Twenty-two members of AU's Chi Alpha Christian Fellowship group spent fall break at Camp Hope, a shelter for victims of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans.
The AU students were immediately put to work helping prepare and serve food, as well as kitchen work. As many as one thousand people could show up for lunch; breakfast and dinner is usually in the hundreds. The students were greeted with 'thank you' and "God bless you" as those affected by Hurricane Katrina filed through the serving line.
Connie Gamwell, originally from New Orleans, was helping with relief efforts to assist her mother and a friend clean up from the storm. Her son, Brennan, was to start his freshman year at Tulane on scholarship.
"He moved everything he owned into his dorm room," Gamwell said. "He's very depressed that he can't be at school."
As for the friend she was helping, Gamwell said they like everything clean, and that "the street in front of her house is spotless" after she got to cleaning it.
Another person eating at Camp Hope that night was a young professional named Ron Hondicheck, originally from Pittsburgh. He explained that two days before the storm hit he had gone out drinking for his birthday. The next day a friend called and recommended he leave and Hondicheck evacuated to Memphis, and then eventually returned home to Pittsburgh. He finally ended his journey in Houston, staying with friends.
When Hurricane Rita was heading for Houston, Hondicheck had to evacuate further inland to Denver. He has not been back to work since, and said he had a few job interviews in Denver.
"I'm just driving around in my rented minivan with all my stuff in there that is smelling," he said.
Denny Nissley, director of Camp Hope, spoke to volunteers about the great responsibility the organization had to the storm victims.
"[The storm victims] won't care about how much you know until they know how much you care," Nissley said.
Percy MacClendon lost everything he owned when the hurricane came ashore in Gulfport. He arrived at Camp Hope seven weeks ago and is now one of its main leaders.
When the AU students arrived, he was operating the forklift, moving food and water to their appropriate places. A volunteer at Camp Hope jokingly warned MacClendon, "I'm gonna tell the Occupational Safety and Health Administration on you." He flashed a smile and threw the machine into reverse.
On Sunday some of AU's Chi Alpha students along with their leader, Mike Godzwa, went to the eastern Ninth Ward of New Orleans, an area that saw some of the worst devastation from the storm.
The students were there to help clean out a home belonging to an older African American woman named Ida, who asked her last name to be kept anonymous. Her husband had died that May, and her daughter, Nolita, had recently separated from her husband.
"Thank you so much for coming," she said to the volunteers.
The woman's home was not completely destroyed, but had been flooded on the first floor up to two feet. Black mold had begun to spread up the walls, and the hardwood floors had buckled.
The Chi Alpha students got to work, using hammers and crowbars to lift up the wood floors, digging out the damaged sidewalk and trashing items in the kitchen.
The flooding caused mold to grow on many pieces of furniture, and even spread into Ida's sprawling closet, ruining several articles of clothing. The group helped Ida throw out countless other personal effects.
Anne Bradley, a sophomore in the School of International Service who volunteered on the trip, lost everything when tornados spawned by Katrina tore through her neighborhood in Pass Christian, Miss. She said she was eager to help those in New Orleans who were suffering a similar loss.
"Three weeks ago I was the one being helped, and now I want to be able to help someone else," she said.
After the Chi Alpha students had worked more than six hours, a trash pile nearly 100 feet long sat on the cul-de-sac nearby. The students, Ida and her daughter posed for a picture outside the house and prayed together before leaving.
According to Godzwa, Chi Alpha plans on coming back to New Orleans over spring break, which would allow them to serve for a longer period of time.
The Gathering, another Christian ministry on campus, also sent a group to the Gulf. Twenty-three students partnered with Faith Presbyterian Church in Slidell, La., a suburb of New Orleans and worked with families, removing drywall and gutting flooded out homes. They also worked to clean the neighborhood, removing trash and other debris.
"This was our biggest undertaking by far," said James Misner, a junior in the School of Public Affairs, and a leader in The Gathering.
"[The families] were so thankful we were there," Misner recalled. "They said, 'Now that you helped me, I can help my neighbors.'"
The students who went to New Orleans raised over $10,000 to pay for the trip as well as to contribute to relief efforts. The money that continues to come in will allow more groups to assist through McClean Bible Church, according to Misner.
