Day 4 Joplin 211

Today we woke up to... MORE rain. Fortunately were a little more willing to wake up this morning, it's funny that out of 7 people none of us are morning people. Today the Americore office sent us back to Elk's Lodge to work on tree limb debris removal. Last night, when it had stopped raining for a couple of hours, the city took bulldozers through the land to remove the debris that we had moved to the street. The bulldozers left the muddy ground very hard to walk through. So we decided to start the day working in the "Fire-brigade" lines of volunteers. We were all correct the first day when we thought that the lines worked inefficiently. However, this did give me a chance to mingle with the other volunteers. One guy next to me came from the University of Tulsa and was studying Electrical Engineering which is what my dad does so we had a lot to talk about. Another lady who recognized what sorority I was in just from my earrings and I talked for a long time and I found out she and her husband took the whole week off work to come down from Cincinnati and help with anything they needed in Joplin. Other volunteers I talked to were locals and said that their houses were not damaged, but some lost their jobs since their places of work were ruined, I had not even thought about that. Not only did people lose their houses, but they also lost a steady flow of income as well. Around noon, it started to completely pour and many groups left. Our group, and a group from the University of Oklahoma were the only ones who stayed. We all worked together to remove a whole pile of debris and even tree trunks together. We were soaked from head to toe but at the same time today was a blast! On the way home, we remembered the story from yesterday of the baby being thrown 12 blocks, and put that into perspective as we drove.

After a very long VERY hot shower, we went to the community kitchen to make dinner. We met a group of elderly RV enthusiasts that were staying there the whole week as well. They even made us dinner and served us sweets! (They obviously know how to get on a college kid's good side) After dinner they taught us how to play a card game called "O Hell" which is the common expression used in this game. We stayed up late playing cards with them and I am so excited to have a rematch tomorrow! We ended the rainy day with group bonding time and answering questions!!