On Saturday we left New Orleans and Louisiana and headed over to Bay St. Louis, Mississippi where we visited Chris Legarde. Chris is an aid to one of the congressmen in Mississippi and one of the leaders in his community. He first introduced himself and then explained his experience and some history about his community. Bay St. Louis is situated right on the water, but it sits on top of a bluff. This was not enough to protect it from the storm surge that Katrina created. As we drove to his house, concrete slabs could be seen everywhere and steps leading to nothing. In all of these places houses once existed.
On one property they had created a sign to say the address of the property and under it was a painting of the house that once sat there.
Chris Legarde's house had a big porch and his yard was full of his possessions. Even his kitchen was moved outside, where his family cooked all of their meals. I split wood for most of the day and I am now an expert in using a log splitter. It was nice to help Chris out.
He had put all of his effort into helping out his neighbors and community after the storm hit, and didn't get a chance to work on his own house. This was our job, and I felt great helping out a man like this. After a morning of work his friend cooked a delicious meal for us, while Christmas music played on the stereo. Christmas music was a weird concept for all of us from the north. Christmas and sixty degree weather just don't go together, I thought it was summer.
Another funny thing was that some of my fellow team members tried buying sandals because it was so warm, but Wal-Mart didn't sell them since it was so cold.
The one thing I took away from our trip to the Legarde family's house was the culture of southern Mississippi. When we first met Chris Legarde he told us that we were here to help, but also maybe even more importantly to learn about the people of gulf coast and their culture.
What I have noticed is that everyone I have met down there has been extremely nice and inviting. Everyone is very appreciative of us coming down to help and more then willing to help us out if we have more trouble. The most important things to them, in my opinion, are having a good time and family.
