Shipping Out!

This is it! We are on our way to N'awlins! These last couple of days have been pretty hectic getting everything and everyone together. But we leave from MHCC at 6:00PM tonight. We had a couple last minute barriers, but by God's will and everyone's tremendous support everything has come together.

Your prayers would be greatly appreciated for our team over the course of the next week, both for protection and strength in the physical work we will be doing as well as the emotional strains we will endure.

I know this will be an amazing experience for everyone involved and I know we will have a blast. Personally, I can't wait to get a taste of some of these:

(Beignets from Cafe Du Monde)

Check back on Aprils Fools day for the first blog posting on how things went! You can be looking forward to many stories and pictures!

Stage 1: Dreaming - COMPLETE!
Stage 2: Planning - COMPLETE!
Stage 3: Sign-up - COMPLETE!
Stage 4: Fundraising - COMPLETE!
Stage 5: Preparation - COMPLETE!
Stage 6: Realization - IN PROGRESS

God Bless,

DK

2 Days Until Heading North!

Registrations have been payed, tickets have been bought, Winter term finals have been completed (Thank God!) and liability waivers have been signed! There are only 2 days before we ship up to Lakewood Washington (just south of Tacoma) for the night at Lake City Community Church. We scrambled to get a shuttle or bus of some sort with no luck. As it turns out, carpooling is the better route anyhow. It will give us the flexibility to work around peoples schedules and drive up in a series of waves. The first wave will be meeting at MHCC and shoving off around 6:00PM Friday (24th) night with the last group leaving around 9:00PM.

From Lake City Community Church we will be waking up bright and early (3:30 for the few of us on the early flight, and 4:30 for the rest of the gang) to catch a bus into the Sea-Tac airport. The bus fare will cost us $3.00 per person, mere pocket change compared to the airport's long term parking cost.

I'm looking forward to meeting up with everyone tomorrow at Wall Street Pizza. News and pictures of the majority (hopefully) of the team to come from that tomorrow night.

I'll signoff tonight with a bit of a teaser. I told you we would be staying at "Light City", a spiffy name for a fancied up warehouse, with 1000 people from all over the country. Well, here is a birdseye view of the warehouse we will be sharing with the 968 other individuals next week.

(Click Image to explore the Lower Ninth Ward in its Pre-Katrina state)

God Bless.

DK

Wall Street Pizza

We will be getting together at Wall Street Pizza, Thursday (23rd) at 6:00PM. Hopefully, everyone who is going on the trip will be able to make it. Its an opportunity for us to just hang out and get to know the people we are going to be spending every living breathing minute with over the next week in New Orleans. It is also important for all team members to be there because we will make sure everyone is up to speed on all the details and ready to go for the trip.

I hope everyone is surviving finals!...I am...barely.

Stage 1: Dreaming - COMPLETE
Stage 2: Planning - COMPLETE
Stage 3: Sign-up - COMPLETE
Stage 4: Fundraising - COMPLETE?
Stage 5: Preparation - IN PROGRESS
Stage 6: Realization -

DK

LSI Logic Donation

LSI Logic just approved a donation of 400 pairs of Latex gloves and 400 N95 grade face masks. (Over $500 value) Both of which are a necessity for manual labor in New Orleans because of the high level of bacteria, in the form of sitting flood waters and airborne contagion.


DK

"Light City"

I made a brief mention of what our exciting new living location will be for the week in New Orleans, and I have a few more details. We are partnering with Rev. Leonard Lucus and we are staying in his vacant warehouse, known as "Light City". It is not fancy, but it is big and safe. It has been cleaned up pretty well and will be freshly painted by the time we arrive. There are large men's and women's sleeping rooms. We will sleep on cots and there will be showers and porta-potties. There is a fence around the property and there will be 24-hour security. There is a well-lit fenced in parking area. We are very close to a medical clinic, fire and police station. There will be several "community" rooms and tents for our group to gather for special meetings or simply to hang out in the evening.

The star marks the location of the warehouse.

As these aerial photos show, not only was it hit hard by the two hurricanes (Katrina and Rita) themselves, the lower Ninth Ward had some of the worst flooding.


By placing ourselves right in the middle of this devastation, our opportunity to help those in need will be phenomenal.

10 more days!

DK

Fiddler on the Roof - SUCCESS!

