Day 124: The Rooster’s Denouement

Last December 30th, I paced the length of my house full of guests from far north and nearby, making sure everyone had what they needed before nights and days hitting the streets of the then-destination city of New Orleans. Did I have an inkling of a clue that a full third of my 2005 would be spent living in Houston? As the NOPD police horse bit down on my wrist and my heart did a number on me in the throbbing pain, might I have believed that my friends and I would experience a lot more pain than that only 8 months later? As we drove to the R residence in Lakeview for our pre-Quarter-warmup party, could I have imagined that entire beautiful neighborhood submerged in filthy floodwater for days and, thus, almost completely destroyed?

My vision for September 2005 (a lot of which I don’t mention on this blog) had a big, fat goose-egg to do with reality. If time is nature’s way of keeping everything from happening at once, nature must have done overtime on August 29th and then gone on vacation because everything did happen all at once right after that. Or that’s what it feels like. Maybe it’s our penchant for thinking in terms of nice, round numbers, but I’m glad this year is done with.

Anyway …

2005 was also a year of exhilarating firsts, each month only piling onto the last in fun and new experience:

* January – As one of the newest members of Krewe de C.R.A.P.S., I marched in my very first Krewe du Vieux parade. 2005′s theme “What Would Krewe Du Vieux Do?” was answered by our “We Support The Right To Arm Bears!” This was an honor, after two years of watching from the sidelines and marvelling at the New Orleanian capacity for creative, colorful and raucous sociopolitical satire. To say that txyankee, my cousin BJV, her boyfriend AF, D and I had a great time that night would be a major understatement.

Rolf & Maitri @ Krewe Du Vieux 2005
txyankee & Me At Krewe Du Vieux 2005

* February – Mardi Gras Madness was only beginning. D rode in the Krewe of King Arthur parade, after which my cousin, SDV, flew down from D.C. to see us through to Ash Wednesday. SDV, D, and I joined our friends, Louise and Michael, in the St. Ann’s Parade bright and early on Mardi Gras morn. It was fun, but walking from the Bywater to the Quarter is quite brutal on a season-wrecked body. [Don't you worry none, a remoulade-oozing, fried shrimp po' boy fixed me right up!]

Burning Bushes A Mardi Gras Day's Dream

* March – After I received the asked-for assignment at work, Machelle and I threw ourselves a pirate-themed birthday party, with the best pirate costumes (Dr. Frye as Superstar Swashbuckler and Morgan as Captain Morgan), rum and big messes that can only happen after a pirate-themed birthday party. It was so much fun, the cops showed up twice. [Apparently, members of Sen. Breaux's clan lived next door to Mac, and had a very low tolerance for "kids these days." I still blame Ray for inviting his Tulane undergraduate "proteges."]

A month of parties it seems, with more food and friends at a crawfish boil in Bruno’s Gentilly home and, everyone’s favorite, the Irish Channel St. Patrick’s Day parade!

Irish Channel St. Patrick's Day Parade 2005

* April – Mostly spent sleeping in preparation for Jazzfest. My very first blogger meetup, with the famous Tilotamma, went beautifully and we are still friends to this day. As much as I haven’t recently taken the opportunity to tell her so, I read her work almost daily and love the western sensibility and experience she brings to writing about South India, Chennai in particular. Definitely a winner in the East Meets West department!

* May – First Annual Tulane Law vs. Shell Kickball Battle To The Death. Boatraces, beer czars, balls and more at the Audubon Park Fly! Tulane won by a technicality; apparently, their lot is a little more athletic than we are. Just wait until next year, you … lawyers!

* June – June 1st marked the beginning of our arduous descent into HurricaneLand. After 2004′s evacuation for Hurricane Ivan and the rather wimpy effect of Tropical Storm Arlene, Tropical Storm Cindy and Hurricane Dennis on southeastern Louisiana in 2005, I cockily decided that hurricanes are things that only happen to other people. Quite ironic considering that, in 1989, this ex-resident of Kuwait thought war and bombs are things that happen to other people. Do me a favor and keep this thought in the back of your mind, please.

