LAKE CHARLES, LA: WEEK 1

A recap of my first week at my internship this summer!

This is a photo of some staff members from when we went line crabbing for blue crabs!

"Why is it so scary to approach someone that you don’t know, and love on them?!"

I'm not at home anymore...

As most of you know, I decided to do an internship this summer with ReachGlobal Crisis Response in Lake Charles, Louisiana for a month. I’ll start by sharing with you the story of how this came to be, because I’ll be honest, it was all a little random. Nonetheless, definitely a God thing. Biola University hosts these “career expos” each semester where they bring in recruiters from different businesses and organizations so that students can have the chance to meet them and build a network. It was missions week, so I signed up for some sessions that sounded interesting to me, and the one I attended (via Zoom) was titled “Arts in Europe.” I showed up, and I was pretty much the only Biola student there amongst six representatives from this group called “Apex.” This allowed for conversation to be quite interesting, because they asked questions to just get to know me, and they shared about their organization. They brought up an internship opportunity for me to go to Budapest as a designer and work at a local arts coffee shop, simultaneously doing ministry work. This was right up my alley, and I was excited about it. After applying and having an interview, they offered me the internship, and I accepted. However, a week or so later, they emailed me to tell me that Apex was no longer sending interns to their international sites because of COVID-19 restrictions. Big bummer, right? Long story left long, they emailed me again saying they’d really like to have me on a team, and asked if I would be interested in doing something at one of the sites in the US, and I said yes. They said it would be in Lake Charles, Louisiana, with their ReachGlobal Crisis Response team helping to rebuild homes after the hurricanes. I’m gonna be honest, at first I was like, “Hmm. Louisiana…” Truth be told, ever since I did my 5th grade state project on Louisiana and learned about their state bird being a Pelican, I’ve always wanted to go. Also, I was told they’ve got good eats. They asked if I would be interested in painting a mural on a shipping container that they have that’s holding all of their tools. Of course I said yes, what a neat opportunity!

It all happened pretty quickly, and before I knew it, I booked my flight and was heading out to New Orleans. I met some pretty cool people on the plane, and made some new friends. Once I arrived, we crossed the world’s longest overwater bridge! I met some of the crew and spent the next couple of nights at their warehouse. Telling my parents I was sleeping in a warehouse with people they had never met before didn’t settle too well with them, haha. The other two interns arrived, and we toured “Nawlins” for a day, which was fun! We went to the French Quarter (I had Jambalaya), Jackson Square, and sprinted to the Creole Queen for our river boat tour to the field of the Battle of New Orleans. We had beignets and a cafe au lait from Cafe du Monde, which were delicious. I felt like I was in the movie “Chef.” It was quite the drive to Lake Charles Bible Church, which is the church we partnered with. We passed by neighborhoods that were still recovering from the hurricanes and the flood, and it was so crazy to think that what we saw was nothing compared to what it was like immediately after the disasters hit. There was a youth team that was staying at the church when we went there, so we got to meet all of them. They were all so fun, and the rest of the staff members were incredibly loving and welcoming. Their humor is quite entertaining. Everyone was stoked to hear that I came from Hawai’i, and I was shot with loads of questions about my life and why in the world I would want to come to Louisiana during the summer. Another team came, this one from New Jersey, and I got to know every single one of the members, which was an encouraging week for me. They were fun, crazy, wise, and had great hearts for the Lord. I spent most of my week doing painting jobs with John, Lily, Sophie, and Brett. Stacie was the person who prepared all of our meals for the week (what a champ), and I got to know her pretty well since we were both at the church for most of our working days. Stacie is one of the nicest people I’ve met, and I wish I had gotten to know her more before she left!

Since the weather was being difficult, raining off and on, I was only able to start on my mural for one day. I applied the primer with some help from the volunteers. It was one of the hottest days, and I had never sweat that much before. My legs were even dripping wet. Anyway, that went well, and it gave me hope for the rest of the project! It was difficult this week, because it was my finals week for one of my summer courses, so I had to leave for meetings, and had to work on my assignments. I’m glad that’s finished! Once the team heard that I submitted my final project, everyone cheered. One of the cool things that happened was that I got to chat with Miles Johnson, former designer for Levi’s jeans, Patagonia, and now Timberland!

On another note, I saw God work in so many clever, intricate, wonderful ways. I was blessed by so many people who taught me a lot about God’s love, and how much of an impact it has on others. Every day we go on prayer walks around different neighborhoods, meeting homeowners and getting to sit with them and hear about their lives. One man I met, we’ll call him Gary, chatted with us for a while about the most random things, but we got to pray over him and his family at the end. That night, he joined us at the church for dinner, and stayed through our worship night and just hung out with us. It was a cool God thing to see. There were so many people that were touched by the love of Jesus Christ this week, and I felt so encouraged to be more bold with my faith. Why is it so scary to approach someone that you don’t know, and love on them?!

It was a week that challenged me and grew me in various ways, which only makes me get more stoked on the Lord. I cannot wait to see what God has in store for this coming week, and to see how he continues to move in this community. I learned about missed opportunities, and how sometimes we can be so ignorant or afraid that we do not go to where God is calling us. I don’t want to miss any more opportunities. To all my readers and supporters, thank you for keeping up with me, and for loving me well. I hope that you find some time this week to meet someone and love them as Christ loves them! People have some crazy cool stories, and we miss out on hearing them all too often.

Blessings, Brooke