October 2010 Weddings
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
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Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
*cm*
I'm curious, did you, friends and family evacuate for Katrina? What was your experience like?
I went down twice to volunteer and was just fascinated by the damage and destruction caused by such a natural disaster? (We visited Nola both times we were there but actually stayed and worked in Kiln, MS and surrounding areas).
Re: *cm*
Oh Katrina!! I didn't evacuate which was the biggest mistake of my life, but now I can say that I was very lucky. I can also say that I will never stay again if told to leave but at the time, we'd never had a storm like that so we thought we'd lose power for a day or two and then be back at work. I was one year out of college and working and living in an apt in the burbs not far from my mom's house.
For some reason neither me or my mom had credit cards, so we couldn't leave the state and go to a hotel, so we went with 2 of my mom's friends to stay at one of their houses on the northshore of Lake Pontchartrain (about 30 miles from nola) where we thought we'd just be there for one night. We lost power of course and trees took off about 40% of the roof of the house we were in, so we were basically camping for a week. Also, you can't drink the water. Water can only be used for flushing toilets (if you dare since it could easily back up). We heard on the radio that the city was underwater so we had NO IDEA if our houses were. We were also told that we would not be allowed to return to the metro area for a few weeks.
This scared the beejeezus out of us. We had limited cash (and all ATMS need electricity-- D'OH!!). We had gas in our cars but we weren't sure if it was enough to get us out of town since we could only go to MS from there and we were sure they didn't have power either (so no gas stations!). We didn't have cell service so we couldn't reach our family or friends and they couldn't reach us, so we couldn't get in touch with anyone to try to meet up.
Finally after one week of basically camping we made a break for it to try to go to my brother's house that lived about 40 miles outside the city. We were stopped by the National Guard. That was pretty much the most desperate moment of my life. The National Guard had road blocks up and they would check your ID and if you had a certain zip code (which were ALL in the metro area) you were not allowed on the interstate. I can't describe how UN-HUMAN and UN-AMERICAN we felt at 10pm driving with my dog on my lap and sobbing to this poor guy in his army fatigues holding an automatic weapon. We were literally homeless. We ended up driving about 3 hours out of our way to go back roads and finally made it to my brother's house not knowing if there would be trees in the road blocking us or if we'd run out of gas and would have to sleep in the car. We also didn't know if my brother would even be home since our phones didn't work!! Luckily he was (his house was looted the week they were gone) and we stayed there for another week and I bounced around for about 2 more weeks before they let us go back home.
Once we got home, we saw that my apt and my moms house did not flood- just roof damage which was ok considering. My office flooded but we were able to set up a temp office in Baton Rouge. Most of my friend's parents and a lot of my extended family lost their homes. One of my coworkers gave birth the day of the storm and the hospital had generators but NO A/C!! So they handed her her baby and sent her home where they thought she would be better and safer than staying in the hospital! Another friend's mom is a tiny little woman that had to stay to work in an inner-city hospital where the first floor flooded and they had to evacuate them in boats and they left her on a bridge for a day with patients until they could get them out. I could go on and on with sob stories.
The city had us on curfew for a long time so if you were caught out you could technically be arrested. Nothing stayed open (if it was open at all) past 4pm. So by the time I left work in Baton Rouge at 5pm and drove the hour home, nothing was open. This went on for it seems like forever but I guess it was really a couple of months.
So sorry for this LOOOOOOONG post, but I could go on forever. The emotional toll it took on us is waaay worse than physical damage. DH and I just moved into a new house last month that had 4ft of water in it for 2 weeks. DH wasn't here for katrina so he doesn't "get it" that I have a fear that we will lose all of our possessions this summer. But it has taught me to NEVER stay (and we actually can't-- where we live goes under mandatory evacuations so you have to leave). I've also have my evac credit card so I never have to worry about that again. We are also insured through our eyeballs so we just have to pack up the dog and the photos and be on our way.
Again- sorry this was so long!
Don't apologize for being so long! I'm so interested and love what what you shared. Thank goodness that even though it sounds hellish that you were okay. I honestly cannot imagine.
DH and I both read Zeitoun, based on a guy's true lie how he stayed after Katrina and was accused of being part of Al Queda and imprisoned. We both were mortified to learn how so many people were treated post-Katrina by the government.
Ha, and I definitely know where Lake P is. We got a flat tire on the interstate over the lake in the dark on our way from Nola to Gulfport!
Please feel free to share anything else about your experience. It's so intriguing to me!
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Yeah the whole thing with the gov't is VERY eye-opening and depressing. I will say though that the local military was there doing there thing. I lived with my sister for a few weeks before I could go back home and every where you looked there were military tanks and troops handing out bottled water, MRE's, diapers, etc.
Actually here's a funny story-- For MONTHS after when things were back up and running, the military was still a HUGE presence in the city. I was on Bourbon Street for a friend's birthday and instead of the usual police on the corners, there were huge army humvees and guys just standing guard. We felt VERY safe- LOL. We would drive down I-10 and get traffic would stink because they would be transporting military vehicles. There was a running joke when you'd get somewhere and be like-- "Sorry I was late, I was caught behind another army tank caravan... AGAIN!" It really makes you appreciate living in a country where we have never seen a war on our own territory in our lifetime.
Oh hey- you were right by our new place when you got your flat!-- haha. We moved to Slidell which is right over the lake. DH works in Picayune, MS (right over the state line) so now we are only about 15 mins from MS.