red tape gets in the way for the money to get to residents). How could such thing happen to the world most organize/advance country? Is it because she was poor that she had less access to resources and had to wait until who-knows-when? Meanwhile, people (those planners!!) were talking about how New Orleans had such a potential to become a sustainable city. How could a place be sustainable without the people?? What is a city without its people?? What they need is a decent, livable house for the moment, while they are recovering from the lost, of memories, life, family members, friends, place, and everything else that was washed away from the flood.
In some ways I could understand how visionaries (like planners) would see this as an opportunity to rebuild the city as a better community, but...sometimes, we need to remember what's real and what's not. what's urgent and what can be done later...
A sense of hope came when some of us talked to a neighbor, who is a renter for the house across the street. He is an immigrant who was originally from Honduras. He said he made about $200 a day with his friends, just picking up appliances and metals from junk people thrown away everyday. The city hired contractors to pick up debris and dumps from houses that are gutted. Every contractor has their own district that they're in charge with. They responded very quickly. I felt that God is recycling the entire city. With the amount of despair in the air, there are hope where people from all over the country came down and helped. Anyone could help if you can breath. When the entire city is damaged, there was no neighbor left to cry to help to..
The second house we worked on was on South St Patrick, off of Canal Street, Metairie neighborhood. We sense that people were glad to see us. We had to wait for the homeowner because she was stuck in traffic, so we played softball with ball made of duck-tape and shovel as bat until someone gave us a real ball and a bat. Raffiel, a boy from the neighborhood saw us and joined with us to play. When the owner arrived, she told us that no one had played in the ball field since the storm.
A fire truck came by to check hydrants around us, and the chief came and talked to us while we were taking a break. He thanked us for coming, chatted with us and told us all about what happened after the flood. He lived in the suburb where the ground was higher that the damaged in his house was nothing compared to what this neighborhood had. I grasped more hope than despair after talking to the people. It is amazing how we "boxed" God into our own tiny brain that couldn't even comprehend the power that He has to move around suffering into joy, despair into hope, dark into light. God will use every flaw on earth and turn it around for his glory. I was coming back into my thoughts of how human being has a privilege to make a choice whether to bring hell or heaven on earth. We have the freedom to just choose and be God's hands and feet to make heaven happen on earth.
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