New Orleans - Land of Dreams

Well, I wish I was in New Orleans, I can see it in my dreams,
Arm-in-arm down Burgundy, a bottle and my friends and me

Hoist up a few tall cool ones, play some pool and listen
To that tenor saxophone calling me home
And I can hear the band begin "When the Saints Go Marching In",
And by the whiskers on my chin, New Orleans, I'll be there

(Tom Waits-I Wish I Was in New Orleans)

I'm heading to New Orleans in less than a month and I'm getting pretty hysterically excited about it to be honest. It's a place I've always wanted to visit (other American cities on my list include San Francisco and Chicago); the history, the music (it's the birthplace of jazz for crying out loud!); the food, steam-boats and street-cars, the Mississippi River and Lake Pontchartrain. As I look at my Lonely Planet the familiar street names echo in the chambers of my musical memory: Bourbon St, Burgundy....Basin St....

Basin Street is the street
where the best folks always meet
in New Orleans, land of dreams
you'll never know how nice it seems,
or just how much it really means.

(Ella Fitzgerald 'Basin St Blues')

Obviously, post Katrina, New Orleans is not the town it used to be. Since I'm participating in a build in Mississippi (Biloxi or Pascagoula) I've been reading up about it and am blown away how such an appalling tragedy could happen in what is ostensibly the 'richest country in the world'. No, not the hurricane, but the way it was handled: the pathetic preparation, poor maintenance of the levees and the hopelessly inadequate response from FEMA (the Federal Emergency Management Agency) and the US government.

The storm was first spotted over the Bahamas on 23rd August 2005. Over the course of the week it was upgraded from Category One to Category Five killing 7 people in Florida when it made landfall. Mayor Ray Nagin ordered an unprecedented mandatory evacuation of the city on the morning of Sunday 28th August. It was a better-than-average evacuation considering how many people normally choose to 'ride out the storm'. Of the 20% of the population who chose to stay in the city, however, many were poor, elderly, disabled or simply didn't have a car with which to leave.

Baby, please dont go
Oh, baby please dont go
Baby, please dont go
Down to New Orleans
You know I love you so
Baby, please dont go.

(Van Morrison/Them - Baby Please Don't Go)

On the Sunday night the storm weakened and moved slightly away from the city and, while it was still immensely destructive, people thought they had escaped the worst. By the following morning, however, floodwalls failed in various locations including the Lower Ninth Ward and water started flowing into the city at a fast pace. In total 80% of the city was flooded, bringing toxic swamp-like conditions to the town.

And then the chaos really started....

Looting and rioting engulfed the city as people faced dehydration and starvation without visible signs of help being on its way. Rescue efforts were hampered by rumour and miscommunication and the true extent of the catastrophe took several days to sink in with the Bush Administration. George W. visited the city 5 days after the hurricane and at that point 28,000 national guard troops finally arrived to put order on the city. Too late for the 1,500 citizens who had died (Katrina's total death toll was 1,836) and too late to prevent Bush suffering an 8 point drop in approval ratings in less than a week - people aren't stupid.

Good morning America, how are you?
Say don't you know me, I'm your native son
I'm the train they call the City of New Orleans
And I'll be gone five-hundred miles when the day is done.

(Willie Nelson-City of New Orleans)

Since 2005 New Orleans has been slowly crawling back to life. It's now back up to about 60% of its pre-Katrina population and much of the CBD and tourist districts have sprung back to life. Whole swathes of the town (including the 9th Ward), however, remain unreconstructed and many of its former residents doubt they'll ever return. The full consequences of Katrina for the town remain to be seen.

I won't have a pre-Katrina image with which to compare what I see when I'm there. I do intend, however, to do a 'Katrina tour' which takes people round the 9th Ward to see the devastation first hand and to talk to as many people as possible about their experiences in 2005. Ireland doesn't have hurricanes, tornadoes or cyclones so the idea of losing everything in one night is pretty hard for me to grasp.

I'm pretty sure my trip to'the Big Easy' will not be easily forgotten.