Tube Relief Reunion

Tami and Tube Relief Challengers

Last night a group of us met up with Tami Brisset who was over from New Orleans. Police Chief, Tami flew over to take part the Tube Relief Charity Challenge last August in aid of the London bombing victims and their families (we raised around £12,000), only to find herself "stranded" in London when Hurricane Katrina hit her city a few days afterwards.

She's a remarkably strong woman and gave an interview to GMTV on the morning she was due to fly back home, at the time not knowing whether her sister and some of her other family members were alive or not. Fortunately they all were and she faced the tough challenge of helping to get her city back together in the wake of the chaos, looting, death and floods which followed the hurricane.


She was in great spirits last night and bought us all an enormous amount of Mardi Gras beads. The Mardi Gras was a sign that things are gradually beginning to get back to some semblance of order and normality in New Orleans, and a number of other people in The Garrick Arms pub where we all met, also joined in the celebrations and draped themselves in beads too.

Here's Jenni and Jon slightly weighed down by the beads:


Anthony Dust Masker Smith looked fairly blinged up to the max


Chris Searle wearing the most beads of the night and Chris Presswell on the right discussing more Tube Challenge plans


Neil and Fimb deep in conversation


Neil and Pete Lupton with a bit more bling:





And finally, a blurry picture of Steve, Chris and Sam

It was great to see Tami again and to meet her husband, niece and her husband who also came over.

Thanks to Ann - Pixeldiva, Neil, Jonny Lyon and his dad, Pete Lupton, Jenni, Jon, Stephen Knight, Chris Presswell, Fimb, the Dust Masker Anthony, Mex, Chris Searle, Sam Cawley and Steve for making it a fun night! There's a few more pictures on the Flickr set here. Plus Jon also has his thoughts of the night and some more pictures here.

On a more serious note Tami had made some CD's showing movie footage of the aftermath of Katrina and gave us all a copy. If anyone wants to see it - Jon kindly downloaded a copy on YouTube.