The Fiddler on the Roof fundraiser was officially a success, and an awesome time for everyone involved. We had about 35 individuals volunteer their time over the course of the weekend, many of whom are not even going on the New Orleans trip but still felt convicted to help out for the cause! Their time was not wasted. We made a profit of $372.75 selling concessions! This money is much needed in light of the bombshell dropped on us yesterday, in the form of an unexpected extra finacial burden. There are now over 1,000 individuals from across the States converging on the lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans on March 25th-30th, which means we outgrew our previous camp (we are now staying in a cleared out warehouse) along with the food subsidy that was being provided (which results in an extra $40 per person). So yes, we have another expense added to the list, but now we find ourselves right in the middle of the community that was most devastated by Katrina and Rita. The people are absolutely thrilled that we have come to help. There is a possibility that the community women might even combine forces to cook dinner for us! Hopefully we will be able to experience some New Orleans home cooking! We will see… God has a plan for us!

To everyone who was able to help out with the fundraiser, Rick Zimmer, the director of the production, expressed great appreciation for helping to make the production truly a success, on and off the stage. It was a blast! I still have "Miracle of Miracles" stuck in my head, of course I did see it three nights in a row. We hope we were able to make the overall experience of the muscial a more positive event for everyone who attended, and in return we greatly appreciate the support they provided us!

More updates to come soon! (Finals always get in the way of all the important stuff, no?)

DK

MHCC Special Funds Request

MHCC just officially approved a $500 Special Funds Request to help out with the Katrina Relief Trip! This will do wonders to ease the finacial burden.

Some of the MHCC Katrina Relief crew, and a few who just wanted to help, got their first taste working together as a team. Tonight was the opening night for our Fiddler on the Roof concession stand fundraiser, and it was more successful then I ever imagined! Complete details on that to come after the weekend showings wrap up.

Shopping spree at Costco! (for the concession stand)

This is only a portion of the crew that showed up Friday evening. Much thanks goes to them for bearing with us and being the test dummies in this crash course learning experience to prepare us for the next two days.

DK

Signup - COMPLETE!

A lot has happened since we originally started planning this trip. Our dream is turning in to a reality. The bulk of the logistics for the trip have been planned. And sign-up is wrapping up. Remember those "jaw-dropping 21 individuals" who were willing to sacrifice their spring break? Well, you can make that 32. We put it in the Lords hands, and we managed to find flights (in most cases, the same flight) for our 11 newest team members who were willing to bear through the frustrations of not having a pre-reserved seat. With the signup phase coming to a close, we are in full swing fundraising mode.

The perfect opportunity has arisen to fund raise for our trip, while also helping to raise awareness on campus for what we are doing. As some of you might know, MHCC is presenting "Fiddler on the Roof" this next weekend (March 10th & 11th at 7:00 and the 12th at 2:00). If you haven't seen the musical or the movie, hopefully all of you well cultured folks have at least seen the Seinfeld episode ("The Limo", for all of you hardcore Seinfeld junkies), where George gets the song "If I were a Rich Man" stuck in his head, and know that it has some good music. We have volunteered as a club to help with ushering, tickets, and whatever else they need. In return, besides getting to see the show for free, we can set up a table during intermission to sell concessions with all profits going toward the trip. Along with concessions, we will be selling coupons for Round Table Pizza who has agreed to team up with us for a fundraiser. Being the closing weekend of the performances, it should be a sold out showing, 500 people, all three nights. Besides raising money for our trip, it will be an excellent opportunity to get to know and start building relationships with the people who are going to be working together for the week in New Orleans.

Something that will be even more helpful then any amount of money we can fundraise, Good Shepherd Community Church started a signup sheet for people to pray for us when we are in New Orleans. We already have 45 individuals who will be praying for us to have Gods guidance that we may have strength, endurance, courage, and patience. So on that note, I will end this posting with a request. A request for your prayers, that things continue to come together as we wrap up loose ends in these last few weeks before we embark on this physical and emotional journey.

God Bless

DK

Stage 1: Dreaming - COMPLETE
Stage 2: Planning - COMPLETE
Stage 3: Sign-up - COMPLETE
Stage 4: Fundraising - IN PROGRESS
Stage 5: Preparation -
Stage 6: Realization -