Fifty Central California volunteers spent spring break (March 26 to April 3) working in Waveland, Miss., and New Orleans, La. Teams from Fresno Adventist Academy and Monterey Bay Academy and Orson, Caroline and Jaylene Chung from Milpitas, Calif., joined 100 other volunteers working with the Center for Youth Evangelism’s We Care Hurricane Katrina Response Project.
The week’s tasks included:
• Gutting apartments in Waveland and houses in New Orleans
• House-to-house surveys in Waveland to assess current and future needs
• Distribution Center staffing for food, personal items and water. (Yes, people are still standing in line for these daily needs.)
• Building volunteer housing with Habitat for Humanity
• Kitchen duty at the We Care campus
• Passing out devotional books on Sabbath afternoon door-to-door to FEMA trailer residents
For academy students, the senior class trip is a big deal. Each class begins saving for this right of passage from the freshmen year. When Fresno Academy seniors started their junior year, they discussed ideas for their farewell tour — a cruise? or Hawaii? Hawaii won.
“It is the one thing we look forward to our senior year,“ explains Rebecca Solano, “other than graduation.”
In February, Tyler Hirschkorn, class vice president, picked up a flyer advertising a spring break mission trip to Waveland, Miss., for Hurricane Katrina rebuilding. Thinking this was “more beneficial” than lying on a beach, he took it to the other class officers. Along with Lisa Palencia, their class sponsor, the group prayed for God’s direction.
Then, they presented the idea to their classmates. “We had agreed that we needed a two-thirds vote of approval,” says Israel Gonzalez, class president. The secret ballot vote was exactly that. “We saw that as God’s leading,” he adds.
With just one month to plan and needing an additional $3,000, the seniors quickly got the word out — calling family and friends and visiting every local church.
Crisol Villasenor voted for Hawaii, but says she is so glad she went to Mississippi. “It was better than Hawaii. It would have been just a bunch of fun and not felt like we completed something.”
For Maricel Misal, the on-site Monday morning orientation changed her mind. “The ‘if’ feeling left,” she says.
Hearing personal stories of survivors made the heart-wrenching work even more meaningful. “A lady told us she was in the bathroom [when Katrina hit],” recounts Jordan Williams. “She freaked out as the water got up to seven feet high. Standing on her sink, she was trying to claw herself through the ceiling. She ended up making her fingers into knobs. She stayed in that bathroom for three days with only several inches of air.”
“What if this was me?” was the question in everyone’s mind. “We carried things [personal belongings] out one-by-one and gently laid them in a pile. We couldn’t just throw the stuff,” Jordan adds.
And they were inspired by other volunteers. “It was really inspiring to take the same route to the apartments each day. An Amish group put up three houses in one week. I gained a new respect for others,” says Tim Lutz.
After five days of back- and heart-breaking work, they continued their senior trip on to Florida for a few days of fun.
