See note from Day one about lack of coherency, laundry list journal, etc. Also further warning, most of this post got tedious and boring. It gets slightly better tmrw, but not much.
Tuesday morning, I found to my delight that there was an open wireless, 'netgear', that was available. It only stuck around for perhaps 30 minutes, but I felt like I was able to get some important stuff. I hurried because I wasn't sure how long the power would hold out.
So I eventually made it to the OSY office. I was concerned bc it was nearly 10:45am, and they had suggested that I get there at 10am. (Upon reflection and the experience of the next day, the delay probably didn't make any difference.) But at the time I was kind of worried that people had gone on, without me. Anyway, the volunteer coordinator that day gave me the assignment of finding out about a cat... I was like, okay? I had questions, but she just shook her head... it was a msg left over from yesterday, so the information on the paper was exactly what she knew, now I knew exactly what she did, and that was it. So how much initiative should I take? should I break down the door? no, no, nothing like that. Just find out more information, and communicate it directly to the ASPCA or the specific Pet Volunteer Network.
I actually found the place without too much trouble. I snagged a guy who had his dog with him, to ask him for directions on where my address was, told him I was on the search for an abandoned cat, I figured he was a pet lover and would sympathize. It turned out to be the building I was in front of.
Went up the stairs, took the elevator, everyone was talking about the storm and being made homeless and etc etc. I knocked on the apartment in question, no answer, no meowing. Not entirely sure what to do, but the note said something about a neighbor, so I knocked on the door across the way. This door talked about the occupants ~ 1 person and 6 cats. I figured that she would be sympathetic to someone who was trying to help cats. She called out and asked who I was, I said volunteer and she came to the door, a bit suspicious. I explained my mission, she gave me an earful about the cat and its owner etc.
I decided to follow those before me who had poured some water and pushed some food beneath the door. Didn't have cat food but I had a bottle of water from before, which I opened and slowly poured beneath the door. I felt a bit bad, making their floor wet, but hey, they shouldn't have abandoned the kitten.
I decided to go and have a chat with the supervisor, when I found him he assured me that the owners had been back to feed the cat, he himself had checked in on it, and they were due back today anyway. I went back to relate pass on deliver communicate this news to the cat lady, who scoffed in disbelief. But since I hadn't heard the cat at all, I thought that this case might be safely closed.
I called OSY, since I was near my car and asked if anything else needed doing. I was sent to pick up an armload of clothes, for a disabled guy who had been washed out. I went to the distribution centers she directed me to.
There were a lot of one way streets, I missed the closer one. So I kept driving a couple of more blocks to the second one. I figured that I could work my way back to where he lived, (behind the OSY office, I later found out). There was tons of mud, but I found a spot which blocked a driveway, I put my phone number on the dash and went in to look for clothes. I found a lot of clothes that were in the size that he gave, and there were lots of trash bags full of clothes, nominally labeled by type and approximate size. I was told that there were so many clothes, so many that they were starting to get thrown away, that I might as well take as many as I felt he needed. I figured several jackets and sweaters and sweatshirts, a coat or two, half a dozen pants and maybe ten t shirts. It wasn't on the list but I also found him some gloves, scarves, and hats for the winter. I wasn't able to find socks or underwear, and since they weren't on the list I left that off. It made me think of the type of things that were needed in these situations though. It is easy to give away clothes once you wear them out. It's a bit more effort to go out and buy clean socks and new underwear.
Meanwhile I also got him some food, and some cleaning materials. The coordinator had mentioned a cleaning kit but I wasn't sure what she was talking about. (Later on I found out that the American red cross had a disaster "cleaning kit" which the OSY office collected like 30 of.) The distro center wanted forms and such though, like an order form, so that they knew what to give him and such.
