02/05/2007 - LAST WEEK, I teamed up with the National Hands On Network, a growing network of more than a half million volunteers changing communities inside and outside the United States, to participate in a week-long service project in the Gulf region.

Since Hurricanes Katrina and Rita struck the Gulf Coast nearly 18 months ago, I've always wanted to volunteer to help with relief efforts to help the residents of the Gulf Coast.
The volunteering experience was emotional and somewhat overwhelming. I went with employees from Kasier Permanente, an organization that donated $3 million toward relief efforts early on. We worked at various recovery projects including, but not limited to home rehabilitation, community resource restoration, and environmental restoration, in Biloxi, Mississippi, and in New Orleans.

Here are some of my journal entries, which I jotted down in e-mails sent home each night after some very long days.

Sunday, Jan 28th
I arrived in New Orleans after 1:30 p.m. As more KP folks arrived, we introduced ourselves and our regions and milled about waiting for those on later flights. I've always had a sweet spot in my heart for this city–although I don't have family here, the friends I know here have always gone out of their way to show me a good time when I visit. The last time I was here was about a week before Katrina. Like the few other times before, it was a trip where I got to be a tourist (visiting historic places, soaking up the music at festivals, and gorging myself on shrimp and catfish po-boys) as well as experience some day-to-day life through my friends who live(d) here.

This time it will be different. One of the main reasons I volunteered for this work is because last year I had an opportunity to interview and collect stories from Hurricane Katrina survivors for a museum's oral history project. Their stories broke my heart. Doing something was just a matter of time. That time starts today.

It's after 5 p.m. by the time we hit the road, all 30-plus of us, excited, anxious, and in awe of the miles of storm-ravaged and demolished strip malls, gas stations, apartment buildings, casinos, and hotels we see along U.S. 90 on our way to Biloxi. It's a reality check that's impossible to ignore.

Monday, Jan. 30
Last night we arrived to the Hands On base camp, located at a Methodist church in Biloxi. The mostly college-aged staff at Hands On Biloxi greet us, introductions are made, rules are learned, a tour is given, bunks are assigned and later we eat. There's much ado over the outdoor showers, two of which reportedly run cold rather quickly… but no one complains. In fact, I think some of us welcome the harsh elements…even from our conversation, its clear that no one among us wants to be seen as a wimpy volunteer.

Here, everyone does everything. Chores get doled out to whoever raises their hand and accepts the challenge to help. I listen to Hand On volunteers give their daily reports: someone gutted a house, someone helped tutor kids, a crew removed mold from a house. There is big applause and cheers all around. I feel like I've fallen down a rabbit hole into an alternate summer camp universe.

Next morning, I awake with a pain in my lower back. The air in my air mattress gave up and departed during the night. From my perch on top bunk I smell the aroma of breakfast. We're out the door by 7:45 a.m. We head to a woman's house in East Biloxi that is gutted and in need of mold treatment. We apply a thick white paint called "kilz" to the interior framework of the house. It's hard but satisfying, especially after meeting Erica, the owner who has lived in the house all her life.

Her Pomeranian, "Kizzy" has obviously seen her share of despair too. She barked non-stop for the four hours we are there. Later we head to 211 Graham Street to help finish gutting that house. We use hammers and crow bars to pull nails from floorboards and walls. Initially, somehow it does not seem as significant as the painting work, kind of like we're using eyedroppers to fill up the Atlantic Ocean… but soon we're in a zone and as we work up a cloud of dust and mete out an audible rhythm – the squelch of steel and nails and wood followed by our own breathing, I realize that this little act, multiplied by all of us, is already making a difference.

I see that difference in the eyes of the Sam, the owner of the house. He greets all 10 or so of us, shaking our hands and thanking us. As he recounts his sad survivor's story, a story he undoubtedly has told hundreds of times, all we can do is stand in a circle around him, listening and trying to be of support.

Tuesday, Jan. 30
A little ingenuity goes a long way. I put a few well-placed cushions and a sleeping bag under my squishy air mattress and finally got a better night's sleep. Today I joined a team designated to go to the Coastal Family Health Center, a community medical clinic for low-income residents of Gulf Port, Mississippi. We painted a mural (well, we filled in the color for a mural that was drawn by a Hands On volunteer) in the pediatric ward.

The work was much easier on the knees and back, no hammering, climbing, or demolishing, just mixing paints and creating a cartoon canvas of kids dressed in career clothes – there was a doctor, nurse, an astronaut, a policewoman, a firewoman. I painted a football player, a New Orleans Saint, of course. In the afternoon, I helped prepare dinner for more than 100 volunteers, military style. We made red beans and rice, salad and cornbread.

Now, beans and rice was something I could get down with. I grew up eating red beans and "dirty" rice. So I'm thinking I can really "hook these beans up" by adding my special ingredients and/or cooking with a little extra soul… nope. The best way was to follow the standard recipe we used so that everyone's tastes can be accommodated. Besides if someone wanted a little extra cayenne or garlic they could add it after they got their plate.

