Tuscaloosa

Helloooooo! Sorry haven't posted in a while. I've been exhausted, one night I almost went to sleep at 8:45....thats too early...ANYWAY So. Left on a Sunday, got to Tuscaloosa on my birthday.  My birthday was alright, not what I'm used to.  We got into Tuscaloosa around 12:00, got to the church we are going to live in and it is amazing.  The area around us got hit pretty bad, but the church is still standing and doing amazing work to help the community.  The team decided to get right to work when we got here, so my birthday was spent helping others.  At night we had some dinner and then went out for frozen yogurt to celebrate.  Not how I would have spent it if I were home, but it's ok, there will be plenty more!

So we are staying at the Forest Lake Baptist Church in their basement area, which is really nice, there is a kitchen, game room (pool table ping pong etc that we can actually use), a couple of classrooms and a bathroom.  The people that take care of us here, Debbie and Kyle are an amazing couple, probably in their 60s I'd say? We.Are.Spoiled.  They provide us with all of our food, and cook dinner for us...they are amazing.  We have showers that are in a trailer, sounds trashy but they are soooo nice! air conditioned and everything.  There are people from a church in Texas that drove it up here and they stay and hand us towels and...get this...do our laundry! I feel so bad being as spoiled as we are, but I understand that these people just want us to be taken care of.  I couldn't ask for better facilities than what we have.  Although there is always a downside...so we aren't the only ones living here, last week there was a group of 9 living here that consisted of some teenagers, lets just say they weren't very wary of our being there.  They were loud in the morning and dirty, but we dealt with it.  There are also 2 big groups of around 20 that are staying elsewhere, but eat with us, so they show up at 7:30am all loud and everything because they are teenagers as well and then are here at lunch time being loud and dinner as well...but we only have to deal with it till Monday! Then after Monday it's all ours except the nice couple that is with the shower trailer!

Turns out we are here the rest of our project, so another 3 1/2 weeks, we leave on July 19th for Denver.  So the work we have been doing has been a lot of things.  I worked a lot the first week with the Salvation Army.  I worked in the distribution center where they provide families with essential needs (food, hygiene prodeucts, cleaning products etc) and I became sort of a go to person there and would train new volunteers coming in on how to fill carts, make food bags, how to arrange things etc.  It was nice to be relied on and trusted and kind of be in charge again, I've missed it.  I loved it there the people there are amazing.  I also worked one day at their Canteen where they provide the community with a meal.  Other days we have helped with debris removal, which consists of going to houses (which are mostly debris now) and helping to clear trees, debris etc.  A big part of what we are doing here is helping the city with assessments of the houses.  So we go around to houses with sheets that we need to provide information such as how many walls are standing, if there are trees laying on the houses, if there are trees or stumps left in the yards etc and we provide them with information on free debris removal.  The past 3 days I have been working here at the church where they have a relief center which is a lot like what I did at the Salvation Army. 

So I've gotten to interact with many many community members that have been affected.  It has been very emotional and intense since we've been here, but I think we are slowly getting used to handling these situations.  The people we help at the relief centers have been helped by FEMA and are so very grateful to us and the time we are giving to help them get what they need.  I can't even put into words how awful it feels to look around this city and see all the destruction.  You can be on one street where one house is completely gone, and across the street another house looks perfectly fine on the outside.  The tornado was a mile wide and went right through the city.  I don't know who knows or not but Tuscaloosa is the home of the University of Alabama which is HUGE on their college football around here.  Everyone is so proud of their state, their college and their city.  It's amazing to see the work that has been done in just 2 months time, but it is going to take a very long time to fully recover.

Intense stuff.

Sorry if I've blabbed on too much and have made no sense, but it's a lot to handle and hard to explain everything I'm feeling and doing.  We have been working 6 8 hour days so far, which I guess normally on disaster we would be working 12 hour days, but for right now it's just been 8.  But I've been so exhausted when we get home, it's emotionally and physically draining but is one of the most amazing things I've done in my life.  I am so proud to be able to say that I have helped with a disaster and have supported so many community members.  I'll probably read this later to find out that it makes no sense....but that's ok...you might get the general idea....

One month to go! Can't wait!  I foudn out that my application is under review for Big Brothers Big Sisters in Philadelphia, so I'm hoping that falls through and I get an interview and get it!  Otherwise my plan is to just come home and figure it out from there! Who knows!

just to give you an idea of the destruction I'm surrounded by...

This is Forest Lake that is one block down the street from the church

Heading to Alabama! (After just getting to Big Bend)



(wrote this post on Saturday 6/11 day before posted)

Holy Moly. It’s been an interesting week! We left last Wednesday from Houston to come to Big Bend National park. It was a long ride (2 days) but it was nice to sleep in a real bed for once! And the nice thing about traveling is we get enough money to go out to eat for dinner the nights we get wherever we’re going. So we ate at Chili’s in Del Rio, TX on Wednesday night. We arrived in Big Bend late afternoon, we had to stop in Alpine, TX which is 2 hours away from Big Bend because that’s where we have to do all our grocery shopping, which would occur every 2 weeks, so we got a whole lot of food!!!!

