A Snapshot of New Orleans

I had actually been wanting to post my ethnography that I wrote for my "Writing Hurricane Katrina" class. I traveled down to New Orleans for a week and helped do some hurricane disaster relief. This was my final assignment for the class and I actually enjoy it for the most part. It's a little lengthy. My b. Oh and now that I'm re-reading this I'm noticing some type-o's and all that jazz. Forgive me. Again, my b.

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"For $10 I got me some gumbo and this Southern Accent":

Rebuilding a City, One Volunteer at a Time

For most people, when they think of New Orleans, August 29, 2005 comes to mind. I think of March 15, 2009. A lot of people might think back to their adolescent years and say cliche things like, "I remember way back when..." and reminisce on and on about how they were in New Orleans for some Mardi Gras and woke up in a foreign place after a night of excess drinking. "Ah, those were the days," they'd say. 

Most would think about the hurricane. She doesn't even need a name anymore. When Katrina plowed through the Gulf Coast and tore trees from the ground, houses from their foundations, and people from their loved ones, she bore her way into the lives of Americans everywhere. Even though we wanted nothing to do with her, she still sent thousands of displaced people into our hometowns, our stadiums, seeking a place of refuge.

Ask me about New Orleans and I'll tell you what I remember. Not about the hurricane although I've heard the stories and I've seen the pictures. Not about the alcohol, although I've set foot in some of the most famous bars that the Big Easy has to offer. My story is one about the people- the streetcar driver, the immigrant who gives up his seat for my friends and I, the 71 year old woman who lost it all, and the volunteer that dared to go.

This is their story, all of them, and this is my story as well.  This is the tale of one person's look into New Orleans, a city that is still broken, still healing, and still fighting, even three and a half years after Hurricane Katrina plundered all that she wanted.

"The storm we always feared"

The Times-Picayune, a major New Orleans's newspaper, called Katrina, "The storm we always feared." For years, government and local officials knew of the city's ill fate should there be a major natural disaster. Hurricane Katrina had been on the radar for some time before it made landfall over the Gulf Coast on August 29, 2005.  When Katrina hit southern Florida earlier that week, she was classified as a category one hurricane. As the storm moved across the Gulf of Mexico, it picked up speed so that just days before it made landfall in the Gulf States, the meteorologists had declared Hurricane Katrina a category five storm. On a scale from one to five, Katrina was a five. The news of a fast approaching natural disaster forced New Orleans's mayor, Ray Nagin, to declare a mandatory evacuation of the city. Thousands fled and clogged the interstates. Thousands stayed and waited and prayed. Oh God, please, not the storm we've always feared.

When the storm made landfall early morning on August 29, 2005, Katrina had weakened and was now a category three hurricane boasting winds of up to 125 mph. Those who had no had the means to leave the city made their way to the Superdome to wait it out. As they waited, the winds blew and the rain fell, levees breached and dumped water on the greater New Orleans area from all angles. As they waited, their city drowned. 

Days past without food, water, or help of any kind and the flood-waters continued to rise. The only helicopters overhead were equipped with cameras and journalists who snubbed their noses at the roof-dwellers waving white sheets of surrender in the air. The days that followed the storm's landfall made everyone increasingly aware that what was happening was by no means a natural disaster but rather a man made one. The levees, build by the Army Corps of Engineers, had cracked, split, and ruptured spewing water into a city that found itself below sea-level, filling up like a sink basin; various pumping stations had failed, backing up human waste into the streets; the government failed to respond with the water, food, buses, and National Guard troops that had been promised.

Bodies floated face down in the streets, houses were thrown from their foundations, and hundreds of New Orleanians cried out for help from their roof tops in the sweltering August heat. Over 1,800 people lost their lives in the wake of Hurricane Katrina while millions of people watched. I was one of the millions. 

I am one person representing a million, trying to alter our skewed perceptions of New Orleans and twisted views of what happened on that 29th of August.

Misconceptions and First Impressions

New Orleans is _______________________________.

Fill in the blank for yourself. Before my trip to New Orleans, I filled the gap with words like dirty, jazz, drinking, Mardi Gras, Katrina, naked women, poverty, Cajun food, gumbo, debauchery, The Real World, alligators, and even the word "fixed". New Orleans was a lot of what we had expected to find- there were bars and Mardi Gras beads and of course, fabulous music. There were street musicians and poor people and lots of gumbo. However, the things that make New Orleans special, unique are the things that I was not expecting to find.

There is something in the air in New Orleans, it's sort of indescribable- the "Big Easy" spirit, I suppose. It's all around you when you're there. I felt it from the moment we stepped off of the airplane. It had been a long day with flights from Boston to Detroit to Memphis and finally to New Orleans. Whatever that spirit is, you can feel it in the humidity. I got my first taste the moment that we stepped outside. The ground reeked of that "just rained" smell and the sky read aloud the warning that more was on its way.

I stared, mesmerized, out of our rental car's window. Houses and people and empty plots of land. As we drove by, families sat on their stoops, seemingly unphased by the large X spray-painted on the sides of their homes. Like a tattoo that "showed up" after a night of bad choices, the X and it's mysterious numbers serve as a painful reminder of what any New Orleanian will call "the storm." This simple fact alone showed me the resiliency of the people of New Orleans. 

