(no subject)
today was our first day of orientation at rebuilding together. it was good. informative. we had po-boys for lunch which was nice.
something that has occurred to me, though, is that the americorps volunteers do not appear to have much knowledge of what actually happened in the storm. at least the a few of them don't.
and i don't understand that. i don't understand how you can come to a new place, know that you are going to be interacting with people who are going to ask you a lot of questions, help traumatized homeowners, and not bother to look up basic information about what happened. It is ridiculous to me that people don't know what category the storm was or that most of the damage did not occur from the hurricane itself but from the flooding that occurred AFTER the hurricane had passed through. that's very basic knowledge. the flooding is why many people got screwed over by insurance companies - they paid for insurance on their homes in case of damage from a hurricane, but not flooding, so then because the damage did not occur from katrina, they didn't get any money.
and that's really been my pet-peeve recently. people talking out of their ass. i've already heard someone, who is a really nice girl that i like a lot, talk offensively about congress (which always bothers me because people are SO ignorant about congress). and today i had to defend peace corps because this one girl said that she decided not to join because she didn't want to make america's reputation abroad any worse. or something to that extent. she had read confessions of an economic hit man, which is about a guy who joined peace corps after college in Ecuador and then worked for a corporation that convinced people there to buy into contracts and stole a whole bunch of money from them. (i've never actually read the book, so i'm winging it here.) what the heck? it's a good thing she said that the program they had in iran was actually really beneficial before they pulled out, because otherwise i would have thought she based all of her opinions off of this one book. (and i'm not even sure how the book speaks badly of peace corps except that was what the guy did before he joined this corporation.) and what really got me was that i had just finished saying that my 2 best friends were doing peace corps and then they started bashing it. i understand not wanting to do it or even criticizing it for varying reasons but where is the tact here? so i stood up for the peace corps. my roommate said she had "her own issues with the peace corps" and said she thought there were other options for doing what they did. if so, i would like for her to tell me what they are because i have researched this topic heavily and while i am not the best researcher ever and i'm sure i don't know about all of the opportunities out there, i'm pretty sure peace corps is one of the very few ways to go abroad and do volunteer work and get paid for it straight out of college. for most programs you have to pay to volunteer. regardless, i was irritated, especially by the lack of tact as i mentioned previously. i found it offensive to bash something that i had just finished saying my friends were involved in, especially since it's something that i know matters to them and like us, they only want to help other people. and when people are directly or indirectly insulting something they do, i get aggravated. i'm overprotective. what can i say? at least have some darn tact people!
other than that, though, it was a splendid day. it looks like we will be doing a variety of things with this job and that seems really great. i will leave this year with a variety of skill sets! i also heard about something called urban gardening and if you volunteer there you get produce in return. holla! i hope that really exists here because that means my grocery bill will be significantly lower.
something that has occurred to me, though, is that the americorps volunteers do not appear to have much knowledge of what actually happened in the storm. at least the a few of them don't.
and i don't understand that. i don't understand how you can come to a new place, know that you are going to be interacting with people who are going to ask you a lot of questions, help traumatized homeowners, and not bother to look up basic information about what happened. It is ridiculous to me that people don't know what category the storm was or that most of the damage did not occur from the hurricane itself but from the flooding that occurred AFTER the hurricane had passed through. that's very basic knowledge. the flooding is why many people got screwed over by insurance companies - they paid for insurance on their homes in case of damage from a hurricane, but not flooding, so then because the damage did not occur from katrina, they didn't get any money.
and that's really been my pet-peeve recently. people talking out of their ass. i've already heard someone, who is a really nice girl that i like a lot, talk offensively about congress (which always bothers me because people are SO ignorant about congress). and today i had to defend peace corps because this one girl said that she decided not to join because she didn't want to make america's reputation abroad any worse. or something to that extent. she had read confessions of an economic hit man, which is about a guy who joined peace corps after college in Ecuador and then worked for a corporation that convinced people there to buy into contracts and stole a whole bunch of money from them. (i've never actually read the book, so i'm winging it here.) what the heck? it's a good thing she said that the program they had in iran was actually really beneficial before they pulled out, because otherwise i would have thought she based all of her opinions off of this one book. (and i'm not even sure how the book speaks badly of peace corps except that was what the guy did before he joined this corporation.) and what really got me was that i had just finished saying that my 2 best friends were doing peace corps and then they started bashing it. i understand not wanting to do it or even criticizing it for varying reasons but where is the tact here? so i stood up for the peace corps. my roommate said she had "her own issues with the peace corps" and said she thought there were other options for doing what they did. if so, i would like for her to tell me what they are because i have researched this topic heavily and while i am not the best researcher ever and i'm sure i don't know about all of the opportunities out there, i'm pretty sure peace corps is one of the very few ways to go abroad and do volunteer work and get paid for it straight out of college. for most programs you have to pay to volunteer. regardless, i was irritated, especially by the lack of tact as i mentioned previously. i found it offensive to bash something that i had just finished saying my friends were involved in, especially since it's something that i know matters to them and like us, they only want to help other people. and when people are directly or indirectly insulting something they do, i get aggravated. i'm overprotective. what can i say? at least have some darn tact people!
other than that, though, it was a splendid day. it looks like we will be doing a variety of things with this job and that seems really great. i will leave this year with a variety of skill sets! i also heard about something called urban gardening and if you volunteer there you get produce in return. holla! i hope that really exists here because that means my grocery bill will be significantly lower.