These Humans Are Scared
Tropical Storm Dennis In New Orleans

* July – All I seem to remember is sweltering heat, humidity and cooking for a bunch of people. What’s new about this? I made a whole South Indian meal, was unaided, and was successful enough to now crave my own cooking. We Tamilians have a saying that is uttered when someone does the unthinkable, much to everyone else’s pleasant surprise: “It’s raining outside!” With the amount of interest I paid to kitchen work, singing and exploding nothing, I’m surprised my friends didn’t see a hurricane headed our way.

* August – Annie and Edu visited from Barcelona for the first time and had a lot of fun walking around the Quarter, taking in some of Satchmo Summer Fest, visiting the D-Day Museum and eating a lot of good food.

Trombone Shorty & Orleans Ave.
Trombone Shorty & Orleans Ave.

D and I also had some wonderful and strange parties go down this month. Our jobs were going well, we looked forward to the fruition of some exciting projects in September …

And, without further ado, The Year Of The Rooster decided to cock up. Given the amount of fun we had all year along, it was probably the “bad eye” of the envious that got us, as opposed to the wrath of a vengeful god, as some hatemongers seem to think. Be it an act of god, the bad eye, the eye of the hurricane or some abominable, atrocious, inadequate, substandard and rinky-dink levee construction (guess which one I believe in), everything went wrong (except for an exceptional evacuation by state and local authorities, and don’t you dare give them hell about that).

Or did it? To be sure, I’ve shed more tears in the last four months than I can remember having done in my life up until then, but some of them were tears of utter joy. When txyankee told me, in no uncertain terms, that I could stay at his house as long as necessary, I thanked goodness for a friend like him. Blogger words cannot express the safety and comfort I have felt living in his home, which is a lot more than a bachelor pad. To have full reign of and responsibility in this place filled with loving cats and dogs, cozy non-rental furniture, that lived-in smell and shared OCD tendencies is a real blessing. One loyal friend is truly worth ten-thousand relatives.

Getting to know ByTheBayou, a warm, funny and erudite person, and his neck of the woods has me convinced that Houston is not such a bad place after all.

Mom, Dad, D, Julie, Anne, Joel, Scott, Laura, Kurt and my cheerleaders in Madison, Door County and C-U (you know who you are) have held my hands and wiped away my tears through this time. Without them, and the southern chapter of the Daughters Of The American Hurricane, viz. Machelle, Beth, Wenni, Anastasia, Keerthi, Colette, Kavita and Stacey, life would have been beyond post-Katrina-unbearable, there is such a thing. I love you, too, Carole, Jorge and Ms. Viviane! To know who your true friends are (and who aren’t) … aaah!

The consideration I’ve received from all of you in BlogLand, people I’ve never met, is amazing. When some pooh-pooh the need and effectiveness of blogging, all I have to do now is show them this. The power of the internet shines in the outpouring of love and support that has followed disasters like the Southeast Asian tsunami and earthquake, Katrina and the Pakistani earthquake. You on my blogroll, especially Alan, brimful, Chai and Mimosa, I salute you. A special place in my heart has been carved for Alan, who has been helping me fix programming bugs in my WordPress blog because he thinks of it as a valuable resource, and Mimosa, who just made and mailed me 2 CDs of 97 glorious songs, with the longest handwritten card ever. Tracks And Trains Trailing My Red Tape, chock-full of Tom Waits, Mark Mothersbaugh, Ray Charles, Willie Nelson and many, many talented more has now permanently fused with my growing playlist. Music makes this world go ’round; never forget New Orleans that gave it much to sing with and about.

