SUBMISSION DATE: MARCH 2006

VOLUNTEER: Ivette Franco

NOTES: During the week of the 12th we had several volunteers come into New Orleans to gut homes on their Spring Breaks. Since we were short on housing, the Sheraton Hotel generously donated 10 doubles for our volunteers.

Each evening we had a meeting to discuss our day and to answer any questions volunteers had. It was during one of those meetings that Miss Ivette and other volunteers shared their thoughts with us.

.....It was my first day working as well as first day in New Orleans. I gutted a house today and started with a child's room. The house seemed like it was a very nice house before the storm but it's just crazy for me to walk into this house and have to rip down pooh bear and basketball wallpaper covered in mold. Along the way I found ruined family pictures. You don't know how terrible Katrina really was until you go in and rip down walls yourself.

Ivette Franco
College of NJ