1-12-09 New Orleans

Today we got to sleep in a little and it was a informative day to say the least. We took a tour around all of New Orleans pretty much and it was soo much fun. However, at the same time is was sad and a little frustrating to see the destruction from Katrina. We went all over the place today; we went to the lower 9th Ward and got out of the vans and walked around a little and saw the levees. It quite literally seemed like a ghost town. There were some houses there were being built and some that were already built. That destruction and feeling I got was something that I expected but what I did not expect is what I saw in the upper middle class area of NOLA. 

I will admit that my eyes did tear up when I saw what the homes looked like in the upper middle class part of NOLA. There were still empty homes and there were still FEMA X's written on the homes. It looked like my neighborhood was hit by a hurricane and no one came to help my people. It got real emotional for me when I just pictured my home and my neighbors homes being destroyed and then those people not wanting to come back to their homes. When I still saw destruction in this part of New Orleans, it really did hit me and made me realize how poor of an area New Orleans really is and how much these people got screwed over by their own government. 

Overall, the tour was great and it was great seeing everything that we did but it really did suck to just be a tourist for the day. We rode around the 9th Ward while there are neighbors busting their butts to rebuild their homes. I just felt like I should start doing something in the middle of the tour. Like get out of the bus and just help someone else rebuild their home. I can't wait til we get to the 9th Ward so that we can do something to help these people of NOLA.