Meanwhile, a bus full of church people was blocking my car, so I went back and got a hot dog and cheeseburger, and checked out the house that was being used as a distribution. Each room was a theme, one was food, one was toiletries, one was cleaning, etc. They got me a couple of boxes, and then I went on my way when the car was cleared. I had felt a bit embarrassed to insist on some other cleaning materials, which I had seen and thought would be useful, but the woman was giving me a slightly hard time about it. To be fair though, I had no idea what the sitch was so I didn't really know what he would want, so I understood. I didn't want to take useful things that others needed, if my guy didn't. But still, I thought they would be needed so I stopped in the other distro center to get a few more things. It was ~extremely~ well organized. There was a hot food truck, and loads of volunteers that were doing bucket brigades out to the cars that were unloading materials. (Wait, or was that the church people at the first place?) Miguel was the volunteer in charge there and he had many things under control. He directed me to his people at the cleaning supplies and said they would sort me out.
So eventually I got back into my car, along with two hot chili bowls. and made my way back to the OSY center. I asked for a bit of help getting the supplies in, a few reporters who were doing a documentary on OWS gave me a hand bringing the supplies in also came in. The house was behind, I was told that there had been four feet of water, and it looked pretty bad, mud caked everywhere. There was an volunteer team there already, cleaning it out, and I brought in the supplies to his room. I can't imagine. Looking at the mud on the walls, and everything off the bare floors, it was pretty awful.A side benefit to the reporters, once they helped get everything inside, they also got permission from my guy to interview him as well. Later they came back out and interviewed the coordinator. I'm glad they asked her and not me, I wasn't really a part of OSY, and it was neat to listen to them and their philosophy. It was interesting when she started out by saying that she was speaking for herself and not for occupy, even though others may share her opinion.
I spent the rest of the afternoon making telephone calls, and asking for serious cleaning help from OS Clean out, as well as a couple of other calls. I volunteered to run the center the next day when it became clear that there were people needed to do her job when she left. She spent the remainder of the time between distractions and training me. I promised to be there at 9am the next day, at which point she entrusted me with the keys.
Luckily I had told her that I wanted to start wrapping up between 3-3:30, and finally by just before 4pm I ran out of there. There was ten minutes between OSY office and my hosts' house, so I rushed back home. On the way, I gave my grad school classmate a call, and she agreed to sort of meet me. She had an interview and a meeting with her church.
We rapidly dressed for the trip out, it had gotten pretty chilly so I grabbed some gloves. We walked to the new ferry and took it into Manhattan. There was a garrulous guy who had grown up in the Brooklyn projects who spoke non-stop the entire trip, listing out all the streets that we were passing, as well as any stories he could think of. My host and I agreed later that he was interesting enough, but his failing if he wished to be a tour operator, was that he didn't talk about what the customers wanted to know. I asked him a few questions, and he barely broke stride to give me one sentence answers before going back to his monologue. I tried to ask him about growing up in the projects but all he said was that it was horrible and crime ridden.
I thought that the other two were remarkably patient in listening to him go on for what seemed like hours. At a beginning point, I took my camera and started photographing the peninsula of Rockaway in the dimming light. The motion of the ferry going up and down made me extremely homesick for the ship. I took a pic of the waves going behind the boat. Sigh.
Eventually we got to Wall Street, and took the trains up. They left me on 50th St, I kept going up to Columbia University area and met with my classmate. She fed me good food, quinoa and chickpeas and other foods I don't tend to eat, and then we chatted for a while about our personal economic crises.
After she had to leave, I took the train back to 50th st and found a nearby starbucks where I settled in for a while. A girl came up and asked if I needed the outlets (I had plugged in my phone and my laptop) and I told her that there was no power at my place. She made a tiny face, since I had trumped her argument, and all of NY is trying to help those without power, and left to find some other outlet.
We had a nice train ride out into the suburbs, maybe Jamaica? or brooklyn, and then a bus ride home to Rockaway.
It was midnight, but I stayed up a while longer to pack for the next day since I'd be out early, and I wanted to make myself a hot lunch to take with me, since the coordinator had looked cold that afternoon.
.end Tuesday
No comments:
Post a Comment