Obama's First Visit to the Crescent City

Wow, two posts in one day. Very impressive on my part, however I'm getting a bit sleepy so this one will be brief.

So Obama came to visit today, for 3 hours and 45 minutes or something like that. I was ensconced in my office for all of that time but RJ tells me it was not fun stuff to drive in.

I will admit I did put myself in the lottery for the Town Hall Meeting--no idea how I would have explained that to my boss, but I thought it was a long shot anyway. RJ was the opposite: rather than crane his neck with everyone else he opted to skip school and avoid "the madness" at the University of New Orleans, his school, and the host of said Town Hall Meeting.

My boss turned up NPR so we could listen to his speech and then RJ and I watched it replayed on TV when I got home from work. I thought it was a great speech and very reassuring to New Orleans. I enjoyed several of the more amusing moments as well, like when the crowd booed Governor Bobby Jindal and Obama sort of had to save the awkward moment.

I know politicians have to act that confident about their plans but it was nice to hear some concrete ideas in areas of concern to the gulf south in terms of recovery, education, housing etc. As usual Obama had a great read on his audience and had just the right touch of down-home charm that a New Orlean's crowd likes.

That's pretty much all the writing I can do tonight but here's a link to the Times-Picayune's main feature article on the visit:

http://www.nola.com/politics/index.ssf/2009/10/president_barack_obama_we_will.html

One Book One New Orleans: Dinner at Leah's

Alright. Finally an event to report on. For the month of October, the Youth Leadership Council has been organizing the 5th annual One Book One New Orleans, a sort of month-long literacy festival. Each year the council chooses a single book from a list of books nominated by the community, generally with a local theme or by a local author. The festival consists of about ten separate events, dinners and writer's workshops, during which the book is discussed in various ways.

This year's book is Gumbo Tales: Finding My Place at the New Orleans Table by Sara Roahen, which I'm ashamed to say I can't tell you all that much about because I haven't read it yet. I know I know... I'm ashamed to call myself a bookworm, but in my defense the author of my favourite historical/adventure series published a new 800 page epic and between 50 hours of work a week and that monster of a hard-cover, I haven't even had time to shop for the festival book.

Still, last night's event, entitled: Chapter 3: Dinner at Leah's had me dying to get my hand on a copy of this culinary-themed homage to New Orleans. Dinner at Leah's was literally dinner at Leah's, referring to the aptly titled "Queen of Creole" cuisine, Leah Chase, owner of Dooky Chase

Restaurant and a veritable culinary institution in this city. I was such a thrill to get to be in the same room as her and finally get a chance to sit in her wonderful restaurant. The main dining

room is also home to Leah's famous collection of paintings by local artists, framed against the vivid red of the restaurant's walls. The food was tasty and definitely fed a crowd. To give you an idea of just how celebrated Leah Chase is in the city, President Obama's secret service staff picked up a to-go order from Dooky Chase just before his town hall meeting today at the University of New Orleans (See following post). She famously gave Obama a stern lecture on his last visit to the city, on putting hot sauce in true Louisiana Gumbo and for being too skinny. She quite a character at 85 years of age and it was so neat to be able to hear her speak about New Orleans and about her food.

There were three other guest authors at the event who spoke about their own cooking and about Sara's book: Elsa Hahne, author of You Are Where You Eat:Stories and Recipes From the Neighborhoods of New Orleans; Poppy Tooker, author of The Crescent City Farmers Market Cookbook (which I absolutely have to buy); and Times-Picayune food editor Judy Walker, co-author of Cooking Up a Storm: Recipes Lost and Found From the Times-Picayune of New Orleans (which I have on hold at work).

What an amazing event for anyone who likes to cook, and for anyone who likes to eat! To that end, there was also plenty of eating done as well. We had a Creole Gumbo to, start of course, then Jambalya, Creole Green Beans, and a wonderful Bread Pudding for dessert. The whole thing was just lovely and I'm so happy that I got to attend. I certainly won't be missing One Book One New Orleans next year!

Just a little water...

I know I haven't posted in a while. Between work and... other work, I've barely had two minutes to myself this month. Plus I haven't really been doing much with my weekends in terms of New Orleans stuff worth writing about.

