A rest day...or is it?

Today we had the luxury of sleeping in. It being the weekend and we're not working. This morning we had breakfast with a goodly number of our crew at the local IHOP. For those of you who haven't ever visited IHOP, it stands for International House Of Pancakes. We had a great breakfast selection of the usual egg dishes and a large variety of crepes and pancakes. After that, a bunch of us went downtown New Orleans to do the tourist thingy.  The first item on our itinerary was a visit to one of the old cemetaries here. Because the ground water level is only a couple of feet below the surface, the graves are in above ground tombs or sepulchres. They are in a variety of styles and sizes. Modest ones, just a bit larger than a coffin as well as palatial grand edifices. It was interesting to see that the cemetary we visited had graves all the back to 1823. There are mostly French names on the tombs. You can certainly notice the French and Spanish influence in this city.

Wedrove to New Orleans with the six of us but once we had parked, split up into three couples and each went our own way. After the cemetary we visited the French Quarter. This is the old section of town and is famous for it's jazz, bars and carnival. It's quite "touristy" with high prices and lots of stuff you can spend your money on. The French Quarter has a lot of character. There are street artists everywhere including cartoon artists, painters, mimes, jazz musicians, street sellers and much more. We walked along Bourbon Street, made famous by its Jazz music and the movies. The interesting architechture here includes the balconies on the buildings complete with cast iron railings. There are also lots of horsedrawn carriages you can hire to tour the area. We visited the French Market which is kind of like a flea market where you can buy all kinds of items such as T-shirts, jewelry, food, etc. We had a good time just browsing around and enjoying the summer like weather.

We then walked along the Riverside Walk along the Mississippi river. We saw a couple of Mississippi river boats. You can go on them for a tour on the river and the harbour. The one that was moored played a few tunes on a caliope. This is a steam powered organ that can play real loud, just like a bunch of steam whistles.

There is no visible damge in the downtown area of New Orleans. When the French originally built New Orleans, they selected one of highest parts along the Mississippi mouth. During Katrina, only a few inches of water ever covered the French Quarter. After strolling along along for a few hours, we got a bit tired and drove back to our temporary home in Kenner. All-in-all it was an good and interesting day. We concluded the day with supper in a large buffet style restaurant and stuffed ourselves with lots of good food (just kidding, we took just enough to be pleasantly full).

We did some laundry and then retired to the lounge to play games and have a good time with the rest of the crew.

Our first week is done!

Here it is, the end of our first work week. I must say that I look forward to some R&R. The week has gone by surprisingly quick though. Even when the day starts at 6 o'clock, the days are so full that the time is just flying by. I did more framing today and we can now see the end in sight for that part of the job. It is a real challenge to make everything straight using a mixture of old rough cut 2X4's and new 2X4's. They are not the same size and we need to slice off a part of the old 2X4's and in other places shim them to get an even and straight foundation for the wallboard.

The plumber finished his work today and we'll be ready for the electrician on Monday. We cleaned the inside as best we could so he has access to the walls for placing the outlets and switches and fusebox. We have worked inside while the weather outside was just beautiful. Today again it was sunny and 73 deg F. Now that we're ready to continue to put siding on, the weather promises to be cooler and wet. Oh well.. you can't always get what you want.

Annie is still mudding and getting better at it all the time. It's something that will come in handy when I'm ready to renovate the basement at home. The owner of the house she's working in came to see how eveything is progressing. He's disabled and in a wheelchair. When we reconstructed his home, we took his handicap into consideration and he will be able to get around much better after everything is finished. He was moved to tears when he saw how much had been done. Needless to say, the DRS people were quite moved as well. One couple from California, John and Audrey Tsjaarda, presented him with a quilt that their church had provided. He was really thankful for that as well.

