Chapter 2- Road Warriors, Part 2
MONDAY
Today was a day to set up our stuff and get oriented, or re-oriented in my case. We helped Hands-On, our hosts while we do our semester down here, consolidate some of their possessions and put down some shipping pallets underneath a really nice army tent and then set up our own two-person tents inside the larger tent forming our own cozy little dormitory.
After we did that and picked up Shana from the airport we had an opportunity to explore. Biloxi is still suffering from Katrina and it outrages me that we are not only throwing away money and lives in Iraq, but that the budget for Mississippi for rebuilding after Katrina is... about 7 Billion. I think I read a figure that said that's what we spend in Iraq... every ONE TO TWO WEEKS. This is plainly unacceptable. Anyhow, I'll try not to get on the soap box too often, but that figure is too staggering. I'll try to illustrate the state of things with some pictures over the next couple of days.
On a positive note, today was Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Biloxi plays home to the second largest parade aside from Atlanta, GA in the nation. There were three college bands and a high school band who also played in a "Battle of the Bands" at the end of the parade route. One band played "Crazy" by Gnarls Barkley... awesome. It was amazing to see everyone from the community as well as tons of people from the surrounding area participating and enjoying the parade. Hands-On: Biloxi had a float and some of the volunteers walked in the parade.
We decided to go out that night once Omar, the last of the studio crew got into town to the pub down street a block called... wait for it... The Pub! Anyhow, a couple of brews with the locals and had a pretty good time. We dropped by the night before and it was Kaye, the bartendress' birthday so we had some cake and hob-nobbed with the three guys in the studio from Mississippi State. They kicked our butts in darts, but are great and funny guys (Chandler, Scott, and Connor) and are all in their 4th of 5 years in Undergrad at Mississippi State.
More soon... time for bed.