So to wean myself back in, this is going to be a mini-post--a snippet if you will, of sub-tropical fun.

Tonight's adventure started when I went into the kitchen to heat up dinner (leftovers of my pseudo-Canadian Thanksgiving Dinner last night), only to discover that water was coming in at the top of the kitchen window and had, in fact, been leaking for a while all over my kitchen floor. It had previously only dimly registered in the back of my brain that it had been raining all day, not exactly an unusual event in New Orleans. In fact it was still raining at this point and had evolved into a rather strong storm.

Still, the house is newly rebuilt and we've never had so much as a drip before. We shrugged it off, called the landlord and sat down to dinner. We hadn't been eating more than five minutes when our neighbour knocked on the door to say that the water was getting rather high on the street and we should probably think about moving our car.

We looked outside and lo and behold there was water beginning to reach the bottom of the car doors. Crazy stuff. Everyone but a few unfortunate souls manage to move their cars to higher ground but there is a sad white sedan parked in front of a house just one down from ours who's owner is going to have a very unpleasant surprise.

You'd think you'd get used to this kind of stuff below sea level but I'm always really shocked at how fast the water rises. At this point anyone trying to drive in Mid-City has a really good chance of getting stuck and having to bail out.

My neighbours are all currently sitting on their porches right now having a good ol' time watching all the passing motorists floundering through the wading pond that has become our street. On the other hand, you gotta love the fact that most of them are also going door to door in a storm like this to make sure everyone on the block is warned.

There are some parts of Southern culture that I wouldn't change for the world. Hands down, there is no better neighbour than a New Orleans neighbour.

Katrina in the Courts

This Times-Picayune article caught my eye because I happened to catch the story on Democracy Now last week during their Katrina anniversary special edition:

Investigation into Memorial deaths during Katrina to be reopened by Orleans Parish district attorney

I still have mixed feeling about the whole thing. While several of the allegations are, at the very least, disturbing, I feel like they're a little too ready to prosecute people who were themselves victims of a really hideous situation that should never have happened in the first place. People in situations like that (no power, hundred degree heat, round the clock shifts for days) are apt to do irrational things, in my opinion, especially when rescue doesn't appear to be coming. Heck, three days without power in New Orleans in August makes everyone lose it--it's like sitting in a sauna you can't get out of, you can't think or move or breathe. Who knows how many people perished after the levees broke while George Bush hemmed and hawed up on that hill. Honest to god, it just burns me up sometimes that the people who were really the architects of this whole tragedy, will never be held accountable for it. I'm not saying there shouldn't be an investigation, just something about the whole thing seems wrong somehow. On the other hand, I'm sure the families of the patients who died wouldn't be won over by my above argument and they certainly deserve their day in court. A mixed opinion, I know, but I told you my feelings on the subject weren't exactly clear.

Also, on a side note, is it me or is the Times-Picayune using the absolute worst photo of Leon Cannizzaro. Is that actually how he looks? And is that actually the newspaper's stock photo? Wow. Just... Wow.

Katrina Remembered and Cultural Collision @ NOMA

So a couple of things I checked out this week, both events hosted by the New Orleans Museum of Art located in City Park.

On Saturday we went to catch the tail end of one of the many Katrina Memorials and we managed to see Part 3 of Spike Lee's When the Levees Broke which was great. I'd only seen bits and pieces of it on TMN and it was a really moving experience to watch it in a theater full of people who have lived through it. There was a lot of laughter (and some tears) over things that I think someone who hasn't lived here wouldn't quite get. Part 3 contained shots of Bush's speech from Jackson Square which got a lot of anger from this particular audience. According to the documentary they got the electricity working to that part of the city just for the president's sound bite before shutting it off again... seriously. Bush may still have some fans in Texas but I don't think he'll be setting foot in Louisiana any time soon.

We also saw the museum's newest photography exhibit entitled Caring

that was quite lovely--shots of people, families, emotions--I really enjoyed the whole thing. The section of the exhibit dedicated to 'Disaster' contained many shots by local artists taken during and after the storm.