97 Songs From Mimosa, My Christmas Faerie
Tracks And Trains … and Maybe This Christmas, Baby?

I believe that children are our future, to borrow a line from a contemporary junk … ummmm … songstress. Life can’t be all that bad when we have the growth and achievements of my beautiful nieces and the brand new heavies, Jonathan, Otto, Lily, Devin and Jemma to look forward to. And Cyril.

Allow me to close by vouching for this life and the paths it has taken me down. What will The Year Of The Dog bring? I don’t know, but my prayer is that it guides all of us deftly through the new road we embark on as a city and, I hope, as a nation. It’s going to be scary and exciting at once; we have no choice but to take it as it comes. In fact, we have a responsibility to our spirits and the town to give it the best go we’ve got.

What’s New Orleans when it isn’t a party? It’s home. And if not forever, it’s only polite to give back what you got from her.

Happy New Year, dear friends and readers! May the delicious aroma of my chana masala and sangria, R’s German meatballs, Ismael’s Mexican cooking, and the mirth and goodwill generated at our small gathering tomorrow evening, reach you all. Peace.

December 30, 2005 | food & drink, hurricane katrina, new orleans | 4 Comments »

Day 121: Center Of The World

Joseph Campbell’s The Inner Reaches of Outer Space: Metaphor as Myth and as Religion mentions Black Elk and his concept of the center of the world, “which is everywhere and from which he viewed in a ‘sacred manner’ all things. It is not a geographical place, but the state of mind of one released from the vortex of delusory desires, fears and commitments by which lives in this world are compelled to their sorrows and pains.” This mentality is akin to a stage prior to moksha or nirvana, in Vedanta and Buddhism respectively.

Before you think I’ve fallen off the far reaches of outer space, let me state that neither do I apply Campbell’s analysis to anything metaphysical, nor do I assume the wisdom achieved by the likes of Black Elk. Instead, I utilize the idea to expand on a recent realization: I feel most comfortable in New Orleans, Madison, downtown Chicago, parts of Ireland, parts of the Netherlands and in the homes of my closest friends because these places are the center of my world. They embody my state of mind, from which I view all things in a healthier and more peaceful manner, if not sacred.

It’s not a trivial thing to know where you feel the most empowered, the most refreshed, the most unthreatened, the most yourself. As I said to Machelle in a recent email, “Guess people like us should thank our stars that, at the least, we know who we are and where ‘our place’ is.” Even if we can’t live there all of the time, or haven’t been there yet.

New Orleans = the pull of a hurting, yet strong, friend.
The recent police shooting of an angry and knife-wielding black man has me a bit upset given that it occurred three blocks from my home, the whole sad incident started at the Walgreen’s I shop and get my prescriptions filled in, and that several officers fatally shot a man, albeit a large and mobile one, armed with a knife.

But, the head prevails and I remind myself that this is nothing new in New Orleans, where I used to hear gunshots fired across the park from my very first apartment in the same neighborhood. I remember instances of D telling me to get away from the windows and quickly. This time it’s the cops doing the shooting. Should I feel good or badly that the situation was attended to by approximately 10 NOPD officers?

Chris Rose scribes everyone’s fears and hopes in his latest, “Is it depressing here? Yes. Is it dangerous? Maybe. The water, the air, the soil … I don’t know … But we’re going to help pick up the pieces. Starting today.”

Chicago = my kind of big city. Hectic to stable in a matter of minutes.
 A great evening on ol’ Halsted followed by a nice day of walking through Millennium Park, museum wandering, shopping and lots of pictures on Michigan Ave. the next day.

Two favorite Halsted haunts are now gone, however – first, Private Idaho, and now, The Prodigal Son. R.I.P., Trappist ales with un-subtitled Kung Fu movies and a bad punk band playing in the background.

txyankee and Mimosa understand Chicago’s allure, and the former hasn’t even been there.

Madison = intelligent calm and welcoming hearths.
Lounging with my laptop and a blankie (and watching a Discovery Channel show on Houston!) on a cold Wisconsin afternoon after Christmas. Ate everything everywhere. Drank everything everywhere. Tonight, great Indonesian food on Willy St. followed by a movie at South Towne, despite apres-nasal issues and what feels like a party in my stomach.

