Time to rest

This trip was so awesome! Our group had great 'group dynamics' and took care of everyone; they did refer to us as a 'family' in an earlier entry. Before leaving I thought the group was a little small, but I think in the end, this was a blessing. Our size allowed us to do things we would not have been able to do with a large group.

For example, on our drive toward Cape Girardeau Friday, we stopped for lunch at a State Park in Jackson, MS. We noticed a few children flying kites. Since the rain stopped some in our group from flying newly-bought kites on Wednesday afternoon, we pulled them out after lunch. It felt so good to simply relax, enjoy the sunshine and have the freedom to run around.

I have to admit, I'm not as young as I used to be... Though I've worked harder and longer days than we did this week, I'm out of practice. Plus I was staying up later, living in a new environment, and responsible for more lives than just my own. I felt fresh when we left St. Paul's Lutheran Friday morning, but by that evening I was grouchy. We made 'walking tacos' for dinner, I called home to check in with my family (who had a big day the next day, their annual cattle sale), and 3 of the students were not doing well either. We were all ready for some sleep.

To round out our experience, we drove through snow on Saturday. Yep, snow! We had hot weather, rainy weather, wind and now, snow! It began west of St. Louis. But one of our blessings this morning was, by chance, stopping at a gas station having a grand opening celebration! Many of us enjoyed free cappiccinos. We ended our journey together pulling into LSC's parking lot in Lincoln around 6:00pm.

Thank you to Daniel, Tyanne, Logan, Becky, Sarah and Tyler for making this week so memorable! Thanks to each of you for what you brought to the group, and for strengthening us! It would not have been the same without you. Finally, a great big 'THANK YOU' to supporters who made this trip possible: Fritz, Barb, Rev. Harold Hamilton, Thrivent Financial for Lutherans, Dorothy Christiansen and the home congregations of each student.

So dere's dis blog...

So here we are, back in Cape Girardeau at St. Mark's Lutheran Church on La Croix street or something ridiculous like that. Today, after leaving Mobile around 7:30 we hit the road and headed to Pass Christian Mississipi to survey some of the old damage. It's amazing. After a year and a half, it still looks like the hurricane hit only weeks ago in some places. Wireless poles remain stranded two hundred yards out in the gulf. The beaches are closed because the boardwalk is still in shambles and there's debris in the water. I'd hate to see the state of New Orleans.

This week's been a real eye opener for me. And I've started to realize more and more that being a Christian has nothing to do with telling other people how to live or even believing in the right things. It's loving people and helping the helpless. There are thousands of people along the coast who didn't have a way to bathe for months. I get grouchy if I don't get a shower every day. After the ice storm in early January, my family was without power for a week. The people down here were without power for a bit longer than that. Boo hoo, poor Becky. Being a Christian isn't about you. It's about other people and your relationship to them. We're all connected to each other through an infinite web. We all sleep under the same sky and the oceans all blend into each other.

This week I was forced to forget about my own stupid problems and help some other people deal with theirs. It feels kind of nice to forget about yourself. And I like to think that if I ever needed other people, they would help me out too. We don't have to sit around complaining about how the world is going bad. We can get off our butts and be the ones who prove the naysayers wrong. There is good left in the world, if we take the time to notice it. And kindness is just as contagious as laughter. And boy I can tell you after this week, laughter is pretty stinking contagious.

Welp, that's about all I got for now.
-Miss Becky-

p.s. Shout out to Burb! Hugs and love from Missouri!

Rain, rain go away

Yesterday the rain hit just as we were taking this picture, 2:00pm. It shortened our work day, but more importantly made our plans to swim less fun. We hurriedly laid the last 2 pieces of luan, screwed them down and cleaned up. Then, more prepared than Tuesday, we headed to the public beach on Dauphin Island. Sure it was raining, but wouldn't the Gulf be warmer? So we changed and headed down to the shore; Daniel decided to stay at the shelter and watch us. The rest of us approached and timidly entered. We shreiked a bit, but once were in up to our necks, we adjusted! We only stayed in for about 40 minutes before heading back to St. Paul's.

This morning (Thursday), we drove to meet Jerry at the LDR equipment headquarters. It was raining so we were doubtful we'd be tarping roofs on 3 different houses. While waiting for the LDR staff to find something for us, we toured Jerry's RV. Then, it was off to the Steele house in Irvington (between Mobile and Bayou La Batre). It took some time to get all the supplies to sand and paint their walls (with polyuerethane), but soon enough we had one team upstairs sanding bead board and one team downstairs painting.

It was so awesome to meet the family (we didn't get to meet Miss Fae at the other house). Miss Julie, who grew up in Omaha, homeschooled her four youngest while we worked. In the afternoon Mr. Tom came home to work on the house too; the kids also pitched right in! Mr. Tom teased us all about being from Nebraska and taught me some Southern manners (so I wouldn't teach his children bad examples... "It's 'yes sir'". Logan bonded with the oldest son thanks to World of Warcraft. And the three young girls bonded with Tyanne and Sarah, talking about boys and the like.

We said good-bye around 5:00 and headed back to shower. The evening ended at The Original Oyster House. We all tried new Southern foods like oysters on the half shell, crawfish, cheesy grits, etc. We had so much fun but ended with good-byes. We hung around to hug Jerry, then off to buy groceries for the return trip. Now I'm ready for bed...

God ROCKS!!!!

