My New Orleans

By Celeste Del Russo '02

Saturday Night

Parasol's was packed. It was the Saturday night before Katrina was due to make landfall and I sat at the bar with my husband, a few friends and a Miller Lite, eating the best roast beef po'boy in all of New Orleans. Gary looked up between bites, au jus dripping down his chin, and asked the bartender, "You leaving?"

Frankie picked up the remote and changed the weather channel to ESPN. "Naw, man. I'm staying put."

I looked at my husband, shrugged, and grabbed a stack of napkins. Sitting next to me, Agnes was on the phone with her roommate, who was boarding the last flight from Tampa to her home city of New Orleans just in time for the hurricane. Around me, I recognized the usual crowd of Irish Channel locals: our neighbor Michael, a contractor who renovated our small shotgun a few years ago; a waiter from Le Cirque who had waited on us more than a few times; and the guy with the pompadour who loved The Clash. There was Joe, a middle-aged man who lived way over near Lakeview; we met him when he first "discovered" Parasol's˜the night his car broke down outside, on the corner of Third and Constance. Behind me, the same hardcore gamblers were (still) stuck at the slots, their eyes glued to sets of cherries and gold bars, only breaking to tell Frankie that the machines had "taken their money." The door opened and I recognized a few Tulane students entering the bar wearing bright yellow swimmies and snorkeling gear.

The view from my barstool proved that the threat of Katrina wasn't ruining anyone's good time, but still, a question pervaded, hanging in the air with the cigarette smoke and the music of Johnny Cash, Galactic and Rebirth that sounded through the jukebox: "You stayin' or goin'?" And there wasn't much time left. If we stayed much longer, the decision would be made for us. "The Big Easy ain't the Big Easy for nuthin," I remember a cab driver once telling me; I looked over the casual crowd, undisturbed by the forecast and more concerned with music and conversation. Laughter exploded when "Should I Stay or Should I Go Now" by The Clash came through the speakers. The guy with the pompadour yelled, "Hey, Frankie! Turn it up!"

Seemed like ages ago

Three years ago my husband and I moved to New Orleans for graduate school; I would attend the University of New Orleans for my master's degree in English, and Gary would begin his first year at Tulane University's law school. We visited in May before our first semester to get a feel for the city and to scour the neighborhoods for a place to live. Aesthetically, the city was captivating. Traveling down the famous streetcar on St. Charles, I felt transported to a Southern oasis; the languorous limbs of the oaks, weighted down with curls of grey "Spanish Moss" and glimmers of Mardi Gras beads, shaded the French Creole mansions that lined the street. New Orleans was a surreal, sultry jungle with a new plant, animal and social life I was sure could never exist up north: palm trees, philodendron, pink hibiscus, and wax plants bloomed all year long in the humid climate, and wrought iron balconies and columns adorned the façades of buildings, in patterns mimicking these exotic flora. New Orleans was a world of Greek gods and goddesses, all of whom left their namesakes to the streets surrounding the Garden District; it was a lineage of Mardi Gras krewes and masquerade balls, of Kings, Queens and their loyal followers.

Blocks away from St. Charles were neighborhoods with a distinct character of their own. Traditional structures˜shotguns and camelbacks˜were renovated to a code of old standards, and were painted in bold, unexpected color combinations that exhibited the vitality of an old city and the creativity of those who lived there. I had never known such architecture among the colonials of New England; here, we drove by a deep purple, double-shotgun with magenta shutters and pale pink trim; twin burnt-orange camelbacks with red doors; old corner-stores-turned-two-family homes. We joked that our plain, small, baby-blue shotgun with simple white trim was a good way to work ourselves into New Orleans style without shocking our systems. Dive bars, five-star restaurants, bookstores and coffee shops were tucked into these residential neighborhoods, creating local hangouts (like Parasol's) that were hidden, even, from the tourists who flocked to the surrounding Garden District for "moonlight" mansion tours.

In many cases, dilapidated homes sat adjacent to half-million-dollar Southern villas. These buildings were claimed condemned by the city and many were left rotting on their foundations, their insides consumed by a jungle wholly different from the exotic gardens that lined St. Charles. Roofs covered in moss, their insides inhabited by weeds, these homes represented a different side of New Orleans. We watched as people transformed these structures into livable homes, just as someone had once done to ours. This sort of reconstruction was contagious; before we knew it, our entire block was renovated. Even in the few days before Katrina hit, my husband and I were painting our front door and building a planter with the help of some neighborhood kids. In my mind, our small block on Annunciation became symbolic of the state of growth in New Orleans as a city.

The culture and acquaintances we encountered around town were just as eclectic as the New Orleans neighborhoods. We looked forward to daily coffee at the nearby rue de la course, to Tuesdays because it was the Rebirth Brass Band's weekly gig at the Maple Leaf, and Fridays because it was gumbo day at Zara's. I woke up early on Saturdays and Sundays to plan lessons or complete course work because Sunday nights were Captain Rick's shifts down at Pirate's Alley café, and listening to him trace his lineage to Pirate Lafitte (while dressed in authentic pirate garb) was more of a cultural experience than locking myself in a carrel in the library. We looked forward to nights in the Quarter; to people-watching in mystical Jackson Square, with its nightly congregation of palm and tarot card readers, vampires, witches, tourists, street musicians and drunks.

