????另外，謠言和虛假消息也傳播得和真實(shí)的求救信息一樣快。比如，有人知道紅十字會(huì)在此次災(zāi)難中遭受的批評(píng)真的是因?yàn)榫葹?zāi)遲緩？從我的朋友到我在布魯克林區(qū)的鄰居中，討厭紅十字會(huì)的大有人在。很多人都深信紅十字會(huì)這次行動(dòng)遲緩且救災(zāi)不力。我不會(huì)對(duì)此事發(fā)表任何評(píng)論，因?yàn)槭遣皇钦娴倪@樣，我也不知道。不過當(dāng)我問我的朋友們，他們?yōu)槭裁慈绱舜_定紅十字會(huì)救災(zāi)不力時(shí)，他們往往會(huì)說，他們自己、或是他們的一個(gè)朋友去了一個(gè)避難所，但紅十字會(huì)的人不在那兒，或是缺少物資。每個(gè)稱職的記者都知道，一個(gè)人的經(jīng)歷不能概括整個(gè)救災(zāi)努力，但是在社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)平臺(tái)上，一個(gè)人的經(jīng)歷卻可以傳播得很廣。

????為了更好地了解社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)發(fā)起的救災(zāi)活動(dòng)，上周四我親自去了安迪的“救災(zāi)廚房”，不過現(xiàn)在，他的“救災(zāi)廚房”已經(jīng)從他的餐廳搬到了紐約市公園坡的老第一歸正教會(huì)（Old First Reformed Church）。這座教堂已經(jīng)成了存放救災(zāi)物資的倉庫。本周早些時(shí)候，兩輛大巴從巴爾蒂摩出發(fā)，載著狗糧、幫寶適和罐裝食物等物資抵達(dá)這里，這些物資都是由本地的一家廣播電臺(tái)倡議募捐的。

????薩拉?安吉維妮是志愿者的協(xié)調(diào)員之一，她帶著我參觀了一間廚房。里面有六名志愿者廚師正在忙活，還有一間辦公室，用來登記災(zāi)民的地址和送飯需求。薩拉以前從來沒有在一家專門做湯的廚房里幫過忙。桑迪颶風(fēng)剛過，她就登陸了Facebook，告訴朋友們，往她的房子里送食物，她會(huì)把食物送到本地的避難所去。然后她與安迪聯(lián)系上了，當(dāng)時(shí)安迪已經(jīng)開始為災(zāi)民做飯了，于是薩拉就幫他組織配送食品。為了把熱湯送到災(zāi)民手里，薩拉、安迪和其他志愿者們前往布魯克林海濱地帶尋找受災(zāi)的地方和災(zāi)民的聯(lián)系方式。從那以后，薩拉把大多數(shù)時(shí)間都花在救災(zāi)上，每隔幾個(gè)小時(shí)就給災(zāi)民中的聯(lián)絡(luò)人打電話，看誰還需要更多的食物。薩拉把志愿?jìng)兊男枰獜堎N在自己的Facebook主頁上（比如“我們上午10點(diǎn)需要司機(jī)”），她的Facebook頁面和Two Boots披薩店的網(wǎng)頁儼然成了他們這個(gè)救災(zāi)活動(dòng)的臨時(shí)官方主頁。而這個(gè)由丹尼爾?米特神父領(lǐng)導(dǎo)的小教堂，也志愿充當(dāng)了捐贈(zèng)物資的接收和分配人員。

