Greg spent Friday and Saturday down on Galveston Island helping folks cleanup. Here is a description of what he did:
On Friday I went down with Ryan Bardo to help a friend of the Anthon’s. He is in his last year of medical school down at UTMB and was actually out of town taking a test or something when the storm hit. He called a neighbor to grab a few things like his wedding photo album, but didn’t really get anything out before the storm. His house had three feet of seawater in it and had been closed up for almost two weeks while the Island was closed. Pretty much everything in the house had to be hauled to the curb for the city to haul off. Things that didn’t actually get wet were starting to be affected by the mold that was growing in the house. Some things that may have survived a regular flood were being eaten up by the salt water. We hauled out furniture and furnishings (living room, bedroom, closets, . . . ) and appliances (washer/dryer, fridge, stove, dishwasher, everything) out and then started ripping out the sheetrock on the walls. We pull off the sheetrock up to about four feet. The mold was growing inside the walls so they had to be opened up so they could dry out. They was also a layer of mud under the wood floors that seem to be common in those homes.
Anything that had filled up with seawater was especially putrid. I don’t know if you remember how things that get wet down at the beach smell if you don’t get them cleaned up but it is really bad. I was wearing a mask to keep from breathing the mold and stuff which helped a bit with the smell, but there were still things that had been holding the seawater for two weeks--letting it get really rank. Dishwashers were particularly bad because they are designed to keep water in them. Also plastic storage containers that were under people beds or other locations where they couldn’t float up had filled with water and were very bad to move.
Saturday was a repeat of Friday’s experience except that we were working with a larger crew. We met down at the Galveston chapel to get a work assignment and then went out. We were paired up with a team from League City. A large group from the Dallas had spent the night at the Alvin chapel and were working near us also.
Of course the upside is the chance we had to go down and do service for these people. It is quite a sight to see this big group of people in yellow “Mormon Helping Hands” shirts singing “Come, come, ye saints” and then disperse through the city. I saw several other groups of yellow shirts while driving to our work location or while driving home. Lots of missionaries from the Texas South Mission. They would show us how to get to our job and then join in with the last group they guided. The church is very visible down there right now between the work crews and the cleaning kits and hygiene kits that we are leaving with people. We spent several hours on Saturday in a non-member house working and at the end they asked about giving us a donation or something. Told them no thanks but to please be nice to the missionaries next time they came by. Even if they initially don’t want to hear a gospel message you never know where the conversation will go even if they are only there a few minutes.
We expect to get more work assignments over the coming weeks. Don’t know exactly what they will be but we’re expecting to be busy.
Anything that had filled up with seawater was especially putrid. I don’t know if you remember how things that get wet down at the beach smell if you don’t get them cleaned up but it is really bad. I was wearing a mask to keep from breathing the mold and stuff which helped a bit with the smell, but there were still things that had been holding the seawater for two weeks--letting it get really rank. Dishwashers were particularly bad because they are designed to keep water in them. Also plastic storage containers that were under people beds or other locations where they couldn’t float up had filled with water and were very bad to move.
Saturday was a repeat of Friday’s experience except that we were working with a larger crew. We met down at the Galveston chapel to get a work assignment and then went out. We were paired up with a team from League City. A large group from the Dallas had spent the night at the Alvin chapel and were working near us also.
Of course the upside is the chance we had to go down and do service for these people. It is quite a sight to see this big group of people in yellow “Mormon Helping Hands” shirts singing “Come, come, ye saints” and then disperse through the city. I saw several other groups of yellow shirts while driving to our work location or while driving home. Lots of missionaries from the Texas South Mission. They would show us how to get to our job and then join in with the last group they guided. The church is very visible down there right now between the work crews and the cleaning kits and hygiene kits that we are leaving with people. We spent several hours on Saturday in a non-member house working and at the end they asked about giving us a donation or something. Told them no thanks but to please be nice to the missionaries next time they came by. Even if they initially don’t want to hear a gospel message you never know where the conversation will go even if they are only there a few minutes.
We expect to get more work assignments over the coming weeks. Don’t know exactly what they will be but we’re expecting to be busy.
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