Victor Vignettes

At the start of the week, we were given our work assignments at the Ocean Springs and Moss Point sites. First we had to find the sites. Clay and Sarah were headed (in two vehicles) for Moss Point, and Rich and Jay were headed for the eastern edge of Ocean Springs. Three drivers shared one map. On day 1, the map alone was not enough, because a lot of the street signs are still missing.

Eleanor and Maureen were switched in the middle of day 1 from Moss Point to Ocean Springs. Here they are preparing to leave camp to dig post holes for the 18 posts that would hold up the wheelchair ramp. Later a power posthole digger was rented to finish the job.

Camp Victor has two resident cats, an adult named Fema (who declined to pose for pictures) and a kitten named Frank (shown here). The women's dormitory was posted as a "no kitten zone" (due to allergies), but Frank was better at getting under the door than at reading the sign. At least one of the cats was pretty good at eliminating vermin — we didn't see any, in spite of living in a former factory/warehouse in an area hit hard by Katrina.

The dining hall is the social hub of CV. We had breakfast there every day, and volunteers from the team helped with preparation and cleanup. Before leaving for the work sites, we prepared our own bag lunches. Several evenings we had dinner there (including a memorable pork roast), again with team members helping John, a two-year volunteer who runs the kitchen. In the picture below, the team shares a light moment after dinner and before Compline.

On our last work day, the Ocean Springs team finished their job first and dispatched Jay to Biloxi to bring back Vietnamese Po' Boys for a late lunch in the dining hall after the Moss point team had also finished. In these two pictures we're negotiating who gets which slightly spicy and really spicy combinations.

Note the colorful T shirts hanging from the ceiling. CV has colorful tributes everywhere (walls as well as ceilings) from the thousands of volunteers who have been there to work on Katrina relief projects.

Our work day wasn't over! There is no end of jobs that need to be done within CV as well as in the surrounding communities. Since we were still available, we helped with drywall installation in an area that is being converted to needed offices, as well as other small tasks.

A notable feature of Camp Victor is its external murals, which we show on a separate page.

DAS, 10/29/07

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