Week 1: Hurricane story
2218 words by cnguye11
My hurricane story begins about one week before I evacuated for Hurricane Gustav. I was notified by my mother when she explained to me about the incoming hurricane and that I had to leave with my brother to go to Dallas, Texas with my car that I just got a month earlier. As soon as I heard that, I packed up as much belongings as I can, learning from my previous mistake with Hurricane Katrina. You see, I wasn’t well prepared for Hurricane Katrina, thinking it wouldn’t be more than a few days away from home and everything would be back to normal. That ended tragically as you can probably imagine. Anyways I ended up packing two bags of clothing, toothbrush, contacts, etc. about a couple of days before I have to leave. Only thing I had to do now is to wait.
It was like any Fridays before until around 11 before noon, I get a text message from my brother “Get you’re things and wait for me. I am coming home around 12. We are going to leave today.” I told him I had one more class left before I can go home. I was sitting in that class just thinking about where am I going (because I didn’t really have a clue), what am I going to do when I get there, what I am I going to do the entire trip, is the rest family going to be ok, and so on and on. Class ended a little early, so I went to tell my situation to all my friends that had to stay back for class and said my goodbyes. I went home, double checked if everything was in order. To no surprise, I knew we were not going to leave as planned. What did surprise me was my cousin, who is coming along with us. I didn’t mind since I figured it was just me and my brother sitting in that little car with plenty of room for about 8 hours. I knew we weren’t going to leave as planned. It wasn’t until 1:30 that we left, and traffic was already piling up. While I was sitting in the car, I overheard my cousin talking on the phone with his girlfriend. That’s when I knew we were going to pick her up too. The traffic was pretty bad. We didn’t reach her house until about 3 o clock. What makes matter worse is she was out getting lunch, which we had plenty of in the car, knowing the fact that we were on our way there. So we had to wait another 20 minutes. On top of all of that, she needed to get her stuff in the car. If I can recall, she had about 3 baskets of clothing and personals. Right when we are all set to go, we had to make one more stop, Baton Rouge.
Now I can probably understand why we have to make a stop there. We can use a little break before we set out for the long trip. But I learned two things. First, we were there to pick up yet another person. Seeing how tight it is already with my cousin’s girlfriend already taking up half of the trunk space, we have to pick up another person. And I am sitting in the back. We went to his house, packed his things in our car that somehow made it happen, picked him up, and we were all set to go. As if the weather wasn’t hot enough, I now have two people sitting on both ends. It was pretty miserable. It all started from evacuating with just me and my brother to now sitting with a couple of strangers. That was the first thing I had to learn. The second and most important thing that I had to realize was the designation. Even though I wasn’t told directly, I had to hear what they talking about where they had unpacked everything. But I figured it all out. I knew everybody in the car were fond of having these spiritual retreats they been going to, including my brother. Just that past summer, they all went to a silent retreat. I also knew that my cousin’s girlfriend needed some fabric for some kind of activity when we get there. And one thing I overheard was the kind of people that were going to be there: some grown people, a priest, and lots of little children. Add all those things together and what did I come up with? We were going to a retreat in Arlington, and retreats are not my thing. But I couldn’t complain about where we were going. Anywhere that is not going to get smashed by the hurricane would be just fine by me.
We arrived at a secluded camp ground at 2 in the morning, and I was ready to go to sleep. I couldn’t catch any in the car because of the tight spaces and the two people sitting next to me were spreading their legs to get real comfortable. The place was bigger than I had anticipated; you needed to drive to get from one place to another. We found our cabin and slept because we already had an activity to do in the morning. There was a big commotion around 7 in the morning about eating breakfast and going to mass. Keep in mind that we were still very tired and eating breakfast was the last thing our minds. When we did get up, we each took turns taking a shower and fixing ourselves up. After we were done, we decided to go to the mess hall to grab a quick snack. There were filled with little children and adults from different communities from all over the country. Breakfast wasn’t all bad. Mass was already starting, so we hurried to the chapel. We already had to do an activity, which is to sit next to somebody you are not familiar with during the mass. Everybody was really friendly, so it wasn’t uncomfortable. After mass was over, we played games that were already prepared for us. Each game had a meaning; in this game, it taught us to learn a little something from one another. We played about 3 different kinds of games before it was time for lunch, but I was called to help set up for an activity. When it was time for it to begin, I had to participate. I had to admit it was a lot of fun. After it was over, we headed back to the chapel to learn about goals. We learned about Michael Phelps and other Olympic gold medalists. I noticed everyone in the chapel was either falling asleep or already sleeping. I made some friends, and I was quick to make fun of them. We played little games and nobody was listening to the speeches. And after that was done, everybody took a break so the chapel can be set up for yet another activity. I forgot what it was called, but it had something to do with deep prayer and total silence dedicated to God. I prayed for my family safety and the safety of those who were still in New Orleans. Then after I was done praying, I just sat there until I took a nap. It felt like an eternity in there. Finally, it was time to eat, and the food was the bomb. It was just like home cooked meal. I ate until I was fat and stupid. This continued on until Monday morning. Everybody had their moments like when everybody got into groups within their communities. In my group, everyone prayed for the hurricane because we heard news that it was going to be “the storm of the century”. Our only source was our phones via text messages, phone calls, and the internet. Everyone got scared and cried. I was just looking at them like wow. I didn’t think it was going to be a big deal because I been here before, I knew what it was going to be like before I even evacuated.