It’s nice to have lived in a few varied and great places and to have made some of the warmest friends on this planet. They all provide home (and cute kitties and pups) on the go. That said, there’s no place like your own. Soon enough.

December 27, 2005 | hurricane katrina, new orleans, travel, wisconsin | 2 Comments »

Surfing The Yuletide

My best wishes to you and your family at this time of Christmas, Hanukkah and time spent with family or in quiet reflection. Looking forward to a relatively stressless and peaceful new year!

Merry Christmas From The Art Institute of Chicago Museum

I leave you with this memo just received from Santa.

Dear People,
Due to the overwhelming current population of the earth, my contract was renegotiated by North American Fairies and Elves Local 209. As part of the new and better contract, I also get longer breaks for milk and cookies so keep that in mind. However, I’m certain that your children will be in good hands with your local replacement, who happens to be my third cousin, Bubba Claus. His side of the family is from the South Pole. He shares my goal of delivering toys to all the good boys and girls; however, there are a few differences between us.

Differences such as:

1. There is no danger of the Grinch stealing your presents from Bubba Claus. He has a gun rack on his sleigh and a bumper sticker that reads: “These toys insured by Smith and Wesson.”

2. Instead of milk and cookies, Bubba Claus prefers that children leave RC cola and pork rinds (or a moon pie) on the fireplace. And Bubba doesn’t smoke a pipe. He dips a little snuff, so please have an empty spit can handy.

3. Bubba Claus’ sleigh is pulled by floppy-eared, flyin’ coon dogs instead of reindeer. I made the mistake of loaning him a couple of my reindeer one time, and Blitzen’s head now overlooks Bubba’s fireplace.

4. You won’t hear “On Comet, on Cupid, on Donner, and Blitzen…” when Bubba Claus arrives. Instead, you’ll hear, “On Earnhardt, on Andretti, on Elliott and Petty.”

5. “Ho, Ho, Ho” has been replaced by “Yee Haw.” And you also are likely to hear Bubba’s elves respond, “I heard dat.”

6. As required by Southern highway laws, Bubba Claus’ sleigh does have a Yosemite Sam safety triangle on the back with the words ” Back Off.”

7. The usual Christmas movie classics such as”Miracle on 34th Street” and “It’s a Wonderful Life” will not be shown in your negotiated viewing area. Instead, you’ll see “Boss Hogg Saves Christmas” and “Smokey and the Bandit IV” featuring Burt Reynolds as Bubba Claus and dozens of state patrol cars crashing into each other.

And Finally,

8. Bubba Claus doesn’t wear a belt. If I were you, I’d make sure you, the wife, and the kids turn the other way when he bends over to put presents under the tree.

Sincerely Yours,
Santa Claus!

December 24, 2005 | funny, new orleans | 2 Comments »

Day 115: Pre- And Post-K Violence Against Women; Reducing Agents

Violence Against Women Before And After Katrina: It amazes me the crimes people, including NOPD, are willing to believe happened in the wake of Katrina. But, what angers me are the acts of violence faced with incredulity, namely rapes reported by the supposed victims themselves. And I say “supposed” because, unfortunately, there are liars who make it hard on the real victims.

NPR does a New Orleans “human” piece before 6:30AM almost everyday and manages to depress the hell out of me before the day has even begun – hey, at least it’s informative, better than Houston schock-jocks badmouthing New Orleanian evacuees and the price to pay before receiving the news of the day. Today, I woke up to Morning Edition investigating the veracity of the rape claims mentioned above (More Stories Emerge of Rapes in Post-Katrina Chaos). Through the course of the show, my brain performed its usual cautious fencesitting on such issues. However, this statement made by Judy Benitez, of the Louisiana Rape Crisis Group stood out to help beget a clearer view:

“The fact that something wasn’t reported to the police doesn’t mean it didn’t happen,” Benitez says. “We know about all the other things that happened, all the thefts, all the robberies. There was all kinds of crime taking place on a much higher level than usual. Why would we think there was less rape typical of any given week in the city? It doesn’t make any sense.”

