-We're gonna now talk about what Nate's been doing.
His latest assignment took him to
the home of one of our all- time favorite guests, Fannie Eugene.
Mr. BERKUS: Princess.
WINFREY: Princess, who we crowned princess for a day back in 2003.
WINFREY: Take a brief look at this.
This was fun.
Fannie lives modestly in a small house.
She drives an old air condition-less van.
Money's always tight.
We thought Fannie deserved a break, so we rolled out the royal treatment.
WINFREY: Got a new van, and it's all yours, Fannie.
FANNIE: Oh, my god, this is unreal.
WINFREY: Two and a half years later, that van would help Fannie
and her family escape one of the worst natural disasters in U.S. History.
FANNIE: Well, we found out Katrina was coming.
I was able to pile 12 of my relatives into the van that Oprah gave me.
We was able to get out.
When we were leaving,
I made sure I had one very important thing,
my tiara that Oprah gave me when I became princess for a day.
And being the van was as crowded as it was with kids,
I didn't want it stepped on, so I put it on. I made sure it was safe.
WINFREY: Fannie lost so much to hurricane Katrina.
FANNIE: I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
This is the first time I really talked about it, so.
FANNIE: This is the house we came back to
and it was completely demolished.
We lost everything. All we had left was the bricks and the floors.
So we got this FEMA trailer.
WINFREY: So two years after the storm,
contractors started rebuilding Fannie's home, but they fell behind.
And after living in a cramped trailer,
one of those FEMA trailers, for 18 months,
Fannie still could not go back home into her house.
So when we heard that, we put Nate on a plane --
woo-hoo -- to New Orleans so he could finish the job.
Take a look.
Mr. BERKUS: Hey, guys. Hi, Fannie.
FANNIE: Oh, look at you.
Mr. BERKUS: I finally get to meet you.
FANNIE: This is great. Oh, my god. Look at me.
Mr. BERKUS: How are you?
FANNIE: I'm good. Oh, my god.
Mr. BERKUS: Nice to finally meet you. Who else is here?
FANNIE: My husband, Gene.
Mr. BERKUS: Hi, Gene.
GENE EUGENE, NEW ORLEANS: Hi. How you doing?
Mr. BERKUS: Nate. A pleasure.
FANNIE: And my nephew Lloyd.
Mr. BERKUS: Hi, Lloyd, how are you?
LLOYD, NEW ORLEANS: Nice to meet you.
Mr. BERKUS: Wow. So this has been home for a year and a half.
FANNIE: This is it.
Mr. BERKUS: Look at this.
There's barely enough room in here for you and me.
So this was a really hard thing for you,
as well, because a bathroom's really important.
FANNIE: Yes, it is. That's where I relax,
because I work, I go to school, I take care of kids,
and when I come home in the evening,
I go in the bathroom and I fill it up and I just relax.
Mr. BERKUS: Close the door.
FANNIE: Right.
Mr. BERKUS: Relax. You mentioned your kids.
And when you say your kids, you've got a big family.
FANNIE: Oh, yeah. When I say "my kids,"
I'm speaking of my sister's kids.
Mr. BERKUS: Okay.
FANNIE: My granddaughter Amber, my grandson Johnny.
Mr. BERKUS: What has been the hardest thing
for you about not having a home?
FANNIE: When they come, I cook for them
and we all just sit around and catch up,
and we can't do that anymore.
WINFREY: Can you imagine trying to be a family in this space?
While Nate and his team tackle the unfinished
house a few feet away, Fannie will move to a nearby hotel,
the belongings she has left put safely in storage.
Mr. BERKUS: All right, so, Fannie,
I am ready to see the house. All right? All right.
FANNIE: Let's go. Sure, sure.
Mr. BERKUS: When you opened that door,
the first time after Katrina, what did you see?
Describe it for me.
FANNIE: It's hard. It's hard to describe it.
It was like, "Oh, my god."
I knew it would be bad, but I wasn't prepared for --
I didn't recognize anything.
It was unrecognizable. We always had big dinners.
We would rent tables,
we'd have tables from here to over there.
Mr. BERKUS: All the way through.
