RAINBOW FAMILY GATHERINGS: Unofficial Community for Rainbow Family Gatherngs

Camp Second Helpin' PT 2

Journey to A Rainbow Second Helpin’

As we arrived in Mississippi at the beginning of December it was evident 150 miles from the coast that much damage was wrought when Katrina danced her way inland. Waveland was on the eastern side of the eye of the hurricane. Meteorologists know that as the most powerful section of that type of storm. As the storm made landfall Katrina brought 9 tornados,
sustained winds of 180+ winds and finally a 36 ft. tidal surge.
Imagine the tsunami prior to Katrina was less than 12 ft and made
world news for weeks, months in fact. I was in no way prepared
for what I saw as we grew closer and closer to Waveland. Destruction
liken to an atomic bomb without the fire damage, Only BIGGER!
The vastness of the devastation was mind-boggling. Almost 3 months
after the storm and it still looked like the day after. I was
totally in shock as we rolled into town, very few cars on the
roads and still houses and debris in the middle of the streets.

We pulled into the “Fred’s” parking lot that had been the location of the New Waveland Café only to find it almost empty except for a few campers and 3 storage trailers. I spoke with the people there asking what had happened to the café and they told me it had moved to Chalmette in New Orleans. (I’d like to mention here that these first
people we met were a group called “His Hands & Feet
Ministries”. Awesome brothers & sisters that had
first partnered with Felipe just days after the storm). It was
growing dark soon and we still hadn’t found a place to land
so to speak so Momma called her friend Matt Lee (from the band
“the Killer Sharks”) that had often played music for
the Café. Matt gave us directions to the Tent he was housed
in and we made our way to a destroyed house with several flooded
tents in the yard.

We still talk to Matt these days and he even came to visit us here in T or C, He went to his first Rainbow gathering with Momma and some of the local Rainbows in 2007. But I digress… Mat gave us directions to where the camp had located and told us that they had changed the name to Emergency Communities. And we were off to Louisiana after breakfast.

Now this seems to be a good point to bring some things to light. While in terms of property damage and dollar amount New Orleans did take a big hit due to it’s vastness and being a Hub for the area. But flooding was the big culprit in the destruction. There was some roof damage and a few trees down here and there but nothing like we had just
come out of. I have no accurate assumption as to the cost in human
life in Louisiana but I know that in the days that followed violence
was rampant form the first hand accounts I heard.

Mississippi was caught totally by surprise. Waveland was in fact the only town on the entire Gulf Coast that had met the Federal requirements for being a Hurricane safe location. The town was protected by a 12 ft. berm that the railroad tracks sat upon. It was no match for the 36 ft. tidal surge that came 10miles inland with the storm. As I stated before
I had made friends later on with several important public officials,
Mayor, the Fire Chief, several police officers. The official Federal
government stance was that 36 people died in Hancock county MS.
27 died in the Jail alone when the tidal surge came in. Members
of the Fire department told me that they had loaded tractor-trailer
freezer trucks with bodies from the county stacked like cordwood.
A far cry from the 36 that the federal gov. had reported. Everyone
that stayed 6 blocks from the beach didn’t make it, no if’s
and’s or buts. A government conspiracy? That has been my
question for years now.

Back to my story… When we pulled into the Casino parking lot where Emergency Communities was just setting up we were greeted by several Rainbow’s and Momma started making her way around the site touching base with the people she had met and known in Waveland. One of the first brothers I met was Misha, an awesome brother that was one
of the old crew and one of the now focalizers for the new camp.
This friendship would one day be one of the biggest boons for
our (unknown to us) project. I spent the next 2 weeks helping
to layout and set up the future Emergency Community’s site.
Helping to assimble the Dome, advising on food storage, drying
canned goods that had set out in the rain, etc.. Both Spring and
I had made a personal commitment to volunteering for 2 years to
the recovery effort and things seemed to be going well.

Just about a week into being on the site a contingency of local citizens from Waveland came to New Orleans to ask the Hippies to come back to Mississippi and help with the recovery. It was so marvelous to see the Brothers Babylon come to the Rainbow family and sit counsel with the Family feeling equal to it simply by the good example of the Rainbow
family that had been there before. That night it was decided that
Momma K and I would go back to Hancock county and start another
hippie kitchen. We had the experience of working Gatherings and
had been a mobile kitchen for the homeless. It was done and decided
tomorrow we would head back to Mississippi for a second helpin’
of Rainbow.

We had gotten a late start leaving the next day, I had to organize the volunteers going with us and gather supplies and gear we would need for the time being. Let me tell you it was very modest what we started with. EC had donated a green 16x19 green army tent plenty of water canned goods etc.. And with true Rainbow hippie fashion we loaded up all the
vehicles with supplies and people then hit the road. Trust me
if you came upon seeing this motorcade you’d know beyond
a shadow of a doubt it was a Rainbow happening.

The sight of the procession pulling into our first location must have been something from the outside looking our way. No sooner than we had decided where to park and a Simi lay out of what camp might present, we noticed it getting dark. A brother approached Momma and said “What’s for dinner we’re all hungry” Spring jumped into action
grabbed several pots and requisitioned a quick firepit. Looking
back on it I can’t tell you honestly what we ate that night
but I’d bet it was some of her awesome stew made the way
only she can make it. As she set off to her task we gathered pallets
and begin to unload our supplies.

More to come…….

Tags: hippie, kitchen, mississippi, wavelnd

Comments are closed for this blog post

Comment by Momma KaBoom on November 7, 2009 at 4:23am: I remember that first night...I"m glad you liked the stew...lol...GUT...More then anything I wanna thank you for sharin' your story...You have such a powerful tale to tell...I love you Hun...I'm so honored to be with such a wonderful person...

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