The tale continues…
After calling to talk to her and learning about the storm and all the damage that had occurred, I decided that I needed to go down to Dominica… If for no other reason, I was going to volunteer to help them rebuild. My first thought was to reach out to the Red Cross and see what I could do through their channels. Unfortunately, they told me that there were no local chapters doing anything more than sending aid supplies. Next, I reached out to the Red Cross chapter that is down in Dominica… They told me that they would be honored to receive the help, but I would first have to join and get the approval of one of the local chapters for them to allow me to come under the flag of the Red Cross. Realizing that I was not going to be able to make any headway under the Red Cross, I began researching how I could go down on my own. For the next couple weeks, I studied flights and expenses… I found the cheapest commercial flight path down to Dominica and I booked my flight using my own money and intuition.
With the intent of this being, first and foremost, a volunteer aid trip… I planned on being there for at least a month. From the day I decided I was going until the day I left, I worked 12 hour shifts 5 to 6 days a week just to ensure I would have the money needed to make such a long trip out of the country. I coordinated with Letricia so that I knew I would have a place to stay and she told me that she would try to help me find groups I could volunteer with to help in rebuilding efforts.
Even before I landed, I could see the damage the storm had left behind. Once I was on my way from the airport to her apartment, it was very easy to see that this island was hurting and needed as much help as it could get. On the Sunday after I arrived, Letricia took me to her church for morning worship. By chance, there was a group of volunteers from a church in Charlotte, North Carolina on a missions trip who had also arrived just a few days earlier. After the service, I approached the leader of that trip and requested permission to join them in their efforts. They welcomed me into their group and early Monday morning, I was headed to a cite where they planned to build a small house for a family that had lost everything in the storm.
For the next ten days, I worked with the group from North Carolina on several projects. We built a small house for a new family who now had nothing, in another town we dug out several houses that had been buried in mudslides and we also packed reusable Walmart grocery bags with non-perishable goods for distribution to people who had nothing left after the storm. On their final day in Dominica, they took me with them to do a little sight seeing and we just enjoyed each other’s fellowship. I got the contact information for several of their group and they showed their appreciation by taking me to lunch before returning to their hotel to prepare to depart.