That's what I like about a true democracy, it leaves room for the "and/both model" instead of the rigid either/or blueprint. Everyone counts. No one is left behind. Now will someone tell that to President Bush? His administration failed miserably to come to the aid of people in the Gulf, especially New Orleans. Katrina was the greatest natural disaster in the history of our country I've heard the damage toll is in excess of $80 billion, and even now some 16 months later, the death toll of thousands of lives lost—many needlessly—still mounts.

If you count the illnesses and suicides I read about recently. Witnessing the government's slow response to help the victims of Katrina was embarrassing and frustrating. It made me angry. And that anger turned into purpose. That's why I am here

Wed, Jan 31, 2007
One thing is for sure: as much as we are needed down here, we all desperately need to do this work. I call it "giver's gain." In my mind, there's no other way to personal happiness or fulfillment. It's just so funny that we have it so backwards in this society. All this occurred to me as I pulled weeds and cleared debris at a Boys and Girls Club in East Biloxi. It was completely gone. Only the foundation remained.

This was the first time all 30 of us got to work on the same assignment. We shoveled dirt, hauled trash, gathered branches, and found sea shells everywhere. This area, like much of the coast, was 20 feet under water. As we brought the playgrounds back to life, we laughed, joked, and considered what we'd be doing if we were back at work (answering e-mails or in meetings). Everyone worked hard and the spirit of cooperation was high. Later we got a historic tour of Biloxi and ate dinner at Mary Mahoney's, a longtime favorite restaurant.

Thurs. Feb 1, 2007
We said goodbye to Biloxi and hello to the Big Easy, arriving to New Orleans in the evening. I won't miss the hard bunk beds or the almost-syncopated, ridiculous symphony of snoring I was treated to every night. The Hands On base camp in located at church in the Central City district, near downtown. Today hit everyone hard. Maybe it was the long, bumpy ride back to New Orleans, taking in the scattered remains of a once-thriving beach town outside the van window.

By the time we unpacked and loaded up to head to the Lower 9th Ward, one of the working-class neighborhoods largely neglected from recovery efforts, I knew I was in store for depressing scenes. But nothing could have prepared me for this.

The TV news and documentaries really can't do justice to the utter devastation down here. Houses on top of cars, roofs caved in, brick homes seemingly intact on the outside but shelled on the inside. Seeing it now, so many months after Katrina, I am left thinking, could this have been prevented? As we fan out near the levee to look at an area where a thriving African American neighborhood once stood, a place where mostly working-class people earned their piece of the dream, ultimately buying their own home and passing it down through the generations, I wonder what will become of the children? What about the elders?

What is a neighborhood or city, afterall? Is it defined by its buildings or its people? If people are the heart and soul, what part is lost when the homes, hewed out of the peoples' particular way of living, are gone forever? I feel a surge of guilt, as some of us take photos–I feel like a gawking tourist among the ruins. I even see a tourist bus drive down the street.

Perhaps people's natural curiosity can be funneled into creating revenue to bring this area back. We visit the area near the levee, and I stand on a small three-step porch that leads to nowhere. The house was washed away. Looking across the acres of concrete foundations where homes once stood, I can't imagine what the people who once lived here went through when the waters came.

I think about how small our childhood homes always seem when we visit them as adults. Is it really a matter if perspective? We say, "How did six of us live in this small 3-bedroom house?" At least we have a place to come back to. Here, it seems they now have no place to hang their memories.

For dinner we are treated to a New Orleans feast at the home of Ray S., the former husband of Jackie, one of the KP volunteers. This was one for the record books. Ray and his family welcomed us into their home where we feasted on gumbo, jambalaya, shrimp boil, catfish and more. They thanked us profusely and said it if wasn't for folks like us they'd still be underwater waiting for FEMA and the government.

Friday, Feb 2, 2007
I love to gut. I discovered this fact by helping Ms. Frances, a woman who's house in Slidell, La., was destroyed by the storm. We arrived early, around 8:15 a.m. this morning, donned Tyvek suits (white coveralls that are used when being exposed to hazardous chemicals), respirators and goggles. With crowbars and sledgehammers in hand, proceeded to pry, pop, bang, smash and pound the walls of her house until all that was left was the studs. We demolished her house in about five hours, a Hands On record.

We ate lunch in her backyard; her family made catfish, white beans and rice, and fixings. She lived in the home for 50 years before Katrina and said she was so happy that we were there to help get her house back in order. The mayor of Slidell came by and echoed everything we heard from other Louisiana residents: "If it weren't for volunteers, the state would still be a mess. Thank you for caring enough to come down."

Later back at base camp, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagins made a surprise visit. He came in and took photos with us and thanked us for helping. At the end of the day, I felt good. I'd worked extra hard on Ms. Frances's house because I knew it would be the last one, at least for this trip.

That evening we went to Mulate's, a famous restaurant that is known for its authentic Cajun dishes. This was the wind-down to the trip. As some headed to the French Quarter to take in the sights or back to the base camp, I realized how much we'd all bonded during this trip. It felt like everyone chosen for the volunteer project had something unique to offer.

For me, this trip was an amazing experience, a kind of social experiment that went beyond all expectations. Among the many intangible, "had-to-be-there" experiences I had, the two top takeaways for me are: We are all driven by a need to help others, and, volunteering transforms the giver as much as it does the recipient. The only thing that has me scratching my head is why don't more people volunteer?