Just when you think you know what is going on, that is usually when you're the furthest from it. That was pretty much my story today as I continued my quest of framing windows. The first few were a bit troublesome as we (Becky and I) lacked what many might call beginners luck. All in all, the window frames started to look better with each passing cut until we finally reached the maximum point on our "awesome-perfect frame" scale. This window frame was without a doubt our BEST one thus far and we were untouchable from that point on with our deserved arrogant panache attitude. Then we hit a brick wall so to speak or, in our case, a steel one with little people laughing at us. After replacing 2 boards, 7 screws, 4 drill bits, 5 lollipops, our pride, 3 turtle doves and a partridge in a pear tree we lit the bat signal. To our surprise our friend Sarah responded to our distress call. With her help things seemed to go a smidgen better or at least resulted in the finalization of the frame.
Our reward was much like God's grace (thumbs up to God), but not quite as cool. WE WENT TO THE BEACH (ok...everyone went to the beach) and many magical things happened there, but I won't go into grave detail on how the water tasted and the way the sand and seashells made intricate designs with flickering sunlight that reflected off the water and......ok, ENOUGH WITH THE RUN ON SENTENCE AND GRAVE DETAIL (sigh). Anyway, we all had a stupendular time and had some unforgettable moments...today, with more to come.



Yay God,
Crunchbite...(Logan Maschmann)

Photos from first work day

Our First Day of Work!

Hello All!
Today was a fantastic day. It was our first day of work here in Alabama. After enjoying a homemade breakfast cooked by the boys we headed to Bayou La Batre for our work assignments. We piled in the now empty van and from Bayou La Batre headed to Dauphin Island to begin our work. We were assigned a home on Dauphin Island along with our now close friend Jerry (aka Kenny). We started our morning with a prayer and a few instructions, and then it was off to work! We were assigned two jobs while at this house. We needed to lay subflooring before the new floor is installed and we needed to frame the windows. Tyler was a lifesaver, if anyone had a qquestion we could count on him to help. He oversaw the flooring project while Jerry assisted with the framing project. Daniel and Crystal became pro's with a saw, and Tyanne and I are pretty amazing with a drill. We finished both bedrooms and began to prep the rest of the house. Becky and Logan helped Jerry frame the windows upstairs, which turned out to be a much more difficult project. From the laughter coming from the roof they did seem to be having fun.
After a long days work coming home to a genuine southern barbecue was wonderful. Pulled pork, baked beans, cole slaw, and some amazing homemade cookies made for an excellent supper. It was also nice to feel clean again! We have been playing cards all night with the other groups here, and there is a rumor we are going to watch Forrest Gump later. One thing I do know is that we will all sleep well tonight! I look forward to the rest of the week and will talk to you all soon!

Sarah Mellick
UNK

Ready, Set, ...

I was so thankful to get a solid night's sleep last night! But I laid down and my mind raced... I had forgetten to do my Lenten discipline (read the devo and my prayer list), I had forgotten to call Denise back, and did I need to lock the door to the church or was it locked already? I finally drifted off, but not before wondering, "What if my alarm doesn't go off?" I imagined someone coming in to wake me up, saying "Hey Crystal, it's nearly 7:00" (we planned to load the van at 7:00).

I awoke to a knock. It was Tyler. "Hey, are you up?" "No. What time is it?" "It's 6:50."

So today didn't start as planned, but I can't complain too much. Okay, I'd like to complain that I really wanted coffee and when we finally pulled over to gas up I bought a cheapie gas station cappiccino and spilled it all over myself. The day got better from there...

Some highlights from today, for me, were pulling over in Memphis at the city's visitor center (to use the bathrooms). We were informed that Graceland was just a mile up the road...why not? So we swung by and took some photos. Then for lunch, we had planned to stop at a rest area...but found it was CLOSED! So we looked on the map and found a state park 30 miles up the road. Though I was a tad lost finding the park grounds, the result was peaceful. And Daniel, who is an international student from Ghana shared, "I'm seeing a new part of this country. This landscape is much like Ghana." That was cool. Also, I'm so thankful Tyler offered to help with the driving responsibilities. He drove from Jackson to Mobile today. It was cool to hear his excitedment as we crossed the border into Alabama. "I've never driven on roads like this, with the land and trees like this."

And tonight we find ourselves, comfortably, in St. Paul's Lutheran Church in Mobile, AL. There are 2 other college groups here, one from Michigan Tech, the other from St. Louis. Plus there are other 'random' volunteers too. It's nice to meet others :) We just finished our orientation and learned a bit more about the population we'll serve this week (in Bayou La Batre, south from here). I think we're all in for a shock. As John said, most of us come from middle class backgrounds and this will be far from 'middle'. South of I-10 he said there are 3 main populations: African-American, caucasians and Asians. Within the Asian group there are Vietnamese, Burmese and Loatian. (I wish I would have known this; I could have listed my Thai language skills, though rusty. I learned last year that the Loatian language is VERY similar to Thai.)

While driving down today, I searched for visual signs of the hurricane. It was hard to tell what remained or was from other things. Since I came down over last year's spring break, to Ocean Springs, MS, I wondered what work remained. Surely volunteers have continued to help people. Perhaps it was the sheer number of people and their houses that was taking a long time. Tonight John shared some insight. The people living south of I-10 were fairly poor before hurricane Katrina, but the storm basically destroyed their livelihood - fishing. Boats went missing, processing plants were destroyed. The poor were deprived of their means of earning a living... What will we see tomorrow? Who will we help? I'm not sure. What cultural differences will we encounter? And how will the students respond? Living in Thailand, I have a good idea of how the average Southeast Asian family lives...will this translate exactly into America's South? Heck, will Loatians be much like Thais? I will do my best to be open to where and whom God sends us. May my eyes, ears and heart be open to listen and to love/serve unconditionally.

Stay tuned to learn who we do work with and what we're helping them with. Good night.