1st day reflection!!!!
Today was an awesome day!! I toured the beautiful city of New Orleans and saw so much. We visited the upper and lower 9th ward, where we saw where the most damage happened. We learned that the lower ward was flooded by breaches in the nearby levies, which happened from the barges hitting with so much impact. Other than that we visited the tree of life, which survived Hurricane Katrina despite its being planted in 1740.

On the trip I learned two really awesome things. The first was the 'x code' that was used in saving survivors of Hurricane Katrina. An 'x' was placed on the door of the house of a family of survivors. The upper triangle was the date the rescue happened. The right triangle indicated if there were any hazards occurred in the home. The bottom stated the amount of people who survived or died. The left side indicated what rescue group saved the survivors. What made this so interesting is the fact that a universal code was established in order to help rescuers decide if house were evacuated or not. The other interesting thing was the burial process of the dead. Because the area of New Orleans is shaped like a bowl the deceased are not buried but placed in a mausolean with their families. Once someone passes away they are placed on a slab for a year minus a day, and at that point their remains are pushed in the mausoleum.

I really enjoyed today and I am SO excited for tomorrow and cannot wait to help the people we learned about today!