Regardless of whether an individual woman was raped or not, logic dictates that the number of acts of violence against women could not have decreased while other types of crime were on the increase. Our horribly-understaffed and strained police force had shooters and looters to contend with, and could not thoroughly patrol flooded neighborhoods and what they thought were safe havens. Yet, rape is a serious human violation, too, and leaves an indelible mark on mother, sister, wife, daughter and friend. At times of crisis and lawlessness, women need additional protection.

“We’re not downsizing anything,” [commander of the sex crimes unit with the New Orleans Police Department, Lt. David] Benelli says. “I’m telling you the number of reported rapes we had.

“I admit that rapes are underreported … I know more sexual assaults took place. I’ve expressed many times that we’re willing to investigate any sexual assaults that happened in this city at any time. We can only deal with what we know.”

While the police can only act on and the justice system can only prosecute that which they have evidence against, there has to be a way that unreported rapes are statistically recorded in the system, especially for this period of time in New Orleans history. The fact that Lt. Benelli “knows more sexual assaults took place” should count for something in the final reporting and prevention plans for the future. Otherwise, we should simply add Misogynists Who Look The Other Way to the growing list of derisive labels applied to New Orleanians today.

According to the NPR story, a series of rapes allegedly occurred in my greater neighborhood, Irish Channel, in a housing complex for the aged. The proximity of the attacks strikes a nerve and reminds me of the fragility of our safety and presumed civilized existence. Don’t even get me started on how a lot of this could have been prevented had the military shown up immediately after the hurricane hit. There is no pardon for that botch in a gaffe in a failure.

—

Reducing Agents: Why would I want to win a Katrina t-shirt?

“Enter to win the NOLA.com Katrina comemorative T-Shirt today!”

Arguably, this is an advertising move on the part of the T-P to attract readers and to keep them interested in the news. [What's boring about it?]

There is also a certain feeling of kinship involved in this very American phenomenon – the wearer of a post-K New Orleans t-shirt shows ownership, participation and pride concerning the disaster and recovery efforts. Yet, if you know me, you know how I feel about causes reduced to t-shirts, rubber bracelets and slogans.

I give this one three-and-a-half out of five Bah Humbugs.

December 21, 2005 | articles, crime, culture-society-history, hurricane katrina, new orleans | 2 Comments »

Day 114: SPECIAL BULLETIN- Magnitude 3.0 Earthquake In Southeastern Louisiana

A magnitude 3.0 earthquake hit southeastern Louisana, west of Lake Maurepas and east of Baton Rouge at 6:52PM CST on Monday, December 19, 2005.

COOL!

Completely bypassing Locusts and Alien Attacks, we have moved to Earthquakes on the disaster list. So what if it’s just a 3.0, bring on the Emergency Declaration and FEMA money stat!

[Just for your reference, this is nothing but a tremor. My 130-year-old house probably experiences a 2.5 every time the Magazine St. bus goes by.]

Some details from the USGS page on the quake:

An extremely shallow quake which was probably subsidence-related. This Louisiana seismicity map gives me all of squat in terms of a deformation trend, but looking at this (most rudimentary) structure map of Lake Pontchartrain leads me to surmise that the earthquake belongs to the en echelon fault trend shown on the map.

The largest earthquake LA has experienced was a 4.2 back in 1930, which “damaged chimneys and broke windows at Napoleonville and cracked plaster at White Castle” near the epicenter. “Many people in the area rushed into the streets.” Louisianans have practice with running amok, it seems.