It is absolutely GORGEOUS here! Where we staked our tents is in the Chisos Mountain Basin. The view is absolutely breath taking! I made a video of a tour of where we live, it won't load on here but send me an email if you want me to send it to you (dont know if it would work then either) ACav_614@yahoo.com

So I set my tent up so in the morning when I open my tent the view is indescribable. I feel so relieved and stress free when I’m here, I get to sit in a hammock and listen to the birds singing as the wind blows me back and forth….love it.



So, I am living an exciting, crazy life right now and I love it. This is exactly why I came into AmeriCorps to get over my fear of change (definitely conquered that) and to make a difference in the world. Love it. Love you guys. Couldn’t do this without your support!!!!!

My Tent

Hammock I got to lay in!

My view from my tent!

On Friday we had the day off but our sponsor wanted us to go explore and see other parts of the park that we may be working on. We went on an early morning hike on the Lost Mine trail which was a 2.5 mile hike up to the top of a part of the mountain. I have another video if you want that one too!



Me on our hike



The team on our hike

I am very proud of myself and my newly gained hiking abilities. In the beginning of AmeriCorps it took me foooorever to get through a hike, now (still with a fair amount of struggling) I am able to keep up with everyone just making sure I take enough breaks and drinking enough water. This hike was perfect because the sun was rising on the other side of the mountain so we didn’t have to worry about sunlight until we hit the top! I’m extremely excited to be able to come back to Maine and discover parts of it I’ve never seen before by going on hikes! I want to buy myself some nice LL Bean hiking shoes, and a hydration pack and be on my way!

We were also able on Saturday to go to Hot Springs in Big Bend National Park which runs into the Rio Grande and we were able to go swimming in it! It was amazing, I loved to sit in the middle of the river and have the running water hit me, it took a lot to stay still but was so relaxing!  Pretty cool to be able to say that I went swimming in the Rio Grande though!

The team in the Hot Spring

Oh, you know, just hangin out in the Rio grande, NBD

The team hanging out in the river!

Jumping into the river!! note: in the background=Mexico!

So Friday night was the most interesting moment here. We have no service internet or phone where our tents are, but through the park there are spots that you can get some service. So our team leader Kiera went to go call to check in with Denver. We got a notice that we may be going on disaster relief. The deal with disaster relief is you can be sent at ANY time and have to be prepared to pack everything up and leave the next morning if they need you to. We knew we weren’t going to be sent while we were In Houston because technically, we were already doing disaster relief work. So once we left Houston our ranking on the disaster list went way up. So we finally on Friday night got confirmation that on Sunday the 12^th we would be departing Big Bend to head to Tuscaloosa, Alabama where they were devastated with a tornado a couple months ago. Currently there are two teams in my Fire unit that are there and have been helping by working in distribution places handing out essential needs to people, cleaning up debris, placing tarps on roofs, etc. We will be working with an organization that is not FEMA or Red Cross but a Baptist church group. We will be helping in distribution centers, possibly more tarping, but also I’m really hoping to help out with a volunteer coordinating project they are getting started. They want to start up a case work project that will be long lasting so they need to start early to keep it going. I am so excited to be able to help out with something like this. These people lost everything and just a small gesture is going to help them tremendously in the long run. It will be amazing to be able to say I was a part in the initial stages of recovery. It will take a long time to fully recover, but my small part will pay off in the long run.

So, 4 days ago we were in Houston. Then we traveled about 600 miles west across Texas to get to Big Bend. Here we are 4 days later heading right back where we came from to go past it. Kind of a pain in the butt, but here in AmeriCorps you are to expect the unexpected!! The way I see it, I get to sleep in a bed for 2 nights in a hotel, eat food from a restaurant, and will have not worked for 6 days….sounds good to me! I am sad to be leaving Big Bend, but as of right now this project is only for 2 weeks, then we will assess the project and see if we need to stay longer. If we are done in 2 weeks I’m hoping we’re able to come back to Big Bend and actually do some work for them!! In Tuscaloosa we will be living in a church and then moved to an elementary school I guess, so I only had to sleep in a tent for 3 days for now, which I actually haven’t minded and am beginning to actually enjoy!!

Cool thing about this whole travel deal, we leave Sunday to go to Stephenville (?), TX then on Monday travel to Jackson, Mississippi, and then Tuesday only have a 4 hour drive to get to Tuscaloosa, which so happens to be my birthday!!!!!! Pretty cool to be spending my birthday in Alabama! Although when we get there I guess we’re having our orientation right away so we can start right up on work on Thursday! But it’s ok, the other 2 teams will still be there until Thursday, and 3 girls from my shuffle round team in Arizona are on those teams so I’m excited to hopefully be able to see them when we get there and hope they can help me celebrate my birthday!! This will definitely be a birthday I won’t forget!!

I am currently writing this from this lovely view of a hammock so that in the hotel tomorrow night in Stephensville, TX I can just copy and paste it for you lovely people to read!! And….it just started raining which I guess it hasn’t done for 10 months!!! But I’m under a tree and am pretty well protected for the moment. It smells so friggen good…the rain that is…