I'm not sure if there is anything I can say about Katrina that hasn't been said before and by people who have lived through it and been affected deeply by it. I just hope no one forgets about us down in New Orleans because nobody around here is able to forget. A lot of times it feels like everyone here has been through a war and is suffering post-traumatic stress disorder--people pick up the pieces but if you ask a resident if New Orleans has changed they'll always say yes in a sad sort of way.

Yesterday we were back at the museum to check out an event called Cultural Collision, sponsored by the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra. I wasn't sure what to expect but it turned out to be a really great time. Every theatre, museum, musical group and art gallery had a booth set up where they were handing out their season programs, coupons and freebies--this might not sound too exciting to you but I've found it practically impossible to find out about preforming arts going on in New Orleans since it's still a city that relies a lot upon word of mouth for its events.

I was shocked at the number of theatre and musical companies in the city that I had never even heard of before. It's so exciting to realize that there is a lot more going on than I had thought. RJ and I have already got our eye on tickets to The Producers, Wicked, November and Avenue Q (the total number of shows he's willing to see) and I am just dying to check out Grey Gardens, The Color Purple, Aida, I am My Own Wife, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels and The 25th Annual Putnum County Spelling Bee, just to name a few. My year is totally looking up!... and my wallet is feeling a little on the light side :)

The festival was also a great chance to scope out some of the smaller museums in New Orleans and the French Quarter now that I'm considering archival work. There are some very interesting historical collections in town that I wouldn't mind exploring a little more.

Tomorrow I'm heading over to the Times-Picayune to fill out a job application--wish me luck!

Dirty Linen Night

Saturday evening was the annual Dirty Linen Night, the French Quarter's version of a follow up festival to White Linen Night. I've been informed that the name of the festival comes from the idea that one could wear the same soiled white outfit from the previous weekend and fit in just fine with the crowd on Royal Street.

I must say, I really liked Dirty Linen much better in terms of vibe and art. White Linen Night was interesting to attend but it was crowded, and the art was mundane and housed in very generic white-walled spaces. The whole event just screamed hoity-toity--people were there to be seen, not necessarily to see any art.

Dirty Linen Night was a whole different kind of event from the get-go. We tried to get there a little bit earlier so we could see as many galleries as possible but we still didn't make it into every one. I was really blown away by the sheer number of galleries along that strip of Royal St. Each space was completely unique; many of them were converted houses with narrow rooms painted brightly and dangerously crowded with artwork. Each gallery had its own drinks and finger food--all free to browsers in keeping with the spirit of the event. Many of the artist were directly on hand at the galleries, which I felt really kept the focus where it belonged.

There were many great places that we visited that night but the ones that stuck out the most to me were Amzie Adams' Gallery and Craig Tracy's Bodypainting Gallery. Amzie Adams has bit of a campaign for mayor going on but I can't tell if the whole thing is a joke or not. I actually support several of his platform points, namely that city-wide recycling would become mandatory (a pipe-dream right now) and that Chris Rose (my favourite columnist with the Times-Picayune) would be named Chief of Staff. Adams is one of those artists who's paintings really feel like New Orleans, in a way that is hard to put a finger on. Plus he's quite a character. (If you check out the picture of the paint-covered woman in the street above, Amzie is the man in the felt hat directly to the right of the artist.)

Craig Tracy is another well known artist in the city. He uses the human body as a canvas but also take photographs of the body art in ways that sort of manipulate the eye. He has a great website so click the link above to see what I mean. I've seen some of his painted people at a few city festival (hard not to notice the otherwise naked person if you're standing right next to them) and his work is so detailed. When we visited the gallery he was painting a woman in black and white stripes to the delight of an avid audience--his studio was one of the busiest we encountered on Saturday.

The whole thing was a lot of fun and I noticed a lot of "sold" signs on artwork so I can only hope that it was a fruitful night for the businesses along Royal. I couldn't take any photos in the galleries themselves so I tried to take some street shots that would do the festival justice.

This will be my last post before leaving for Canada on Thursday. I'm hoping to maybe write something during the next two weeks but my schedule is already looking crazy. Come September I shall be officially unemployed so I will have nothing but time to blog!

White Linen Night on Julia St.

Yesterday Denise and I attended White Linen Night in the art district--which required a pre-event trip to my favourite vintage store for costuming purposes.