It maybe interesting to tell the folks back home how our day kind of goes. I'll describe the start of our day here today and the end of the day at another time. We get up at around 6 o'clock and get dressed and do our thing. We then go to the dining room around 6:30 to make our lunches. There are always a lot of food items to choose from, including sandwich makings, yogurt, fruit, snacks, drinks, etc. We pack our lunches into our coolers with an ice pack and since I'm the "waterboy" of my team, I fill a large water container with water and ice to take along. I usually have a cup of coffee and read the paper after making lunch. At 7 o'clock we have breakfast. One of the couples (this rotates on a daily basis) opens with prayer and then we eat. There is usually fruit, porridge, grits, toast, cereal, eggs, coffee and a whole bunch more. One thing we're not doing, is starving. There is an abundance of food at all times. After we're finished, the designated couple leads in devotions and finishes with a prayer of thanksgiving. Tom then tells everyone what the weather is in their home towns and reads a funny or interesting story. Any housekeeping items are discussed by either Tom or Grace. Our construction manager then gives us information and tips about the work sites for the day and usually also has a funny remark. We then stand up, hold hands and sing "This is the day". It has a special sencond verse related to the work we do as reps of DRS. Our construction supervisor is Ed Buisman ably assisted by his wife Sjoukje (Sonia). Sjoukje is a sister of Agnes Wyga.

Tom and Grace are doing a marvelous job here in Kenner. They bring a sense of fun and excitement to this venture that is uplifting and appreciated by all and they just make everything run smoothly. The best thing is that we can really feel the Spirit at work in this group. It's like a small group in that we can share our concerns and joys without judgement.

Annie and I are thankful for the people back home that are praying for us and surely appreciate that very much. So endeth the story for today. God bless and have a good night (or day) to all.

Oh the pain....

Today, we did more of the same work that we've done so far. I'm still helping put in ceiling rafters and prepping for putting the wallboard up. I did a lot of overhead hammering and my shoulder and arm muscles are a little tight right now. I wish we took my daughter Caroline with us. She's a massage therapist and could really help not just myself but also a lot of the other people here.

We had to remove a lot of old stuff before we could get our new rafters in. All in all a good day though. We work really well together and have quite a bit of fun too, which is a blessing. At break times we get into some real good discussions sometimes. The weather is staying very nice. Today is was 76 deg F and sunny. Yeah, I know you're all jealous I suppose but I feel is at least some compensation for the work we're doing. Annie did a lot of "mudding" again and she probably will be doing that for some time to come yet. Annie has become good friends with Carol Schuitema. She's also mudding, primarily in the various closets and joked that by the end of the day she could finally come out of the closet.

We had a couple of guests tonight for dinner. Cynthia, who is the sister of the owner of the house that Annie works in and Margaret who is a long time member of the church here. Margaret is 83 years old and is the only surviving person of the original founding members. She's a lovely spry lady and told us a bit about the church here and still teaches adult sunday school every Sunday. Cynthia also told us about her family and how hurricane Katrina affected them all. She had to move to Texas for 2 years to wait for her house to be reconstructed. She's glad that she's  been back here again for the last 2 years. Her brother, the home owner is handicapped and she's dropping by the house almost every day to check on the progress for him. She's a warm outgoing black lady and so appreciative of the work that we're doing here. She had a number of family problems and Grace prayed over her on our behalf, which she really appreciated. All in all, we had a lovely time.

This it it for today again and I hope to add to this blog tomorrow.

Work..Work...Work...

It's our third work day today. I didn't get around to write my blog yesterday. The dining hall we used is rented out to AA on Tuesday evenings. So we had to have our dinner a little earlier and then we all moved to the lounge. Since I usually use the lounge to set up my laptop, I didn't feel like getting set up. Anyway, we all had some great and busy days. So far, nobody has been injured on the job and we are thankful to God for that. The camaraderie and fellowship is just great, we all get along. It is interesting to see the church at work in this way. I can't think but that if we could work together with this unity of Spirit in our home churches how powerful the church would be. It is really interesting too to hear the life stories of our fellow Christians here.

Yesterday and today, my team mates and I were putting new rafters in the house we working on. This was quite a job since the old rafters were sagging badly. This is because of the age of the house and also because the heating unit is located in the attic and rests on top of the rafters. We had to use a hydraulic jack to lift each old rafter until it was straight and the nailed a new 2X8 to the old one. We also had to remove a lot of crossbraces before we could get the new rafters in.

An interesting historical note here. This house and many similar houses here in Louisiana are called "shotgun" houses. They are quite narrow and long About 16ft wide and 50ft long almost like a trailer home. The original layout was a long hallway along the long side of the house and then the various rooms ran off the hallway. You could see the back of the house from the front entrance and fire a shotgun without hitting anything. I believe the reason for this style of house dates back to the time that Louisiana was still a French territory. The property taxes were directly proportional to the frontage of the lot. Thus the lots were laid out as narrow deep lots to make them affordable. This also was the case in Holland in the middle ages. Therefore when you are in Amsterdam for instance in the old section, you notice that the houses are also very narrow and long.

