The Battle of New Orleans

Sunday we met Bob Lautenbach from First CRC for coffee and a beignet at the Cafe du Monde, before he gave us a tour of N.O. A beignet is a deep-fried pastry something like Dutch "appelflappen" (without the apples) for those of you who know what that is. It is covered with powdered sugar and is very tasty and very New Orleans. The coffee was made with chicory and was super-strong.

Bob, who is down here working for a mold eradicating company, took us all around the city. We have read about the damage and slow recovery of the city but we really didn't comprehend it till we saw it for ourselves. We were shocked at the level of devastation still apparent. We saw entire neighborhoods with no one around and houses still in the condition they were in after Katina. We drove by two large hospitals that were still not being used. The city is slowly coming back, and Bob pointed out a number of businesses that had just opened in the past weeks. Less than half of the people have returned to N.O., and it is going to take years to get back to where it once was. It may never recover completely.

Today was another day of door-to-door work. We again got into some very needy homes. Our day was shortened by a thunderstorm at about 3:00 pm. The highlight of the day was 2 emails from Louise Sonderfan, an encouraging comment from sister Helen, and a phone call from Herm Witte.