When we lived in uptown it was an easy walk to Buffalo Exchange but since we moved I haven't had much of a chance to shop there and man do I miss it. It's your basic used/discount/vintage clothing chain--apparently there is a location in most major cities in the states--but the clothing selection is great, the prices are ridiculously low, and the store does a lot of fundraising for local and environmental causes. Yesterday they were having an all day event for the New Orleans Animal Rescue so there was a DJ playing music, free lemon gelato from La Divina Gelateria down the street and a pen full of squirming puppies. I wish all shopping could be like that.

So I managed to restrain myself and only bought a white blouse for White Linen Night that could also be used in a job interview (she says defensively) and that went very nicely with my khaki work shorts. After that we wandered around Magazine some more, but really, aside from Buffalo Exchange, most of the stores in Uptown are fantastically outside of my price range. I did stop at Petcetera, the little pet boutique, to buy some of the furry ball-things they make there that my cat can't get enough of--I can't seem to find them at any of the less expensive chains but he never likes any other toys I get him so fuzzy/pricey balls it is.

We finally ended up on the patio at the Bulldog which really made it feel just like old times--I honestly hadn't realized just how long it had been since I'd visited that part of town and I sort of miss it. I'm not a huge fan of the Uptown vibe in general but Magazine St. almost made it worth living there, with so many restaurants and colourful boutiques. The Bulldog has always been one of the more pleasing hole-in-the-walls that tend to characterize New Orleans bars, and they have an amazing selection of international and domestic beer on tap; however, I've always been disappointed that their menu only has one Canadian beer on it and it's one I've never heard of. Still, that's one more than I've found anywhere else.

They have food at the bar (a bit of a rare perk in N.O) and it's decent but the last two times we've sat inside there have been ceiling cockroaches, *shudder*. I know they are of the outdoor variety and that every joint in town has them, not much they can do about it, but I still can't bring myself to eat a burger while looking at them so we stick to the patio nowadays. Yesterday we hung around there for a half-an-hour before the ride (RJ) showed up.

Went home to primp for an hour and then we headed to Julia St. for the festival. New Orleans has kind of a strange seasonal calender compared to most North American cities because it's high season begins when most places are still experiencing the post-Christmas slump. In N.O., after Christmas we just tuck and roll into Mardi Gras season which is then stretched into French Quarter Fest and Jazzfest so that by the time the big parties are done it's late spring. The low season here generally begins with the start of hurricane season when it becomes too damn hot for the tourists and even the locals will take a holiday outside of the city of they can afford it in July or August. Still, New Orleans can't have a whole week pass without some sort of celebration so the summer months in the city are filled with many smaller, local festivals and events in various neighbourhoods. I really enjoy them; they're generally cheap, or free, and the crowds are generally much smaller, although last night the crowds were quite large.

White Linen Night is basically an annual event where people (mainly the well-to-do, it seems) dress all in white and head to the art district of New Orleans, which stretches between the 300 and 800 blocks of Julia St. in the Central Business District (downtown). For those of you that might not know, New Orleans is not just a mecca of Jazz but also of visual art, the city is crawling with artists and galleries, many of them in this one section of town. For the festival all the galleries were free and open to the public and various local restaurants provided food and liquor. A lot more people turned up this year than last year, or so I heard from a woman in the crowd; there were long lines everywhere and it even took a while to make your way into each gallery--we saw maybe five or six of the smaller ones and we took a tour around the Louisiana Children's Museum which was fun. I grabbed some Saag Paneer and Basmati Rice from a local Indian restaurant tent and it was very very yummy--I'll have to remember to order it if I ever eat there. There was some good live music going on at either end of the street and random weirdness like the street pillow fight that left hundreds of white feathers swirling around like it was snowing--very sneezy.

The one negative part of the night was that they ran out of liquor before the festival ended at 9:00. Nothing angers a New Orleans crowd faster than sobriety and the crowd was getting a little ugly before we left. I think the festival organizers underestimated the turnout based on last years numbers.

I drank red wine the whole night, a daring feat in my white clothes, and it made people around me very nervous whenever I came in their direction. I didn't spill a drop the whole night until we were walking over to St. Charles to meet RJ and I tripped over a curb. *sigh*. I think it will come out.