Brisbane floods and community spirit

[WhiteD3]

My 14yo son (min age was 14) and I turned up for the volunteer clean up yesterday. Sign in at MacGregor started at 0730 so I thought I'd be a little early and got there at 0645. Would have been a 1000 people there already. Took 90 minutes to get to the sign in desk and by that time the line had more than doubled.

People from all walks of life; young, old, families, social groups, blokes with power washers and tools, people with esky's of food, people with 20L water containers, brooms, shovels, cleaner stuff, you name it. People with no English (I know because I had to help with some of the forms), all different ethnic backgrounds, whatever. One large group of African refugees (Sudan I think) trooped in.

Very well organised with water, snacks, safety vests, ear plugs, masks, free tetanus shots, etc.

Off we went to (eventually) Moggill where 40 bus loads of volunteers turned up. Everyone was happy, friendly and eager.

Being a natural cynic and having seen some atrocious human behaviour in the past, I was amazed and gladdened by the attitudes of all these strangers.

24,000 people turned up over the weekend to volunteer!

The councils, state government and their staff have done a fantastic jobs organising the clean up.

[VladTepes]

Yep.

[weeds]

gotta agree, i didn't sign up but drove in to milton to help a friend which is against what there were asking although didn't create parking issues thanks to all the voluteers doing the right thing, i did have five people in the car and took a car load of goods away with me to clean

i dont watch much tv and thought all the reports about people helping people was a bit over the top.......well i gotta say it was mind blowing what was happening in the city 'milton' yesterday

i turned away at least 30 people wanting to help as we already had 15 friends/family in the house

i was amazed at the efforts from the council and other organisations from cleaning rubbish off the streets to water being given out to ice being offered to sunscreen freebies and the list goes on......the redbull girls were very welcome

at the end of the day a lady was walking down the street with spag bol done up in little plastic containers complete with fork napkin, mainly for the owners who would have stayed around after night fall, top effort, she indicated she was all her own doing i.e. not part of any organisation

[Ace]

Its awsome to see.