NBA Cares Day of Service

Friday February 15th

About 20 Americorps teams from the gulf region traveled back to the New Orleans area to work with NBA cares, Hands On New Orleans, Habitat, Kaboom! and other community groups for a day of Service. The NBA Cares group consisted of about 2,500 players, former players, family, friends, media, celebrities, CEO’s and other ridiculously rich people. Everyone was split up into different groups and we worked at ten different sites building homes and playgrounds, revitalizing schools, and refurbishing neighborhoods. My team worked at the Capadu School repainting the inside of the school, laying down sod to create a football field, putting up basketball hoops, mulching the playground and surrounding area, and building tetherball poles. We worked about an eleven hour day, got a lot done and got to work with: Yao Ming, Rasheed Wallace. Joe Johnson, Gerald Green, Tim Hardaway, Detlef Schrempf, Karl Malone, Lenny Wilkins, Peja Stojakovic, Richard Hamilton, Dikembe Mutombo, “Big” Bob Lanier, Byron Scott the Head Coach of the Hornets and West All Star Team, Will Smith from the New Orleans Saints, WNBA players; Temeka Johnson and Ruthie Bolton, Taylor Hicks from American Idol, and actors; Jet Li and Seth Gilliam. Just to name a few. Haha. There are pictures on:

http://www.nba.com/gallery/NBADayofService/021508_1.html
http://www.nola.com/hornets/photos/

Some highlights of the day were definitely my teammate Geoff teaching Yao Ming, Jet Li, Rasheed Wallace and Will Smith how to lay down sod (and seeing a grass field in the middle of a city), watching Yao Ming reach the ceiling while painting next to people on ladders, bashing cement blocks with sledge hammers, and working alongside a lot of people I might normally never get the chance to talk to.

I had a lot of doubt in the NBA from past experiences that the players would only come for the photo opportunity and wouldn’t do a lot of work, but to my surprise they were extremely hard workers and willing to get just as dirty as everyone else. Some of the players even asked the media to stop bugging them so they could get more work done.

To add to my 15 hours of fame, the night before, Anderson Cooper filmed his Anderson Cooper 360* show LIVE at Camp Hope. All the Americorps teams that traveled to New Orleans for Day of Service got to be the back drop for his show. We were able to take pictures and talk with him before and after the show and during commercial breaks. He has been doing a lot of work to help keep the Gulf Coast Recovery in the public’s mind and getting people to volunteer their time and money to the cause. Even though he will never read this, I just wanted to say Thanks!