OnSite Relief Blog - Volunteer in New Orleans

For the months of October and November we had a long term volunteer named Jan from Yukon, Canada. During her stay she restored some windows and helped out at ARNO.

Jan has traveled the world and found New Orleans to be the friendliest city she has ever visited. She loved the artsy neighborhood of Bywater where our volunteer house is located. We took Jan to Vaughn’s to see Kermit Ruffins play, Lafayette to dance to some live Zydeco music and Bacchanal Wine for their weekly wine tasting.

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We now have a full time project manager, Ben Sanady.

Here are some photos of Ben and his first crew of volunteers…Heather (UK), Elma (Montreal, CAN), Rachael (Southern NJ), Ronnie (East Orange, NJ), Emily (West Chester, PA), Gabrielle (West Chester, PA), Jenn (Rowley, MA) and Craig (Southern California)

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Here are a few photos of our volunteers out on the town.

Jared shows us how to suck the head of a crawfish

Jared just had to take this photo

Jared was goofing around here at The House of Blues

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After 2 long months of waiting the power was finally turned on at the Onsite volunteer house. Right after that we had Craig, our electrician, install our lights and wire up the fuse box.

Jared and Justin patiently wait for the power to be turned on

Craig installs a ceiling fan

Jenn installs a power outlet

Justin takes a break on the patio after a long day

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This was just an amazing week. We had 2 volunteers from Florida come down to build custom bunk beds for the volunteer house. We also had a few more volunteers help setup the shower and sinks.

James works on the drains in the bathroom

Justin under the house getting the new plumbing installed

Here 10 year old Jared, from Florida, puts together a bunk bed

And here he is again trying to train the local kids
on how to use power tools…these were not plugged in

A finished bunk bed

Ola and Tevoan put together the shower while Jared supervises

Larry and Jared from Florida helped serve
dinner at the St.Bernard Community Center

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Onsite has helped the Guidrys get back into their home this year after being taken for thousands of dollars by crooked contractors.

Here they say their thanks just before moving into their new home. This really was an amazing day for us.

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For two days this week we had 14 stage carpenters from the BLUE MAN GROUP come and help us fix our volunteer house. This amazing group of volunteers re-roped the windows, fixed the damaged floor boards, reinforced floor joists, re-framed a wall and replaced a rotted main beam under the house.

They also helped install baseboard trim at the Guidrys’ home in the lower 9th ward.

They all had a great experience and will try to return in 2009. Thanks again!

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