We drove down the highways littered with billboard advertising demolition services, promising to rip your house down at a cheap rate. We wove through the streets in our rented Chrysler PT Cruiser, through the not-so-good parts of town into the Garden district. We drove down St. Charles Avenue where everything was littered with Mardi Gras beads and yet everything was so beautiful. From our first 15 minutes in town the stark contrast was evident between the wealthy and the poor, the ones who got out and the ones who didn't.

New Orleans surprised me. Where I had expected to find a tasteless city littered with drunken college students and strip clubs, there I found a rich history and sincere hospitality. Where I had expected to find Bourbon Streets on every street I found real people dealing with the realities of life, not escaping them by begging for beads under a balcony.

Smelly Like Me

The Big Easy offers so much more to the visitors and volunteers than just booze and Mardi Gras beads, it offers a place to renew your soul. After a 6 hour day of caulking and staining, what you really need is some live music. Some energy. Some amazing food. Some hospitality.

We were offered the chance to experience the things that we read about in books, saw pictures of in movies. The good and the bad. The beautiful and the ugly. The French Quarter and the Lower 9th.

I had this idea in my mind that we would not come into contact with many other volunteers in New Orleans. Why would anyone else spare their spring break on the beach to try and tackle the daunting task of building a house? Even I had wondered why I was really there.

I had no idea what to expect on Thursday night when we were headed to the Rock 'N Bowl in Midtown. "Oh, it's crazy. It's awesome," I had heard a couple of people say. 

From the outside, Rock 'N Bowl looks like your typical bowling alley- neon lights, a huge sign in the shape of nothing other than a bowling pin. Opening the door revealed a whole different world. I had been on my cellphone with my friend Peter, explaining to him how I was in New Orleans and it really wasn't a good time to talk when the explosion of noise came bursting from the door as if it had been dying to get it. That was the end of that phone call. The noise was deafening-  I could barely hear the woman at the door ask me if I was 21. "Yes?" I replied as she stamped my hand, snatched my money, and gave me a head nod to continue up the stairs.

I stepped off those stairs and into the world of Zydeco- a world of music that I never thought possible. Instantly, my inhibitions flew out that door, following the noises of the harmonica and rub board. My classmates and I began to flail about, dancing and shouting, jumping and laughing. There was no one there to judge us for dancing like "wet noodles" and we weren't there to judge anyone else, even the people who kept creeping up on our space. We were all just there to let loose, to let the music carry us away from our jobs or our pains or the staining and installation of cabinets that were going to meet us the next day. 

I had just about bumped heads with an entire group of people when a girl in purple tapped me on the shoulder. "Where are you guys from?" she shouted as she leaned into my ear. 

For a moment, I panicked. Was it THAT obvious that I wasn't from New Orleans? Oh no! Did I smell like a gross volunteer who had been caulking a house all day? 

"Massachusetts," I replied hesitantly. "You?"

"Virginia," she shouted. It wasn't until then that I noticed the large group of people that were with her. I smiled and waved and they smiled and waved politely back. I turned back around to share the information with the rest of the group. They all smiled and nodded because the truth was, this was not the first group of other volunteers that we had run into. They were everywhere- the airport, the Maple Leaf, Cafe Du Monde, The Gumbo Shop.  Perhaps the strangest thing was that there seemed to be some sort of connection between "us" and "them", we gravitated towards one another.

On our last night in town, we found ourselves waiting in a very long line to eat at The Gumbo Shop, which boasts to have the best Chicken Andouille gumbo in the city. As smaller parties passed by the ten of us, the gap between us and another large group of young adults began to close. Before we knew it we were standing shoulder to shoulder, sharing the news that we had already received about the long wait. Then came the question again, "Where are you guys from?"

The question regarding where one calls home always manages to stir up a conversation quickly. We learned that they were from Arizona State volunteering for spring break as well and that this was also their last night here. We told them all about how we were from Massachusetts and that we were volunteering with a class that we had taken. "Massachusetts? My dad lives in Massachusetts. Westfield, I think." 

"Small world," I thought but where we were from wasn't the topic of discussion. We divulged details of where we were working, what we were doing, where we had gone. It was not only evident that we were in a new place for the first time but also that we were in New Orleans to do something outside of ourselves. 

Working With Power Tools

After being in the Big Easy for even just a day, I could tell the sort of person that we would be helping to build a new home. They would be someone who didn't laugh at your silly accent and didn't show you their tall finger when you cut them off with your grocery cart at Walmart. No, these were an entirely different breed of people. They were genuinely kind. That is the sort of person that we were going to be helping.

Helping is great but volunteering is not glamorous. You sweat and get dirty. You return back to your bed at the volunteer housing in black pants caked in an inch of caulk, your arms tinted orange with wood stain. Volunteering is humiliating yet exhilarating. It is not about doing things that you're comfortable with but rather doing the things that you fear most.

My father had warned me countless times: Do not touch a saw or a nail gun. I had all good intentions at heeding his word because even the idea of touching one of those two things frightened me into a cold sweat accompanied by a stomach ache. However, it's like they say "when in Rome..."

