By Isabel Lawrence
News Editor
Despite the weeks that have passed, many are still struggling to recover from the damage done by Hurricane Sandy, especially citizens of the Rockaway area of New York. Helping in the Sandy relief efforts were the Mormon Helping Hands from the New Canaan Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day-Saints, which gathered student volunteers to devote two weekends to restoring the Rockaways.
The magnitude of Sandy came as a surprise to many northeasterners, including sophomore Brian Macari, who has a vacation house in Breezy Point, Queens. “As the storm was approaching, my worries started to increase,” he said. “The extensive damage from this storm was not expected.”
Citizens and vacation goers alike suffered from the high winds and heavy rains of Sandy, and regions near the coast were especially impacted by incoming tides and waves. Brian saw the results of Sandy first hand. “The structure of my house is still there,” he said. “However, we had a lot of water in our house so everything in the interior part of the house has to be re-done.”
Looking to help the people of the Rockaways, the Mormon church in town organized a
relief trip. Senior Chris Gutierrez was part of this trip. “I became involved in the relief efforts because my church, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day-Saints, had organized a day of service to the Rockaways for those who wanted to go,” he said. “I was eager to serve those in need so I volunteered to go.”
Chris and other volunteers worked in the damaged homes of Rockaway citizens, cleaning houses and cars and clearing away debris. “What my group and I did in our first house was that we ripped out the insulation from the ceiling and anything else that was damaged including wood or scrap metal,” Chris said. “We also sprayed down the entire basement with bleach to stop or prevent mold. In the second house we ripped up the tiles of the entire basement that were forming mold.”
Also working on the tiling project was senior Juliet Guynn, who volunteered in the Rockaways with the church as well. “Personally, I did a lot of tile removing because there’s a lot of water damage in people’s basements from the flooding, so we had to remove tiles with crowbars,” she said. “A lot of people had to smash out the drywall or just take furniture out and put it out on the street for the trash collectors.”
After spending time helping in the Rockaways, junior volunteer Jared Rowley was struck by the overall devastation to the area. “Out of all the images that stuck in my head it was probably either when we were driving in and saw scratched into a glass door ‘Sandy Sucks’, or a man we were passing by who took a brief case and turned it upside down, only to see nearly a gallon of water pour out,” Jared said. “Another thing that stuck with me was seeing all the cars that were destroyed. Hurricane Sandy didn’t care if you were rich or poor, from a Porsche to a run down 80’s truck, it was all there.”
Though the houses and cars of the Rockaways were largely destroyed, the optimism of
the Rockaway citizens weathered the storm. “I think what impacted me the most was how much hope people derived from us just being there,” Juliet said. “Just seeing how happy they were that we were there and how much hope they had because they knew someone was looking out for them.”
This positive attitude also affected Chris, who was inspired by the outlook of the Rockaway citizens. “The people of the Rockaways taught me a huge lesson, to appreciate the stuff I have and when things seem to be going wrong and there’s no way to recover, that’s the time to push forward the most,” he said.
Despite the shock of the damage, volunteers also took away an overall sense of town bonding from the trip. Chris specifically felt the strength of New Canaan’s community efforts. “New Canaan is heavily involved in helping other communities,” he said. “Working alongside other New Canaan kids in a community that’s two hours away from us shows our unity as a town, and that we are there for our neighbors. We want other communities to realize that in times of crisis, that they can trust New Canaan to step up, volunteer and extend a hand.”
Not only was the strength of the New Canaan community emphasized, but so was the strength of the church. “To be honest we did it because service is a cornerstone of our religion,” Jared said. “As it says in the Bible, ‘love thy neighbor’, these people live less than an hour and half away. Why not give a little bit of time this holiday season?”
Though many students wouldn’t want to spend their holiday season in the center of
such disaster, for Juliet, helping out was the natural choice. “I find I’m happiest when I’m serving people, and I can feel like I’m making a difference in the life of someone who can’t help themselves,” she said. “Knowing that these people in the Rockaways had way too much work to ever handle themselves, being part of something where they could get the help that they needed is what I wanted to spend my weekend doing.”