FANNIE: Yes.
Mr. BERKUS: I love that.
FANNIE: And this is the second bedroom.
Mr. BERKUS: I assume this is going to need to do triple,
quadruple duty.
So how many people at any given time are in this house?
FANNIE: Fifteen or 20.
Mr. BERKUS: Fifteen to 20.
FANNIE: Fifteen to 20 at any given time.
Mr. BERKUS: And that's not a party.
FANNIE: Oh, no.
Mr. BERKUS: That's an afternoon.
FANNIE: Oh, no, no. That's just normal.
Goodbye to the trailer.
Mr. BERKUS: There it goes.
FANNIE: I thought that would be a way
of life for me for a long time.
Mr. BERKUS: I mean, I can't believe when I look at this --
you can see -- here we were.
That's been home for so long.
FANNIE: It's gone. It's gone.
Mr. BERKUS: So, guys, I have a lot of work to do,
and you know, my goal, truthfully, is going
to be to make this place a place where you can forget
about the past and really look forward
towards brightest of bright futures.
FANNIE: Oh, thank you.
Mr. BERKUS: You're so welcome.
You are so welcome.
WINFREY: I -- I -- yeah, I'm tearing up,
because I think about that moment that every
person who's still living in one of those
trailers wants that to be gone.
Mr. BERKUS: Yeah.
WINFREY: So coming up, Nate gives Princess Fannie
the royal treatment.
[APPLAUSE]
So I'm back with Nate.
We sent Nate to the rescue of our own
Princess Fannie Eugene after her home was destroyed by
Hurricane Katrina.
This is what her house looked like post-Katrina.
WINFREY: And now take a look at it post-Nate.
Take a look.
Mr. BERKUS: Come on out.
FANNIE: Oh, my -- oh, my god.
Mr. BERKUS: Come on out. Hi.
FANNIE: Oh, Nate, look at this.
Mr. BERKUS: Welcome home.
FANNIE: I said I wasn't going to cry.
WINFREY: For a year and a half,
Fannie's FEMA trailer sat in her front yard.
Mr. BERKUS: This is a really big day.
FANNIE: Oh, my god.
Mr. BERKUS: I can't imagine how it would
feel to be standing right here for you after,
you know, this trailer's gone.
I think we should go in.
GENE: Look at this.
FANNIE: It's beautiful.
GENE: This is great.
FANNIE: Oh, oh, my god.
WINFREY: Since Fannie often has a full house,
Nate created a living room for the whole family.
FANNIE: Oh, my god.
Mr. BERKUS: I'm glad you guys like it.
Now, let me tell you something, darling.
This is a sofa bed, so this pulls out because you told me
no one gets turned away from this house.
So this moves out of the way.
You've got a full-size bed here.
Anybody can come and stay and then,
check that out. You're sash.
FANNIE: I lost my sash in the hurricane.
Mr. BERKUS: Well, it's back. I thought,
"We're the ones who gave you the sash,
so we should be able to make another one."
FANNIE: Thank you. It's beautiful. Oh, my god.
Mr. BERKUS: And there's even storage underneath that table.
You can continue to keep the room looking like
this even when you've got a bunch of people at the house.
Now, let's see the kitchen.
FANNIE: This is beautiful.
GENE: Oh, look at that.
FANNIE: Oh, my god.
GENE: It's beautiful. It's beautiful.
FANNIE: Oh, my god.
Oh, look at the china.
Oh, my god. That's my grandson. Oh, Nate, thank you.
Mr. BERKUS: You are so welcome.
FANNIE: Oh, my god.
WINFREY: Fannie's kitchen was demolished by Katrina,
but now, it's more beautiful than ever
with room to feed an army.
FANNIE: This is great.
Mr. BERKUS: This is the heart of the home.
I wanted you to have as many people here
as possible so I did this banquette all along the wall.
You can get eight people back here when
you have your big buffets.
And then over there,
all somebody has to do is grab their own plate,
because you told me it's buffet- style
and your kitchen never had a dishwasher?
You do now. We put one in for you.
So I think that's going to be a lot easier.
