Tuesday, September 06, 2005
Sunday in Houston
So, I went to Houston on Sunday to volunteer to do what I could at the Astrodome. I left Austin around 9:45 AM and got to the Astrodome around 1. The Houston Red Cross Astrodome volunteer website had claimed that there were 4 to 8 hour shifts going on throughout the day, the reality, though, at least for the 'walk-in' volunteers was that it was an ongoing thing. My friend and I got there, parked, and signed in (name, address, phone number). We then went to a 10 minute 'orientation,' and were then sent to a staging area where we were to wait until needed. The staging area had quite a few rows of chairs (probably 100 chairs in all), but not nearly enough, and there was a big clump at the back. My friend and I took it upon ourselves to try to get the back clump organized into rows, walking around the center looking for the post-and-rope thingys (like the red velvet ones, though these were considerably lower-end), but when we found the Head Guy, we were told that they were out. So that turned out to be a futile excercise, and of course when we got back to the clump (which had thinned out considerably in our absence, since they had stopped admitting volunteers), we were still at the back of the crowd. Next we were asked to distribute drinking water to the other waiting volunteers, since many of them had not brought any with them.
And here I'll pause for a short digression about people not following directions. There were really only a few publicized guidelines for volunteers - y0u must be at least 18 years old, able to climb three flights of stairs, bring drinking water, and don't bring your purse. And yet most people didn't bring their own water, many women were toting purses, and there were several kids there with their moms - one actual baby, and 2 or 3 teens/pre-teens. Now, these were all well-meaning people who were spending their Sunday helping out strangers, they definitely weren't bad people. They just didn't notice or chose to ignore the few directives they were given. These directives were on the website, on the recorded phone message, and posted in the center itself, so they were easy to find for anyone who bothered to loook.
Ok, back to the story - after handing out water to everyone who wanted some, we again got in line, in the back of the line. We moved up relatively quickly, though, and eventually got assigned to an actual job with actual evacuees - we were asked to corral the many kids who were playing and keep them away from the triage area/quiet area. We were given these instructions by a volunteer, and led part of the way by another volunteer (I think, it may have been the same woman) who got distracted on the way because they were no longer admitting volunteers and they needed more volunteers - the last group they had asked for was supposed to be 50 people, but there were only 13.
And now another digression to observe that it was still pretty clear, in the relatively calm situation of the Houston astrodome, that those 'in charge' were making it up as they went along. They were clearly doing the best that they could, but they were not well-organized (the miscommunication about turning away volunteers when in fact volunteers were still needed, the congestion and confusion in the volunteer 'holding area', and the lack of someone in charge of our pack of 20 volunteers).
Anyway, we made it to the floor. Note that we never actually made it to the Astrodome proper - we were in the Reliant Center, which is part of the same thing, but in a different physical building - it's like a conference center, I guess. So we were on the floor, striding purposely, but none of us really knew what to do. We passed lots of kids playing with various sorts of balls, but they didn't seem to be doing anything they oughtn't be doing, and they were far away from the triage section (or, more accurately, the 'elderly' section). Eventually we sort of made a plan, and my friend and I set off to find the guy making PA system announcements, to ask him to make an announcement that the kids should head over to one section of the room for games. We were successful in that he made the announcement, but it was pretty clear that nobody listened to it - you know how inaudible these things tend to be - big room, cement floors, lots of people - the acoustics are horrible. Probably half an hour later, one solitary kid came up to us and asked us where the games were. We pointed him in the right direction.
Which is not to say that we didn't have some measure of success - there were some games of dodgeball and duck, duck, goose organized, and we were able for the most part of curtail the throwing of balls near the elderly and the very unquiet 'quiet area'. There was one kid who was in the area because he had to stay near his family - an understandable directive, and not one we attempted to circumvent. We just asked him to stay on the far side of the corridor. We also had some success in using tape to mark the borders where kids could play and where they oughtn't, and that helped. The tape itself was a precious commodity, and the Red Cross guy we got it from was very adamant about getting it back (which eventually he did - though there wasn't much left of it).
I also got to play a kind of basketball game with a very cute little girl - probably 6 or 7 - who was very forthright in asking me to play with her. So that was fun.
As we were about to leave, a kid pegged me (hard!) in the back of the head with a football. I took it away from him (well, my friend took it away and then gave it to me, and I kept it), and took it to a table with various toys to be picked up by another (hopefully less agressive) kid. It was a pretty aggressive act, but it's hard to be too mad at a kid who was probably pretty hopeless about life before Katrina, and now is even more hopeless and angry and having to deal with being homless and with no possessions about the clothes on his back.
The evacuees we saw were pretty clearly doing what they could to deal with an awful situation. They weren't in the dire straits of the first days when people were trapped without food, water, or electricity, but they were still living in a sports arena with no privacy and no idea what was going to become of them. One woman was telling her kids to stay in eyesight, and told us that someone had been raped there last night. It could very well be rumour, but it could very well be true. It's hard to know from this vantage point. And, I don't think I saw any white people amongst the evacuees. I know the storm destroyed lots of lives of folks of all races and classes (even Trent Lott lost his house, though I tend to doubt it was his *only* house), but the people who are in the most dire straits now are the people who were in the most dire straits before the storm, too. The straits are just dire-er.