It was time to leave the campground, but we weren’t ready to part ways yet. All the young adults and some grownups were going to eat at a restaurant before everybody. Everybody had a great time; talking about how much fun we had at the camping grounds, what they thought about the past retreats, how much the hurricane weakened, the people from New Orleans were all invited to a resort in Denver for the winter and spring, and the World Youth Day in Barcelona, Spain in the next three years. After we ate, everyone that I evacuated with (except for our friend from Baton Rouge, who was gone for most of the time while we were at the retreat and my cousin’ girlfriend) were headed towards Dallas because a friend knew we were nearby, so he invited us to stay at his place. We all had a great time. He prepared a barbeque just for us. And not only that, three more of my cousins were nearby and they wanted to party with all of us, but they had to leave that night. There was yet another barbeque the next day from a nearby neighborhood. We had to pack up to go to Houston because there were people expecting to see us from the retreat. We said our goodbyes and showed our appreciation for everyone who let us stay at their home. On the way to Houston, we saw a lot of familiar people and chatted with them for a little bit. When we arrived, we settled down and took a long nap. We all woke up to lunch at a Thai restaurant, which wasn’t all that bad. Our group from the retreated had an urge to go shoot some pool at a family pool hall. That night was memorable. There were things said that I would like to share, but I know I will get in trouble for it. We had a really great time, but we needed some sleep to leave for Monroe. It was going to be a painful trip, especially going to a place like Monroe. We had to go to Monroe because my cousins who visited us in Dallas were stuck there, and the only way back was us. It’s funny how the trip started with 5 people and ended up having 5 different people going home. We got there in the evening with some good news. New Orleans wasn’t hit as bad as everyone expected, and it was alright to go home. As a celebration, we spent most of the night at a friend’s house just to have a good time. I couldn’t remember much that happened that night, but I heard some bizarre stuff was going down. There was this time when one guy was cheering for no reason, and disappeared on everybody. There was another time when the host went straight to sleep and we were just getting started. Everyone returned to our rooms to sleep, so we can wake up early to watch the Saints game. After we watched the game, we packed up and were set to go home. I don’t know how we were able to fit all of those luggages, I mean we used up every available space in that trunk. During our ride home, we just reflected on what happened and told all kinds of stories during our little vacation. It was like my summer was extended for another week. Everyone got home safe and sound.
My expectation about this course is that I will learn even more about the Bible in depth. I have a general knowledge about the Bible already, but I wanted to learn even more, which is why I enrolled in this class (other than the fact that this course is required). I am a Roman Catholic, and religious classes were mandatory in my community. I was always interested in the Bible ever since I can remember. It contains all sorts of different stories, especially those that were considered to be supernatural. Other than reading the different stories, I haven’t really used the Bible to guide me.
586 BCE was a key event in the Bible because the Babylonians destroyed the Temple of Solomon along with most of the documentations that recorded their previous history. In response to this, the Hebrews rewrote the Torah, which is initially the birth of the Bible. Lamentations is the time period when the Babylonians left Jerusalem in ruins and depicts the suffering of the Hebrews. This parallels aftermath of Hurricane Katrina because New Orleans looked like it was in ruins and people were suffering. The Merneptah Stele was an Egyptian inscription on a tablet that was famous for naming Israelites outside of Israel. The Babe Ruth clips showed how one story can be told in many different ways. It showed us that the Bible could have been reflected at the time it was written.