SU Alternative Fall Break 2010

I learned many conceptions we see today, especially in the media, are actually misconceptions. We have such a fallacy in believing the world is corrected once a disaster is no longer mentioned. But affected areas are still healing. Katrina's aftermath is still evident and alive, while the oil spill is still lurking in the Gulf. Neither is mostly absolved. Both are still there, still in need of help, though little apparent to people outside these regions. These disasters are still there, still causing pain and hardship for the residents.
I would like to challenge anyone who claims the Katrina region is fixed, that the Gulf is 75% clean of oil. We heard plenty of eyewitness accounts proclaiming continued pain. We saw for ourselves the infrastructure that must be rebuilt five years later, and will continue to be rebuilt long after our trip.
I learned much on this trip about misery, recovery, hope and stubborness. I feel I've been affected in profound ways, such as I can seriously feel stirrings of compassion on a much deeper level than I felt before the trip. I'm going to appear cliqued here, but one person can make a difference. How many people whom we talked to were grateful we had taken an interest in a forgotten disaster-recovery area in our country? How many willingly shared their lives painful stories to a bunch of college kids? We may have made a small difference in their lives and upon the Gulf region, but I feel the greatest impact was made upon me and my fellow Alternate Fall Break travellers. We came on this trip to have a good time, but we also willingly gave up our vacations to learn and work. We've made but a small stirring in a wide sea, but even a small stirring can expound to create further reaching results. Our experiences and stories are not hidden behind the agendas of others. No one needs to read between the lines and decifer the facts to get the real story. Our experiences and thoughts are raw, true and less biased by the outer world because we saw for ourselves the truth of the painful disasters of the Gulf of Mexico.