So, I plan on signing up to volunteer with the Red Cross in Austin shortly, though from everything I've seen and heard they're even more disorganized than Houston. Still, there are lots of people here who will need our help in the coming months, and I hope to be able to offer some small amount of that help.
And here I'll pause for a short digression about people not following directions. There were really only a few publicized guidelines for volunteers - y0u must be at least 18 years old, able to climb three flights of stairs, bring drinking water, and don't bring your purse. And yet most people didn't bring their own water, many women were toting purses, and there were several kids there with their moms - one actual baby, and 2 or 3 teens/pre-teens. Now, these were all well-meaning people who were spending their Sunday helping out strangers, they definitely weren't bad people. They just didn't notice or chose to ignore the few directives they were given. These directives were on the website, on the recorded phone message, and posted in the center itself, so they were easy to find for anyone who bothered to loook.
Ok, back to the story - after handing out water to everyone who wanted some, we again got in line, in the back of the line. We moved up relatively quickly, though, and eventually got assigned to an actual job with actual evacuees - we were asked to corral the many kids who were playing and keep them away from the triage area/quiet area. We were given these instructions by a volunteer, and led part of the way by another volunteer (I think, it may have been the same woman) who got distracted on the way because they were no longer admitting volunteers and they needed more volunteers - the last group they had asked for was supposed to be 50 people, but there were only 13.
And now another digression to observe that it was still pretty clear, in the relatively calm situation of the Houston astrodome, that those 'in charge' were making it up as they went along. They were clearly doing the best that they could, but they were not well-organized (the miscommunication about turning away volunteers when in fact volunteers were still needed, the congestion and confusion in the volunteer 'holding area', and the lack of someone in charge of our pack of 20 volunteers).
Anyway, we made it to the floor. Note that we never actually made it to the Astrodome proper - we were in the Reliant Center, which is part of the same thing, but in a different physical building - it's like a conference center, I guess. So we were on the floor, striding purposely, but none of us really knew what to do. We passed lots of kids playing with various sorts of balls, but they didn't seem to be doing anything they oughtn't be doing, and they were far away from the triage section (or, more accurately, the 'elderly' section). Eventually we sort of made a plan, and my friend and I set off to find the guy making PA system announcements, to ask him to make an announcement that the kids should head over to one section of the room for games. We were successful in that he made the announcement, but it was pretty clear that nobody listened to it - you know how inaudible these things tend to be - big room, cement floors, lots of people - the acoustics are horrible. Probably half an hour later, one solitary kid came up to us and asked us where the games were. We pointed him in the right direction.
Which is not to say that we didn't have some measure of success - there were some games of dodgeball and duck, duck, goose organized, and we were able for the most part of curtail the throwing of balls near the elderly and the very unquiet 'quiet area'. There was one kid who was in the area because he had to stay near his family - an understandable directive, and not one we attempted to circumvent. We just asked him to stay on the far side of the corridor. We also had some success in using tape to mark the borders where kids could play and where they oughtn't, and that helped. The tape itself was a precious commodity, and the Red Cross guy we got it from was very adamant about getting it back (which eventually he did - though there wasn't much left of it).
I also got to play a kind of basketball game with a very cute little girl - probably 6 or 7 - who was very forthright in asking me to play with her. So that was fun.
As we were about to leave, a kid pegged me (hard!) in the back of the head with a football. I took it away from him (well, my friend took it away and then gave it to me, and I kept it), and took it to a table with various toys to be picked up by another (hopefully less agressive) kid. It was a pretty aggressive act, but it's hard to be too mad at a kid who was probably pretty hopeless about life before Katrina, and now is even more hopeless and angry and having to deal with being homless and with no possessions about the clothes on his back.
The evacuees we saw were pretty clearly doing what they could to deal with an awful situation. They weren't in the dire straits of the first days when people were trapped without food, water, or electricity, but they were still living in a sports arena with no privacy and no idea what was going to become of them. One woman was telling her kids to stay in eyesight, and told us that someone had been raped there last night. It could very well be rumour, but it could very well be true. It's hard to know from this vantage point. And, I don't think I saw any white people amongst the evacuees. I know the storm destroyed lots of lives of folks of all races and classes (even Trent Lott lost his house, though I tend to doubt it was his *only* house), but the people who are in the most dire straits now are the people who were in the most dire straits before the storm, too. The straits are just dire-er.
So, I plan on signing up to volunteer with the Red Cross in Austin shortly, though from everything I've seen and heard they're even more disorganized than Houston. Still, there are lots of people here who will need our help in the coming months, and I hope to be able to offer some small amount of that help.
# posted by Amy @ 2:58 PM 
