Last week, my family participated in an effort to help the poor victims of Hurricane Katrina. It was brought to our attention that there were communities of people who had no other option but to leave everything they had behind and walked to areas that had less damage. They walk 69 miles from New Orleans to Baton Rouge. They went seeking shelter from small churches and parishes. These churches opened up their arms to shelter them but had very little to begin with.

We first heard about this immediately after the storm on Sunday, Sept. 4. Our aunt, Susan Talve of St. Louis, was working with Pastor B.T. Rice of New Horizon church and was in direct contact with Reverend Macio Bailey of Baton Rouge. Reverend Bailey, along with other pastors of small churches in and around the Baton Rouge area, had reached out to Pastor Rice and Rabbi Talve because they were overwhelmed with people in need and were receiving no direct aid from the larger relief agencies. Pastor Rice and Rabbi Talve immediately sent out a call to their congregations to send basic supplies to Reverend Bailey and his colleagues and "Operation Baton Rouge" was born.

They sent several small trucks of supplies down to people in need. We decided that we could do the same and our mom called some trucking companies and her company hired a 53 ft. closed van. First we sent out a flier to the community saying that we could use anybody and everybody's help. We were thrilled when our public schools such as Vernon, Roosevelt, and Oyster Bay High School embraced this project so willingly. We were all so grateful when the private schools such as St. Dominic's and East Woods asked their families to participate. We were the most excited to see the hundreds of bags and boxes delivered to various drop-off points throughout town, which we brought to our dad's office at 16 Spring Street. We knew that this giant truck would be filled in no time. [It was a tractor trailer filled with goods.]

We would like to thank everybody who donated his or her belongings, time, and energy to this project. From the people who searched their homes for things to donate, to the people who spent hours sorting and packing boxes, to the people who loaded the giant truck by hand on Thursday, Sept. 15. It makes us so proud to know that we live in such a giving and caring community.

We would like to thank the OB-EN Soccer Club, the Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts, the leaders of our public and private schools, and countless individuals in our town who stepped up to make this project possible. On Monday Sept. 19 our truck was delivered to Reverend Bailey of the Borean Church, in Baton Rouge LA. Reverend Bailey gave the children their letters that were written by the kids of Roosevelt elementary school. He told us that the kids will be sending letters back and that they have been blessed by the folks of Oyster Bay. After this experience we truly feel the same.

(Ed. Note: This article was written by Joey and Marina Heaney, seventh grade twins. They are OB-EN soccer players from the Tsunami and Twisters travel soccer team.)