Luck of the Land

Last night I got scolded for going downstairs to publish this blog at 4:30 in the morning. "Sweetheart, I can't have you coming down here at this hour. We're under marshall law and crime is rampant. You know that side of St. Claude used to be bad and it's even worse now. They're all just holed up in abandoned houses. I had to kick out a bunch of crack heads hanging out on the benches earlier tonight. We try our best to maintain a sense of normalacy around here, but it's hard. The National Guard is just one block away."

At that hour even the criminals are asleep. But I accepted my scolding and will hold off on publishing at all hours of the night. There must be so much that I'm not seeing during my brief stay. Given time, I'm sure my enthusiasm would be tempered by the reality of the situation. But still, I see signs of hope everywhere I look.

Nonetheless, today was a sobering experience. I went back to my old high school on the lakefront. The water damage was apparent and the whole first floor of the school is still shut down one year later. The field where I used to eat lunch and play hackey sack was devastated. The school was making great strides to continue business as usual, but things were definitely not usual.

I drove to my old neighborhood a few blocks away, just over the levee. Half the bridge was closed and I started to worry as I took a detour to get to my street, then saw tractors and trash littering the levee. Miraculously enough, 1711 Jay Street--the house I lived in with my mother all through high school--was fine, but a few blocks away the damage was intense. PJ's on the lakefront, where I used to hang out after school, was completely devastated. The water lines were well above my head and that's just where the water settled. The whole shopping center was gutted, and the gas station across the street, the apartment buildings and all the single family homes in that part of the neighborhood were destroyed. Most of the houses were abandoned, but a few brave families were camping out in trailers attached to what used to be there homes.

The storm was capricious, knocking out a street here and a street there, and leaving others almost untouched. The fortunes of thousands of people were laid out in the silent geography, the luck of the land. In mid-city, a whole neighborhood that sits on a ridge was spared, while all the houses below were destroyed. No one even knew about the ridge before the storm. Now every one refers to it as mid-city ridge--they were the lucky ones. I'm willing to bet the housing prices there have skyrocketed. The contours of the land, which were once invisible to its inhabitants, are now obvious.

Craig, the security guard assigned to an ATM machine plopped down in this abandoned shopping center in this wrecked neighborhood was happy for the company. "Don't believe what you heard in the media. This was a category 5 storm. There was sustained winds of 175 mph easy and gusts up to 2 and a quarter. It was the gusts that blew the trees down and the poles, that ripped off the roofs." Craig now lives in a houseboat a few miles away to cut the commute time. He has been assigned to patrol private property all over the state since the hurricane hit.

I drive down to the lake and am happy to see the same old sight: families fishing, artists sketching the scene, birds swarming over the lake and fish jumping in the twilight. The trees are held up with wooden braces, the levees are fortified with corrugated iron, and giant pumps are still installed in the bayou. But other than that, the lake looks peaceful and seems to have gone back to being a companion to the people of the city. New Orleans is the Crescent City because of its relationship to this lake, which gives and takes in cycles that have gone on since this city was first built.

The Funnest Place on Earth

Even after Katrina, New Orleans is the funnest city in the world. It's almost 4 AM and I'm just getting back from my reunion and the night on the town that followed.

Tipitina's. The place I first cut my dancing feet. Where you can still hear Cab Calloway, Sly and the Family Stone and Curtis Mayfield songs performed live by musicians younger than me. Where funk still packs the house and people dance till dawn. Where the night builds and builds and everyone shares an understanding of the musical tradition.

Professor Longhair smiles down from the stage and people remember. Somehow I end up dancing on stage, just like the old days. The band calls for three ladies to come up and dance and my friends push me towards the stage. I dance my heart out and my old classmates cheer me on. The song ends and I descend from the stage only to be greeted by a very good old friend who I haven't seen in years, who I lost touch with somewhere along the way. She picks me up and spins me around. We dance the rest of the night together, as if we never missed a beat.

So here I am back in my hotel room reminiscing about my life tonight and my life 10 years ago. At this moment it feels like the same thing. My ears are buzzing and my voice is hoarse. I've talked and danced the night away. There's something about New Orleans that awakens my joy for life. Something missing in Los Angeles and London and all the cities I've lived since. New Orleans is home. I am the city.

I'm happy here. I feel at peace. It doesn't even bother me that all my former classmates are doctors, lawyers and real estate agents living in Texas and Louisiana. I'm just a poor documentary filmmaker living in Los Angeles, but here I feel at home.

Only the Hopeful Remain

I drive uptown, passing Soul Food to Go stands and banners reading "Hold the Core Accountable." There's an explosion of now hiring and for sale signs, but in between all that the city is still very much alive. It seems like the mansions and the projects are for sale. The poor people can't afford to live here anymore and the rich don't want to. New Orleans may just become the perfect middle class city.

I can't remember ever seeing so many shiny new cars in a city where polluting jalopies once ruled the streets. Over 100,000 cars were destroyed in the storms and I can't tell whether these new cars are a result of gentrification or just replacing what was lost.

