I <3 Pink

The Make It Right foundation's pink house display is over, and that's a little bit sad for me. We had just finished touring the Lower Ninth, which was an incredibly emotional, moving experience for me. I had heard vaguely about the MIR project, but apparently Brad Pitt really blitzed the news etc. while we were in New Orleans. (And someone saw him on his motorcycle when we were working at the Community Center, and the V-Tech kids were apparently 2 minutes away from him while they were on their tour, but yada yada.)

It was very impressive to see in person. We climbed up the observation tower, which in retrospect we figured out that we were probably not suppposed to do, as we removed some caution tape in order to go up. But I don't regret it, because the view across the canal to the rest of the city was something that has really stuck with me. That community is physically separated from the rest of the city. I know that's an inevitability in a city the size of New Orleans, but it was (still is) hard for me to get over that. And when the people of the Lower Ninth think that the city doesn't want them back...I guess I can just understand why they might think that. But I think that efforts like the MIR project show that we, as a society, do need them to come back.

That's why the pink houses made such an impact on me, I think. After seeing such heartbreaking devastation, the pink village left me with such a feeling of hope. The pink was utterly absurd, of course, and the tents really didn't look all that much like houses, but I could imagine a community being rebuilt there. And that felt good.

So it's a bit upsetting to me that the tents are being taken down, but I understand that it's time. They need the scaffolding for Carnival, and that's a really important part of New Orleans culture. MIR has made $10 million, and that's amazing. Right now, 64 houses have been fully sponsored, and the 65th is more than two-thirds of the way there.

Anyway, the pink houses aren't really disappearing. The material is being used to make tote bags, and all the proceeds go to MIR.

Mine has already been ordered.