December 20, 2005 | hurricane katrina, new orleans | 8 Comments »

Day 114: Spending $29B; A Streetcar Named Canal; Seasonal Migration

How To Spend $29 Billion?: The Washington Post reports on the financial breakdown of the $29 billion aid package recently approved by US Congress. Please note that the money has been allocated for all 2005-hurricane-ravaged states on the Gulf Coast and not just New Orleans, as some people seem to think.

Some highlights:

  • $11.5 billion in Community Development Block Grants to spur economic development and help homeowners without flood insurance rebuild or repair their homes
  • $4.4 billion for storm-related Defense Department expenses and facility damage.
  • $2.9 billion for the Army Corps of Engineers to continue storm and flood repairs, begin reconstructing levees and accelerate studies on improving Gulf Coast flood protection.
  • $1.6 billion for education, including $645 million for schools that took in students, $750 million for schools affected by the hurricanes and $200 million for higher education.

Two glaring thoughts:

1) Businesses and homes will be rebuilt using $11.5 billion, while only about a quarter of that amount goes towards storm and flood repairs. Again, repairs and not protection over and above. Tell me if the phrases temporary solution and recurring expense don’t occur to you.

[I say this while fully understanding the Catch-22 of populating New Orleans and finding these people suitable employment, while simultaneously repairing and rebuilding flood protection. No people => no rebuilding; no rebuilding => no people. However, how about beginning to pour some of that money into a larger-scale redesign of the entire levee system? All I'm asking for is some futuristic thinking.]

2) The grant technically derives from a Defense Department appropriations bill. However, $4.4 billion for “storm-related DoD expenses” has been approved with no questions asked, but Congress continues to argued over a quarter of the amount set aside for education.

“Public school districts that took in hurricane-scattered students would get $6,000 for each displaced student and $7,500 for each special education displaced student. The state reshuffled its own education spending to give school districts that took in students an extra $1,250 per student, but the districts had said that would not cover the expenses for educating them.”

*sigh* Education is our best defense against citizen apathy; energy is wasted on that kind of thought in the short term (and the long one in the case of New Orleans), isn’t it?

—

A Streetcar Named Canal: With a 100,000 residents currently in the city of New Orleans and the population expected to double in the new year, public transportation is once again in motion. YatPundit reports from the scene on the December 18 test of the Canal St. line. St. Charles service is still not available, but that’s just a matter of time.

“The testing went so well that RTA approved limited operations of six Perley Thomas streetcars on a hybrid line consisting of the Riverfront trackage and a portion of the Canal line.”

ABC News article with two-minute video segment on the streetcars of New Orleans and some footage of the Friday test.

On my last trip back, I saw the Magazine St. bus dropping passengers off by the D-Day Museum and heading up towards the direction of my neighborhood. Now I know that I can at least get home from work!

—

Seasonal Migration: Choices, choices. A day spent in Chicago wandering the hallowed halls of the Art Institute (hence re-adopting an old annual pilgrimage), shopping on Michigan Avenue and photography at Millennium Park, followed by spending time with friends in Madison, a Christmas Day dinner cooked by Aunt Candy and a Packers-Bears game at Lambeau Field? [Please don't lose this one, dearest Packers, even if it means sending the Vikings to the playoffs.]

Or spending five days at home in NO with most of my friends having left town to be with their own families, after months of staying in the city?

Hmmmmm …

Let’s just say that given the limited police and fire services in the city, I don’t want to add to their burden by setting the turkey and pie on fire. Instead, I’m going home to the midwest – to good food, good fun and, as Jorge says, “to where the most number of people who love you are.”

Most fly south in the winter, this bird heads north.

—

This post is dedicated to Garrett Armand Alley, age 16, who passed away on Saturday in his temporary Houston home. My heart and hope go out to his mother, Beverly, who is not only a great colleague but also a brave and ever-cheerful Louisianan. Please keep the Alley family in your thoughts and prayers this holiday season.

| hurricane katrina, new orleans | 4 Comments »
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