Sep 18 2009
Planning to Spend October in Iowa (Yep, Iowa)
I’ve been home in Canada for about six weeks and I’m starting to think about what my next move will be. This time around things are a bit different because I arrived without any escape plan. It’s been great not having anything set in stone for the next six months of my life but unless I want to still be sitting here in six months, I will need to come up with some plans and make some decisions on my next move.
Fortunately that decision was sort of made for me when I received an email from the folks at Hands On a few weeks ago. They were trying to recruit experienced tradespeople for a rebuilding project in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Hands On deployed to Cedar Rapids last year for several months, helping out after the area was completely flooded and now they’ve managed to get a grant to help the community rebuild. I’m not an experienced builder but it looks like they’ll need some people to do the grunt work and that’s where I come in.
I’ve secured a spot and it looks like the project will be starting sometime in early October. This project should be really interesting since instead of tearing things down, we will get to build things back up! Much of the work after a flood involves ripping out the entire inside of people’s homes and it looks like now it’s time to do some repairs. Power tools scare the crap out of me so this could be an interesting experience.
Iowa isn’t exactly on the USA tourism trail and that’s exactly why I’m excited to go there. I didn’t even know where it was until a few days ago (although I also thought New England was a state up until six months ago, so my US geography isn’t exactly great) and I’m still not sure how I will get there but I’m pretty excited about it. If volunteering with Hands on in Cedar Rapids is anything like my other two experiences in Haiti and Bangladesh then it will be a guaranteed good time.
If anyone is in the area and wants to meet up, get in touch!
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I've been travelling since January 2008 living off earnings from the web. Follow me as I bum around Asia and beyond, getting up to mischief and working online as I go. 
Kirsty,
I’m enjoying reading about your travels, and of course, learning about how you do this vagabonding, nomading thing.
I think it’s great you are going to Iowa to help out. That’s fantastic. It’s okay to say power tools scare you a little. But for a traveler to say they don’t know their geography? You might want to 1) brush up on your geography or 2) just not mention this deficit again.
Be well. Travel safe.
Brent
Try the Hy-Vee. Aircraft hangar sized supermarkets with cheap, massive portion serving cafeteria/cafes with free wifi and all you can drink coffee refills. Large cofee, baked potatoes, green beans, chicken mmmm. And every time I’d go in there there was always some kind of club meetup or something going on. Yeah, the Midwest… It’s not so bad. Sometimes I miss ol’ USA.
@brent Thanks! But hey, as far as the geography lessons go, I’m never trying to impress people so it doesn’t matter much to me.
Haha… You thought New England was a state? OK, don’t worry about it. Being a Canuck, I’ll cut you some slack. It’s not that bad though because when I lived in England, my coworkers were adamant in their beliefs that there were either 48, 51, or 52 US states depending on who I spoke to. When I insisted that there were 50, I was universally accused of taking the piss.
As for Iowa, I was stuck there for over a week about a decade ago because the transmission in my truck completely disintegrated. That was one hell of a long week. While waiting for replacement parts, we spent the days digging a duck pond. The nights required lots of alcohol and choice between two local party spots. One was a trailer park, the other was a giant irrigation canal surrounded by cornfields referred to as ‘the ditch’. Good times… good times.
Sounds amazing! I’m a little jealous but hopefully it will spark me on to work harder this side to organise a road-trip to the states in a few years!
@sparetire Haha… I think the US portions and giant supermarkets will be one thing that is very different from the small Haitian and Bangladeshi markets with flies on the meat (the rare day that they have it) and a choice of four different veggies! I always hear about this midwest place so it will be cool to check it out.
@languagedude I thought there were 52 states for years! I swear it’s what we’re taught up here in Canada. Boozing in a ditch sounds right up my alley… should be good times!
@stooly This will just be a short trip to the US for me but a road or cycling trip around the States has always been something I’ve wanted to do.
Good luck, Kirsty. Not quite as exotic as some of your other adventures (at least not to me, a lifelong midwesterner), but sounds like a great cause. Looking forward to hearing more about it.
Good luck, Kirsty. Not quite as exotic as some of your other adventures (at least not to me, a lifelong midwesterner), but sounds like a great cause. Looking forward to hearing more about it.
What a great cause, Kirsty. Good for you! My husband is an Iowa man, from the small town of Algona. When we were home visiting last year, he showed me around. It was a long week, but after the hustle-bustle of Asia, I admit it, I really liked the wide-open starry skies and fields of corn as far as the eye can see.
Despite being small and flat, there are a lot of cute little oddities in Iowa. It has its fair share of roadside attractions. My favorite was The Grotto of Redemption in West Bend. It’s a massive religious structure fashioned out of different types of minerals from all over the world. Don’t forget to go and pose as an American Gothic in Eldon at the American Gothic House.
And, if you’re heading over to Blue Earth, Minnesota, keep an eye out for the jolly Green Giant and the Keebler elves. You can’t miss them.
Awesome! I’ve been traveling around the US and doing quite a bit of volunteering… it’s a lot of fun, you meet great people this way.
Personally I’m going to head toward Georgia (I’m in North Carolina now) and see about doing some flood relief work there. But if that doesn’t pan out, perhaps I’ll see you in Iowa.
You have inspired me with the volunteer work thing. I’m trying to get some online income going and just volunteer sense the peace corp rejected me
This definitely is a change for you. It definitely isn’t as glamorous as traveling across Europe and Africa. Still it should be very rewarding to help people restore their homes. Best of luck with that.
[…] A few weeks agoI wrote that I was hoping to head to Iowa to do some volunteering in Cedar Rapids with Hands On Disaster Response (HODR). I love volunteering with this group and I was hoping to get a chance to work with them again sooner, rather than later. I think their plan was to pull a bunch of professional builders (volunteers) together with a bunch of wannabees like me to help out with rebuilding in the flood-damaged community. […]