????筆者到達(dá)10分鐘后，坐上了一輛豐田RAV4越野車的副駕駛。司機(jī)名叫海德?約翰遜，職業(yè)是編寫菜譜。他是通過教會(huì)與安迪的救災(zāi)組織聯(lián)系上的。當(dāng)時(shí)我們的車上大概載著300碗湯，還有200多份火雞三明治。海德對(duì)我說：“我平時(shí)也做飯，過去幾天我一直都在這里做飯。但是他們非常需要司機(jī)，于是我想：‘我有一輛車，而且現(xiàn)在還有點(diǎn)汽油?！痹诮稚祥_了半小時(shí)后，我們到了霍華德灘。一些孩子們背著書包，穿過廢墟放學(xué)回家。有一個(gè)大牌子上寫著“聯(lián)邦應(yīng)急管理局，請(qǐng)幫助我們?！蔽覀兇┻^了這個(gè)地區(qū)到了羅克韋，然后向左拐，到了一個(gè)更貧窮的地區(qū)。

????我們首先停在一個(gè)住宅區(qū)里，不少人在門外排隊(duì)。一名警察說，他們?cè)缟?點(diǎn)就集中在這里了。他說：“附近真沒什么還開著門的地方了?！?我們的聯(lián)絡(luò)人山姆要了150碗湯，我們把湯搬到一個(gè)廚房里，志愿者們往外發(fā)放花生醬果凍三明治。然后我們給薩拉打了電話，她告訴我們第二站去什么地方。

????Also, rumors and misinformation spread as swiftly as the calls for help. Case in point: does anyone really know whether the Red Cross deserves criticism for a lethargic response to the storm? Among my friends and neighbors in Brooklyn, hating on the Red Cross abounds. There is a belief it has been slow to respond and inadequate in its efforts. I won't address whether this is true because I don't know. Here's what is true: when I ask why my friends are so certain the Red Cross has failed, they often report they've been down to a shelter, or a friend has, and the Red Cross wasn't there or was undersupplied. As any decent reporter knows, one experience doesn't sum up a relief effort, but on social platforms, that one experience can be broadcast widely.

????I wanted to better understand the relief efforts that Facebook and Twitter have supersized, so last Thursday I took my own trip down to Andy's kitchen, which had been relocated from his restaurant patio to the Old First Reformed Church in Park Slope. The chapel had been transformed into a warehouse for supplies. Earlier in the week, two large buses had arrived from Baltimore, stocked with dog food and pampers and canned goods collected by a local radio station.

????One of the volunteer coordinators, Sara Angevine, toured me through a kitchen with a half-dozen volunteer chefs and an office papered with addresses and delivery needs. Sara had never helped run a soup kitchen before; she jumped on Facebook shortly after the storm to tell friends to drop food in the vestibule of her building, figuring she'd bring it by a local shelter. She connected with Andy, who had started to cook, and began to help him figure out where all the food could go. To do this, Sara, Andy, and others went down to the coastal neighborhoods of Brooklyn to scout out locations and contacts. Sara has spent most days since then calling her contacts every few hours to see who could use more food. She posts the needs on her Facebook page ("We need drivers at 10am"), which, along with the official Two Boots page, has become a makeshift news outlet for the relief effort. The church, led by Pastor Daniel Meeter, volunteered to act as a fiscal pass-through for donations to the effort, which Sara and Andy both began collecting through links on their pages.

????Ten minutes after I arrived, I found myself riding shotgun in a Toyota RAV 4. The car's driver was a recipe writer named Heather Johnston, who had connected to the effort through the church. We were transporting 300 cups of soup—and 200 or so turkey sandwiches on walnut bread. "I cook, and I've been cooking here for the last few days," Heather told me. "But they really needed drivers so I thought, 'well, I have a car and I have gas right now.'" After winding our way through city streets for half an hour, we reached Howard Beach, where children in backpacks were picking their way home from school across piles of debris. A large sign read "FEMA Please Help Us." We crossed the bay to the Rockaways and banked left into a more impoverished area.

????We made our first drop-off at a cafeteria inside a housing project where a line of people stretched out the door. A policeman said they'd begun gathering with carts at 5am. "There's really nothing around that's open," he said. Our contact, Sam, asked for 150 cups of the soup, which we brought into a kitchen were volunteers were handing out peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches. We then called Sara, who gave us directions for our second stop.