I park my white Magnum on Octavia street and realize that all the houses have a fresh coat of paint. The neighborhood looks great.

A couple sees me taking pictures and comes out to talk about rebuilding the city. "It's a day by day process, but it will get there. It's hard to explain to people who aren't from here what it was like to be away. It was unbearable." They have so much pride in this place and encourage me to come back and help rebuild the city. I want to, I really want to. The good people who stayed are the ones who know New Orleans in their heart and soul, not the pretenders who came for a good time and left when the going got tough.

I feel like a mother checking in on her children--making sure all my favorite places are intact. PJ's Coffeshop, check. The iced mocha still tastes the same after all these years... The Maple Leaf Bookshop, check. And earlier today, Cafe Brasil, Mona's, The Dragon's Den, Molly's, Faulkner House, check.

And, of course, WWOZ, New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Station. I can't help but smile listening to the raspy old blues men on the radio.

DJ: How you doing T. Model Ford?
T. Model: I'm hanging like an apple on a tree, waiting for the ladies to come out tonight.
DJ: Yeah you right. Keep your daughters locked up, cause T. Model's on the prowl.

You wouldn't believe the dirty conversation that followed...Clearly the FCC hasn't made it to New Orleans, but I have.

A Day in the French Quarter

I sit under the familiar eves of Cafe du Monde and look out at the giant magnolia tree in Jackson Park. Tourists still stroll the quarter and most of my favorite places are intact. It still looks like the New Orleans of my memories. I'm elated to be here and surprised to see that things aren't nearly as bad as I imagined, at least in this part of town.

Things are different, of course. This once bustling cafe, with wait times up to an hour for a plate of beignets and a cafe au lait, is nearly empty. I used to love watching tourists try and eat beignets and blowing powdered sugar all over themselves with the first bite. Only the locals knew you can't exhale through your nose while eating beignets.

The fence around the park at Jackson Square—where artists, musicians, palm readers and hustlers used to jostle for space—is nearly bare. A few hawkers remain alongside the horse drawn buggies. I used to think the horses in New Orleans looked like the most miserable horses in the world, and today is no exception. Eric Lee Buchannan dips his paintbrush in the fountain and fidgets with his ornate bike. His fabulous bright panel paintings are hanging along the wrought iron fence showing scenes of a tugboat sitting atop the raging Mississippi and jazz musicians of every denomination.

I make my way up to the top floor of Tower Records on Decatur where I first built up my record collection. All the Cajun, Zydeco, Jazz, New Orleans R&B, and Blues are up here and the salt-and-pepper salesmen have been on the scene for a lifetime. This is where I bought my first Dr. John, Donald Byrd, Pharoah Sanders, Rebirth Brass Band albums and so much more. But I don't have the heart to buy anything from this chain and I make my way back down to street level where Stoney B. calls out to me, "Do you have a blues man on your camera?" I say no and he and his partner, Grampa (a blind harmonica player with only one lens in his sunglasses) start performing some sweet New Orleans blues. This duo has been playing together in the streets of the quarter for years. I ask them if they're OK since everything... and Stoney B says, "Well, we're alive." Blues men to the core. They tell me they'll be playing blues in New Orleans till the day they die. I buy their homemade CD for $20 and smile as the old blind man flirts with me. Stoney B. tells him I'm pretty and unmarried, and that they caught me just in time. Grampa says he's been sending Stoney B. to talking school so he could talk for him.

I feel like spending money on all the touristy things that used to repluse me—CDs, t-shirts, pralines, alligator potato chips, even a divination bone reading—in the hope that my money can do some good in at least a few people's lives. I sit down with Leroy (aka Hurkey) after he calls out to me a few times for a personal divination session. He hands me a black cloth bag filled with cowrie shells, bones and a single dice. He asks me to shake it around and then dump the contents on the table. He closes his eyes and holds my hands and tells me I'm a creative, spiritual person. That money will come to me by December and that I intimidate men because they think I'm too much woman for them. Then he gives me a prescription:

Next month on the first full moon, put three tablespoons of sugar in your bath water and take a bath. This will sweeten your life and your path. Then step out of the bathtub backwards to get rid of bad luck. Following this, on the next rain, set a white cup with a pinch of salt out in the rain—this is holy water. When it stops raining, put the cup in your bedroom window until the water evaporates. Then wrap it in a white hankerchief and throw it away. A lot of people are jealous of you, and this will dispel the bad luck that comes from this.

It definitely wouldn't be New Orleans without the cheeky hawkers and scam artists. Some kind of salesman approaches me, "Ma'am, ma'am, this area is for the ugly people. You're way too good looking to be in here." I walk away. I've heard it a million times before in New Orleans—that and the man who knows where you got your shows—some things never change.

