United Way Alternative Spring Break sponsored by Deloitte

Back in January Brian, myself and a couple other national team members had the opportunity to travel to Lake Charles for 3 days. While we were down there we met some really amazing people and learned an incredible amount about Southwest Louisiana, the devastating impact Hurricane Rita had on the region, and all the work that still needs to be done.

We arrived in the afternoon on Tuesday , January 16th and after getting settled into our hotel room we met some local young people for dinner. These four young people were recruited to act as a host committee for all of you folks traveling down to Louisiana over your spring break. We had great conversation over dinner as they told us about their experiences before, during and after Hurricane Rita. It was incredibly moving to hear them all share their stories. All of you heading down will definitely get to meet them and hopefully hear their stories too.

On Wednesday our team took a tour of Southwest Louisiana. You can see some of the video footage I shot by checking out the "Why Southwest Louisiana" video on Youtube. Here is the link- Why Southwest Louisiana and Cameron. Our first stop was at Camp Wi-Ta-Wentin, or as we called it, Camp W (easier to say). Camp W is a summer camp that specializes in educating kids about the environment and nature. We met with the staff of the camp who explained to us how the hurricane impacted their camp and what their rebuilding needs are. From the sounds of it, all the teams who work at camp W are going to have plenty to do to help get the camp back to pre-Rita condition and ready for the kids. Next we went on a drive through Cameron parish which, as Dina Landry explains in the Youtube video, is the largest parish in land mass but least densely populated. I had the pleasure of riding with Kathy Williams, who works for United Way of Southwest Louisiana. We talked at length about how Rita impacted the area and how it was still a long way from being what it once was. She explained how the storm impacted local industry, which consists mainly of fishing and oil. Both on and off shore oil rigs were damaged along with many of the refineries. Fishing boats were destroyed and in some cases, found miles from where they had been docked. One of the most amazing things I saw during this tour was a house that was in a ditch on the side of the road. Kathy said that the house had been washed away by Rita and was over 20 miles away from where it was built! It was unreal. After the storm some people had to literally go and find their house. You can tell this by the spray painted address on the front of the houses. Can you imagine? During our tour we also stopped at South Cameron High School. More than 15 months after Rita hit the school is still not open. From the outside of the building you can see right into the gymnasium because the walls had been knocked down by the storm. Next to the school you can see the rows of temporary buildings that currently house the students. It was really a moving experience to have been driven around Cameron and see that there is still such a tremendous need well over a year later.

That night we had dinner with the host committee. They took us to a local place called Steamboat Bill's for some real Cajun cuisine that included 4 POUNDS of crawfish. MMM MMM Good!!!! After eating all that amazing food we retreated to the hotel for a good nights rest because we had an early morning ahead of us.

The next morning at 5:30 a.m. Brian and I went to the local news station with Stephe because he and Tom Morris, president of United Way of Southwest Louisiana, were being interviewed on live T.V. about ASB! We spent the rest of the day frantically driving around Lake Charles trying to get the rest of the footage we needed for the YouTube videos before we had to catch a flight back to D.C. During that time we had the opportunity to meet Chef Joe and his students who treated us to some of their homemade chicken stew, complete with hand made, hand pressed pasta. It was delicious. You can check out the video we shot of Chef Joe and his students here at Meet Chef Joe.

What a great 3 days we had. We met a bunch of wonderful people, all of whom went out of their way to make us feel welcome. They shared with us their gratitude and excitement about having young people from our program travel to Southwest Louisiana to help them rebuild. They all gave new meaning to the term "Southern Hospitality". All of you traveling down will find out first hand exactly what I mean.