Annie was again put to work "mudding" drywall in her house. She's getting quite an expert doing this. Today she did corners which are a step up in difficulty. I don't think we have worked this hard for a good long time and are a little tired today. However, it is very satisfying to see the work progress.

Well...that's about it for today. I'm going to relax and then hit the bed at around 9:30.

Our first day on the job!!

Today we woke up early but not quite early enough. The plug that our alarm clock was plugged into was intermittent, causing the alarm clock to go off at times. It went off 25 minutes too late. So....we had to really hurry to get ready. From about 6:30 - 7 o'clock, we are making our lunches and then at 7 o'clock we all have breakfast. We packed whatever we thought we needed into our lunch coolers, including lots of water because the temperature was going to be around 22 deg C (71 deg F). No clouds to give us any relief either. Annie was scheduled to do "mudding" which is part of the drywalling process where all cracks, joints and screws are covered with drywall plaster, ready for painting. It was something she had never attempted in her life. She had a good teacher in Boukje De Raaf. I was assigned to a team (3 of us) to start applying vinyl siding. Again, even though I have done nearly anything related to home renovations, I had never done siding. We had a great time and after a bit of a slow start due to the house not being square and level, we got really going after a couple of hours.

We're in a black neighbourhood and met some of the people here. They are really happy that some of their fellow neighbours are being helped this way. It is amazing how may houses are still empty and are just falling apart. There is also a lot of new construction going on where whole neighbourhoods have been torn down and a whole new subdivision is being build.

We are all very tired after working hard all day. It was a joy to take a nice hot shower after we came "home". The kitchen staff did a marvelous job feeding us supper. We had a chinese cabbage salad to start off. Then we had the main course of roast beef, mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans, carrots and peas. We then had apple crumble with icecream for desert, yum-yum. We finished our dinner with devotions and singing some songs. Tom had a funny story to tell and then we shared our day's experiences with everyone. This is the way our days are going to be more or less during the week.

I think Annie and I will hit the bed quite early to get some well deserved rest. We hope and pray that everyone at home is doing well too. Here ends today's story, good night and God bless.

First Sunday in Kenner

Last night we woke up around 2 am to the sounds of an emergency vehicle and fire truck. They stopped right outside our window and made a lot of noise, talking over their radio and idling. Well... we hope this not a regular occurrence. Luckily they moved on after about 15 min and we were able to get back to sleep. We woke early again at 6 because of the time shift. We are now 2 hours out of sync from last week in Ontario, one hour in daylight savings time and one hour in time zone difference. Anyway, it gave us some time to walk around here. We are about a mile from the Mississippi river where we walked to. It was very nice. The weather is absolutely beautiful. No clouds and the temperature around 22 deg C. We attended church right here where we're staying, the First United Methodist church of Kenner. Unfortunately, this church is suffering from loosing a lot of its members after hurricane Katrina. They very much appreciate the work we're doing here. Also, it helps them survive since CRWRC is paying for the use of their facilities. Our whole group of 19 people made up a goodly part of the attendees. It's good to get together with different Christians though and we felt a real connection with the people here. We celebrated the Lord's Supper with them as well.

We know we're in the south not only because of the warm temperatures but also because of the palm trees and grapefruit and orange trees.

This is another day to get to know each each other and to sort out our jobs for tomorrow. We all visited the sites where we'll be working tomorrow. There are 3 work sites. I will be helping putting up vinyl siding and Annie is on another site doing drywall finishing (taping and mudding). It appears that we have a great group of people here. We having people from Canada (Ontario), Michigan, Massachusetts and California. It is also amazing how we can find connections. One couple for instance are Lawrence and Boukje De Raaf. Their son is a minister, Kevin De Raaf in Burlington Faith CRC. Lawrence and Boukje used to be members of the Ottawa church where Annie's brother Jack used to be a minister. So they know Jack very well. Also, Jack has been a mentor to Kevin De Raaf. This is just an example of how we connect with each other.

Tomorrow is going to be a busy day. We'll get up at around 6 o'clock to get ready. We should be on the job site by about 9 we hope. The traffic here in New Orleans is horrific, very busy and terrible drivers. Oh well at least we don't have to drive ourselves.