Timmy, our crew chief or "team leader" so to speak, encouraged everyone to use every piece of equipment. He gave a thorough explanation of how to use the equipment safely and said, "Now you try it." So we did. Each of us used the tools that we had feared for so long and felt so liberating for having done so. Shelley was ecstatic as she told me, "Oh, I feel so powerful!" It was true. It was liberating being in a different place doing different things with a real solid purpose behind it and that purpose was Ms. H.

Ms. H was the 71 year old, spunky woman who would be living in the beautiful house that we were piecing together one tile at a time. She came strolling in to visit us one late afternoon. Adorned in all shades of vibrant orange from head to toe, she doled out kisses and hugs left and right. Ms. H radiated beauty and strength. She gave our actions, our hammering away from 9 to 3 a deeper purpose. This house was to be hers. She would live there and play with her grandchildren there and cook meals in that kitchen. She would have memories there. Ms. H would call it home.

Throughout the week we stained cabinets, caulked baseboards, installed trim and window sills, painted, hung doors. We conquered the things that were completely foreign to us so that they became mundane. When Shelley and I hung the kitchen cabinet doors, we were beaming. Ms. H's kitchen would look so beautiful. She would be so happy.

On our first day of work, Timmy had made a comment that I didn't understand. He said that even if he got a family into a house for four months and something like Katrina happened again, he would be happy knowing that they had four months in that house and that he was able to help them. I hadn't understood it until we hung those cabinets and then I knew, the happiness that you get from making someone else happy, a stranger who feels like a grandmother.

Like Kings

When you're in New Orleans, you feel at home. It might be attributed to the vast range of people that live in New Orleans but I'd attribute it to the genuine Southern hospitality. Perhaps even more than that, the gratitude of the people of New Orleans. On numerous occasions we were welcomed with open arms and sincerity from New Orleanians and visitors alike. 

During the beginning of the week of our work at Ms. H's house, one of her neighbors came over to greet us and check in on the progress of the house. "Look at all of these beautiful girls!" she said. Beautiful? Are we looking at the same people? We're covered in everything imaginable. "My granddaughters would never do anything like this, they're too afraid of getting dirty," she said, "but you, you're going to be successful because you go out and do it." More than just being grateful, this neighbor was refreshingly encouraging. 

Not all New Orleanians could offer up encouragement through their words but they gave it by giving up and their seats for us on the streetcars and their truthful "thank you's" and "we can't do this without you's".

Even people visiting New Orleans could tell that we weren't the typical tourists. An average looking woman dressed in black from Texas was visiting friends in New Orleans when we ran into her at the Maple Leaf, a local bar. Even she thanked us. A woman visiting New Orleans thanked us. 

New Orleanians realized their brokenness after the government failed to provide substantial funding for them to rebuild. Volunteers were the only way to get the city back on its feet, to get people back into their homes so they decided to treat them like kings. I have heard tales of being invited into strangers homes and being served food, of being hugged and kissed out of thankfulness. The people of New Orleans know how to make you feel welcome and they know just they right way to say "thank you!"

From A Class To A Team

At the beginning of it all, we had each come from a different mindset, a different town, religious affiliation, family life. Yet, as we registered for classes, Writing Hurricane Katrina had, for one reason or another, caught each of our eyes as we ached for adventure among our boring foundational requirements of maths and sciences. It drew each of us in and latched onto us tight so that we could not shake it despite what work schedules and bills and Friday afternoon plans might say. Somewhere throughout the course of a week, these ten strangers became one team. More than just a class of students or even a just group of volunteers, a team, a body. Functioning as one unit, a machine with its nuts and bolts, microchips and batteries. 

I recall how after our plane had landed and our bags had been collected, we waited for Sean, the only guy on our trip, a non-traditional student in his 40s, and Chrissy, our professor, to get our rental cars. Things were still tense among the group, slightly awkward. Everyone stood around, looking everywhere but at one another. Some sat on their luggage, some sat on the floor. Others made phone calls to relatives to let them know that we had in fact arrived. 

But within just a few days, these things had changed. Traveling does a number on breaking down boundaries, of forcing us to share our hopes, dreams, and pet-peeves with those people that we just happen to be squished in tight spaces with or those that you have to share a bunk bed with. It will bring out the best and the worst in people. It will show you who is a trivia master and who is a silent poet. People will change from someone you thought you could tolerate to someone who goes on your hit list. 

It quickly became apparent that we had become a subculture of our own. There was a bond between the ten of us that separated us from the "other" volunteers. We shared jokes and hard work. We shared meals and early mornings. It was obvious that we were not the "typical" class at any college or university because most classes don't go on field trips to Bourbon Street with their professors- but we did. 

Scholarship brought us together but humanitarianism united us in the end. Each of us had a story to tell before New Orleans and now each of us has one to share because of New Orleans. I am only able to tell my small portion of the story but I have found that the Big Easy unites people that would otherwise be strangers and gives purpose to experiences that would otherwise be devoid of value.

What can be found in helping someone rebuild a part of their life? Love.