FANNIE: This is like, oh, my god.
WINFREY: And there's more.
[APPLAUSE]
WINFREY: There's more.
Listen, and I think the reason I'm so emotional,
I've seen a lot of wonderful Nate makeovers,
but I think about how, for me,
Fannie represents, you know, the multitude,
the thousands and thousands of people whose
FEMA trailers are still in their yard and
didn't have this opportunity and she represents,
you know, the struggle and the hope.
So let's take a look as Fannie sees the rest of her new house.
Mr. BERKUS: All right, are you ready to see the guest room?
FANNIE: Yes.
Mr. BERKUS: Yeah, should we go?
GENE: This is beautiful.
FANNIE: Oh, my god.
GENE: Look at this.
Mr. BERKUS: And I thought too, you know what?
You guys have been in that trailer for a year and a half,
before that a shelter, you might need your
own space a little bit, too.
This room doubles as a den.
Here's the best part, you guys.
That is a bed.
There's another bed underneath.
FANNIE: Oh, my god.
Mr. BERKUS: So, you know, it works as a sofa but you can have a den,
but you also have a guest room.
Every closet in here is actually all built out for you.
GENE: Great.
Mr. BERKUS: You've got drawers in here,
there's shelves.
So, you know, this really maximizes the space, too.
FANNIE: This is beautiful.
Mr. BERKUS: Your bedroom, I needed that to be the most special place.
So ...
FANNIE: Oh, my god.
GENE: This is beautiful.
FANNIE: Oh, my god.
Mr. BERKUS: All right, guys.
Here's the deal.
Fannie, you've been in school.
So that's why I put the desk in your bedroom.
I thought, "You know what? You can close the door.
You can concentrate.
This is a spot for you."
And then I put mirrors over here,
because all I could think about for
the last few weeks was how narrow that trailer was.
And I thought, "I want this to feel even bigger than it is."
Because it's time for you to have some space.
When we started this project,
I said, "I want to find a place that has beautiful things."
And Ballard Designs said,
"We'll do it." And I went through everything
and I picked the most beautiful things.
And Lowe's was here around the clock.
So I wanted a special
spot for the tiara because, when you wake up every morning,
that's what I wanted you to see.
FANNIE: Thank you.
Mr. BERKUS: You are welcome.
You ready to see the bathroom?
FANNIE: Mm-hmm, god.
Mr. BERKUS: Go in to the bathroom.
FANNIE: Oh, my god.
Mr. BERKUS: Isn't this great?
That's a Jacuzzi. We took out that old tub.
FANNIE: I wanted this but we couldn't afford it.
Mr. BERKUS: Well, you have it now.
FANNIE: Thank you.
WINFREY: So that was about three months ago.
They did that this summer when Fannie and Gene
moved back into their house
but they were evacuated again when Hurricane
Gustav touched down in Louisiana.
WINFREY: Can you imagine that?
And after seven anxious days in Alabama,
Fannie is now back in her house and joining us
from her new kitchen. Hi, Fannie.
FANNIE: Hi, Oprah.
[CHEERS AND APPLAUSE]
Mr. BERKUS: Hi, Fannie.
WINFREY: Well, you know, Fannie,
I was thinking about you and,
obviously, the people of New Orleans and Mississippi
and the gulf coast but, you know,
during that whole Gustav, I was thinking,
"How's Fannie's house?
How's Fannie's house?"
How was the house when you came back?
FANNIE: The house is great.
When we left I knew they would have a little debris
with the wind and all. But somewhere in my spirit,
I just knew that my house would be okay,
because God had already blessed me to have it done
which was a huge blessing.
And I knew it wasn't going to be taken away
from me just that easily.
WINFREY: I heard you also -
you took the crown with you again?
[LAUGHTER]
FANNIE: Everywhere I go my crown goes.
It's very important to me.
It keeps me grounded and let's me know
that good things do happen and it will happen.
WINFREY: Yeah.
FANNIE: And sent my sash to my niece.
She live in Metairie and her
apartment is on the third floor.
So that's where my sash is,
but my crown was on my head.
[LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE]
WINFREY: I love that.