Reporting from Biloxi

I remember watching Hurricane Katrina news coverage back in September and thinking CNN's Anderson Cooper cried on the air one day just for the cameras. But now that I'm down here experiencing it for myself, I don't know how it's possible to not cry.

A few hours after I got here, I attended a Sunday service with some of the Kent State volunteers at a Vietnamese Catholic church about 20-30 miles away. We drove alongside state Route 90 where I got a chance to see the hurricane devastation first hand.

I saw houses with insides completely leveled, as if C4 explosives had wiped out each one. Some houses were completely destroyed with only the porch steps remaining. Imagine climbing a set of stairs now leading up to nothing.

Even creepier were colossal highway signs for restaurants like McDonald's and Waffle House; except the restaurants themselves were gone.- Waffle House is a well-known restaurant chain in the South, so along the way to the church we saw at least four to five Waffle House signs all having no restaurant buildings to offer.

Casinos along the shore, which once served as a tourism and economic backbone for Biloxi, were leveled too. I can't stop thinking about one casino in particular that was shaped like a giant Viking ship. The entire middle had collapsed as if a renegade pirate ship assaulted the casino with cannonballs.

Going to church was a chilling and calming experience at the same time. The Vietnamese people in the church were happy to see us, but they were too overcome with shock from the hurricane to smile. Throughout the week, many of the Kent State volunteers will be repairing roofs and fixing drywall for members of this church.

My family is from India and I've seen parts of that country with the lowest-of-low living conditions. But I didn't think conditions like that existed here.