Sometimes, someone asks you to volunteer for something, and its a helpful but somewhat mindless job. Other times, you wonder how you were so lucky to ride a volunteer position right into the front row of a huge event.
I heard that they needed a couple extra people for the Safety Team in the Superdome in New Orleans during the national youth gathering. I was given a yellow shirt and quick instructions, and we were off, standing between 37,000 teenagers and the intensity of the stage on the right, which over the course of five evenings featured loud rock bands, jugglers, a New Orleans jazz combo, and pyrotechnics. Lots of pyrotechnics. Quite a safety risk in a situation that was being handled by amateurs such as myself. One begins to wonder how its all possible that noone was hurt. People jumped around, rushed toward the stage, but also managed to stay "in bounds". Then I remembered that these are 37,000 teenagers that someone believed in enough to help them get to New Orleans in the first place. These are youth who raised the money, solicited donations, and cared enough to show up. That is the difference.
I am in New Orleans for a week, staying at the Holiday Inn French Quarter. One of the people with whom I am working here read in a guidebook that all chains in New Orleans are somewhat lower quality than their counterparts elsewhere. My roommate pointed out that there would be no reason to make the rooms nicer considering what usually goes on in them, particularly around Mardi Gras.
This is my third trip here, and the second time for the Lutheran national youth gathering. The last time the national youth gathering was in NoLa was 1997. This time, it is the biggest event that the city has hosted since Hurricane Katrina with 37,000 attendees. It is sobering to think that people lived (and died) in the convention center and dome where we are hosting activities.
I heard one post-hurricane perspective from the volunteer driver who brought me from the airport to the hotel. He'd come to New Orleans as part of the coast guard and stayed here after retirement because he and his family love the food, music, and people. He'd also worked for FEMA over the past three years, and had occasion to bring people from New Orleans to Grand Forks, ND to show them how the town had recovered after their equally devastating 1997 flood. I am somewhat more familiar with the flood recovery in North Dakota and commented on what a great example that must be as a beacon of hope. He said that North Dakota's type of recovery would never happen in New Orleans because in Grand Forks the people decided that if their town was to recover, they needed to do the work and they did. He said that in New Orleans, many people just wait for someone to come and help them and do not put in the effort themselves. This is one person's perspective, but it is not what you hear on television. Even in this day and age of communication, you still have to go to a place to really get both sides of a story. This is why I travel.