The barges blow their horns on the Mississippi and I decide it's time for my favorite meal, a fried shrimp poboy with lots of tabasco from Verti Mart on Royal Street--real food for real people at real prices--the best kept secret in the French Quarter. When it comes to Cajun cooking, I buy the hype.

First Impressions

I love it. The moment I step out of the plane I know it's New Orleans from the unmistakable blast of heat and humidity. It lasts for just a moment before I enter the air conditioned overcompensation of the airport; the cheerful dixieland streaming over the PA system; the blue vinyl "We're jazzed you're here" welcome banners;and the ubiquitous restaurant ads with Times Picayune bean scale ratings—forget about stars or thumbs-up, four beans means yum.

I'm instantly calmer, friendlier, talking to everyone around me. The Southern has come back within minutes and the frenetic LA mentality seems to have melted into the heat. My glasses fog the instant I leave the airport. This is swampland.

I feel an enormous psychic release to be back in what seems like another world, another life. The shuttle to the Alamo lot takes its time and the only words the woman at the wheel has for me are "My job is to circle, drop, circle, drop." She drops me off and I find out my economy car has been upgraded to a premium white Magnum pimp-mobile that I can barely see out of. Perfect.

I've finally got my chops on and I'm ready to roll to the Olde Town Inn in the
Marigny, part of the 30% of New Orleans that's still habitable or so Gus tells me as he shows me to my room. I remember the view from the sky as I landed in New Orleans--the smattering of lights scattered on the banks of the Misssissippi and concentrated in the few lucky neighborhoods that survived. The rest was swallowed in darkness.

Although I've see little direct evidence of the storm, I get the strange feeling of being in a sparsely populated ghost town. New Orleans is no longer the city that never sleeps. At 1:30 AM I am the only one up. The neighborhood bars and cafes are closing for the night and I don't even have a bottle of water. I make my way down the uneven wood clapboard stairs into the overgrown courtyard of the inn and find a vending machine. I'll have to hydrate myself on rootbeer until the morning.

Time to Go Home

One year later, New Orleans is in the news and on my mind…

Tomorrow I go back to New Orleans for my 10 year high school reunion and I’m bursting with enthusiasm. I usually hate this kind of thing, but somehow I’m ready to go back. For the past year, I’ve preferred to hang on to my memories—the city in my mind—then witness first-hand what New Orleans has become. But denial can only last so long before reality comes calling. And this is my excuse to go back. To wander the streets that shaped my personality, to knock on doors and not know if anyone will answer. How many of these memories are now lost at sea? I can only guess if my favorite tree still stands… if my old haunts are still open for business… if the street musicians still busk on every corner… but something tells me its time to go home.

Mardi Gras Indians

I received a reaffirming e-mail today from someone who had read my blog, and commented, “Those that think money is what richness is all about, should read this and know that richness in spirit and love will trump money every time.”

What a perfect quote to introduce the spirit-rich tradition of the Mardi Gras Indians, who happen to be some of New Orleans’ poorest residents.

I first heard about the Mardi Gras Indians through my bus driver, Mr. Chuck. He told me a story about a friend of his who had been a Mardi Gras Indian Chief, and had been shot so many times in the stomach that he couldn’t eat solid food.

Apparently, Mardi Gras used to be even more lawless than it is today, and the Mardi Gras Indians were largely responsible.

The Indians are one example of how every cultural tradition that enters New Orleans and stews for a while finds another life, another soul, and eventually becomes a different thing entirely. Like the base of a good gumbo, time on the stove—in the heat and humidity—adds richness and flavor.

So the Mardi Gras Indians took the culture of the Native Americans, brought it to New Orleans, let it stew for a while, and added Mardi Gras. And here’s what you get:



























So why were poor descendents of slaves interested in Native American culture? Back in the days, Native Americans helped blacks from New Orleans escape slavery by bringing them through their tribal network and on towards freedom. In honor of this incredible kindness, black New Orleanians formed their own Mardi Gras Indian tribes, each with a distinctive color costume and pattern of beadwork. Traditionally, Mardi Gras Indians make a new costume every year, and burn the old one after Mardi Gras is over. They spend hundreds upon hundreds of hours each night sewing tiny beads into the elaborate designs that are their signature, and stitching feathers into their towering headdresses.



























Come Mardi Gras, they come out in full force to sing, dance, and compete for the honor of being “the prettiest chief of all,” gold teeth and all. That honor doesn’t come without sacrifice, and back in the days, armed brawls used to break out in the clamor for recognition. Indians would bust out revolvers and battle axes and take a drunken swing at each others feathers, if not shooting each other outright. The fracas would ensue until one tribe said “Homba!” in recognition that the other tribe’s chief was “the prettiest chief of all.”

Eventually, the violence got out of hand, and the mayor of New Orleans threatened to shut down Mardi Gras. The street fights turned into impromptu singing, dancing and beauty competitions, and the great Mardi Gras Indian bands—like the Wild Magnolias —were born.

Always broke and chock full of soul, the Indians come out each year and party their hearts out.