Wonderful sum of your experience. I went down there to volunteer also and your impressions of the experience resonant very strongly with mine (though I had been to NOLA many times before, so my experience was tinged also with some "I remember what it used to be like BEFORE...").

Let me not forget to commend you for making the effort to volunteer. You are hereby commended...

Also, if you took the train from Chicago down (as it sounds like you did) were you aware that that train is the one featured in the famous folksong "The City of New Orleans"? I assume you know this given that your title is also a great old song about the Crescent City.

Finally, if you're interested, I just uploaded to Vimeo a slideshow I did of photos from my trip there:

vimeo.com/251461

I didn't have a video camera with me on the trip, which I regret in a major way now!!

Again, nice post, this. Keep up the good work...