A Typical Day
What does a typical day at Re-Member look like? The answer is that there isn't a typical day.
Saturday is the start of our week, we welcome new volunteers starting at 2 p.m., ending our weekend (which begins on Friday at 9 a.m. when the group from the previous week departs.) We spend most of Saturday moving people in, getting them settled and oriented to the program.
Sunday morning is sleep-in day (7 a.m. rather than 6 which is wake-up time the rest of the week.) On Sunday morning, we visit the mass grave at Wounded Knee, which is located about fifteen minutes away from Re-Member. Tom -- the Executive Director -- tells the story of the incidents that have taken place there, and then allows volunteers time to reflect at the cemetary and mass grave site.
Sunday afternoon, we build the Re-Member tepee, and typically have a few hours of work projects around the site that help us get ready for the week ahead. We end Sunday night with our first Lakota speaker, Minerva Blacksmith who speaks to our volunteers about growing up, and living on Pine Ridge.
Monday thru Thursday, we are out on worksites, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., eating lunch on site. On Wednesday and Thursday, we split our crews in half, sending half on a tour of the Rez each day which includes a tour of Pine Ridge village, Oglala Lakota College and Bette's Kitchen -- where you can get the world's best piece of chocolate cake for twenty-five cents.
Work sites are managed by full-time staff who are the construction supervisors. Program Managers (this is what I am) are on site to assist with the supervising of the volunteers and to participate in the construction work.
This summer, Re-Member is doing a lot of skirting on trailers (this helps with insulating the under-side of the trailer during the cold and windy winter) as well as the building of ramps, making it easier for the elders to get into and out of their homes. We are also doing a fair amount of remedial work inside homes, putting a fresh layer of paint, repairing drywall, working out issues with electric and plumbing and so on...
So, that is basically the nuts and bolts of what a week at Re-Member looks like to a volunteer; behind the scenes, the staff split a schedule that fills an entire sheet of columns and rows, starting as early as 5:30 in the morning for breakfast prep and ending at 10:30 p.m. with "tuck-in" when we lock the buildings down and remind our volunteers to get to bed so we can wake them with traditional flute music the next morning.
It makes for long days, especially since the staff tend to stay up well past "lights out" at 10:30, but we keep things fun, which makes the time go by.
*****
New photos from the past week, including a visit to Badlands National Park and the Allen Pow-Wow are on my Flickr page: http://www.flickr.com/photos/corytrue
Saturday is the start of our week, we welcome new volunteers starting at 2 p.m., ending our weekend (which begins on Friday at 9 a.m. when the group from the previous week departs.) We spend most of Saturday moving people in, getting them settled and oriented to the program.
Sunday morning is sleep-in day (7 a.m. rather than 6 which is wake-up time the rest of the week.) On Sunday morning, we visit the mass grave at Wounded Knee, which is located about fifteen minutes away from Re-Member. Tom -- the Executive Director -- tells the story of the incidents that have taken place there, and then allows volunteers time to reflect at the cemetary and mass grave site.
Sunday afternoon, we build the Re-Member tepee, and typically have a few hours of work projects around the site that help us get ready for the week ahead. We end Sunday night with our first Lakota speaker, Minerva Blacksmith who speaks to our volunteers about growing up, and living on Pine Ridge.
Monday thru Thursday, we are out on worksites, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., eating lunch on site. On Wednesday and Thursday, we split our crews in half, sending half on a tour of the Rez each day which includes a tour of Pine Ridge village, Oglala Lakota College and Bette's Kitchen -- where you can get the world's best piece of chocolate cake for twenty-five cents.
Work sites are managed by full-time staff who are the construction supervisors. Program Managers (this is what I am) are on site to assist with the supervising of the volunteers and to participate in the construction work.
This summer, Re-Member is doing a lot of skirting on trailers (this helps with insulating the under-side of the trailer during the cold and windy winter) as well as the building of ramps, making it easier for the elders to get into and out of their homes. We are also doing a fair amount of remedial work inside homes, putting a fresh layer of paint, repairing drywall, working out issues with electric and plumbing and so on...
So, that is basically the nuts and bolts of what a week at Re-Member looks like to a volunteer; behind the scenes, the staff split a schedule that fills an entire sheet of columns and rows, starting as early as 5:30 in the morning for breakfast prep and ending at 10:30 p.m. with "tuck-in" when we lock the buildings down and remind our volunteers to get to bed so we can wake them with traditional flute music the next morning.
It makes for long days, especially since the staff tend to stay up well past "lights out" at 10:30, but we keep things fun, which makes the time go by.
*****
New photos from the past week, including a visit to Badlands National Park and the Allen Pow-Wow are on my Flickr page: http://www.flickr.com/photos/corytrue
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