While the feeling of moving to a new city is always intoxicating, I found that this feeling never wore off in New Orleans; the city had staying power. And although my husband and I had only just begun to discover the city as actual residents, we had acquired some characteristics of the New Orleanian as we perceived him. The laid-back, "anything goes" attitude made our Boston and New York friends cringe when they tried to make definite plans with us when we were home for semester break. We had also internalized a "connection" to the city (one might call it stubbornness) that held us in New Orleans to confront Katrina as she imposed on our turf.

Sunday afternoon

In the lobby of the Loew's Hotel Downtown, where we checked in with three dogs, two cats and four people, I was reflecting upon the structure of my home, and how, even after 120 hurricane seasons, it still stood secure on its pilings. My sense of security (which, in retrospect, I would label false) was high; I was surrounded by other New Orleanians˜those who left their homes for "higher ground" and who opted for what local officials had coined "vertical evacuation," a term I then recycled to explain our choice to remain behind to our frantic family and friends calling from Connecticut. Sitting cross-legged on the bed, cell phone glued to my ear, I didn't tell them about our spectacular view of the Mississippi, or the teetering cranes that towered over the Harrah's hotel construction zone just opposite our window. There was a knock on the door. The hotel manager entered to explain some emergency procedures and to collect our names and signatures. They would add our names to a long list of people who chose to wait out the storm.

"Remember, this will not be your typical hotel stay," she said, while I signed my name on the dotted line.

Hours later, when I stood in front of the window, mouth gaping, watching the Mississippi run backwards˜upriver˜folding in on itself in riptides, this woman's warning reverberated through my mind. The wind whipped the rain, sending garbage, scrap metal, palm fronds and other debris swirling outside our windows, clouding our vision. No longer able to see what was going on outside, our focus shifted to what we could hear; the harrowing sounds of Katrina. The panels of glass we were told could stand up to 150 mph winds began to hum and rattle, the racket so unnerving we moved into the hallway, and finally, when our brains registered the slow, slight swaying of the building itself, edging ourselves farther into the laundry and storage facility in the core of the building, near the elevator shaft, where things were more "shift" less. Our mattresses piled on the floor, we tried to sleep and wait out the storm. Others soon joined us, dragging in blankets and pillows to make themselves comfortable. Electricity long gone, we sat on the floor, distracting our minds with a game of poker by the light of the emergency EXIT signs.

It went this way until daybreak, and when it got quiet, we wondered if it was all over.

Monday: "New Orleans dodged a bullet"

I said to my friend, walking around the city Monday evening, taking pictures of fallen palm trees, parking lots of smashed cars, piles of bricks that were once facades of buildings. As we made our way Uptown, the car barely fit through the streets. We drove, weaving past downed power lines, street lamps and signs until we found our block, where some people had already begun dragging branches and debris out of the streets. Parasol's was fine˜save for a few shutters that were blown off˜and it was not yet looted as I heard from later reports coming out of the neighborhood. Our house was fine. A tree in the backyard, the one that ceaselessly dropped hard, gumballsize berries onto our terrace, had fallen over, landing on our fence, tearing it down.

"That takes care of that problem," I said, picking up a fallen berry and chucking it at the fallen limbs.

"Yup, it could have been a lot worse," my friend said, looking around the neighborhood. Her house had been spared, while one directly across the street had crumbled to the ground as though it was made of sand˜the remnants of a sandcastle village.

"Let's get back to the hotel," Gary said, emerging from our house with four champagne glasses from the kitchen cabinet "and stay one more night." We hopped in the car and headed back to Loew's, where we celebrated the end of Katrina with a frosty bottle of chilled champagne.

Tuesday afternoon

It wasn't until late Tuesday morning when the news finally got to us that the levees had broken. That afternoon, the view from the eighth-floor conference room window proved that Katrina's aftermath would be the real challenge we'd face in New Orleans. High-rises were on fire in the central business district. We were told there was no water pressure in the city to put these fires out, and the manager called for a full evacuation of the hotel, per order of city officials. Amazingly, he calmly gave the room full of women, men, toddlers, newborns, grandmothers and grandfathers directions to Baton Rouge.

What ensued was a mad rush to get out. With no use of the elevators, the stairwells were mobbed with people dragging coolers, suitcases, diaper bags, canned goods, water and animals. My Boston terriers, Bayou and Gumbo, refused to budge˜overwhelmed by the chaos and noise. Gemma, my Maltese, perched on my shoulder like a parrot, clinging on for the descent to the lobby. My husband and friends followed close behind with two cats and whatever they could carry from our room. We didn't know what to expect in Baton Rouge, so we had emptied out the minibar, taking bags of Twix, crackers, bottled water and booze. After the mass of people cleared, I made another trip upstairs, my husband screaming after me, telling me not to go. I had packed a suitcase of personal belongings, family heirlooms that I would never forgive myself for leaving behind. My heart was pounding. With every step I was thinking a fire would engulf the building, or that Lake Ponchartrain or the Mississippi would come swirling in around me. I had no idea what was actually going on "out" there, beyond the walls of the hotel.

We fled the city with just enough time to see the water rising on Canal, where we had walked less than 24 hours before. We passed the Convention Center (not yet in the state of horror as in later days post-Katrina) and hopped on the high-rise, passing over the Mississippi heading south, the only way to cut north out of the city and into Baton Rouge.

After

My husband and I returned to Connecticut after slowly making our way through states I wouldn't have been able to show you on a map prior to our evacuation: Mississippi, Arkansas, Missouri, Ohio, Illinois... The weather was mild, and we had a tent (as well as other camping equipment, all donated by the kind people of Arkansas). In retrospect, I see our slow flight across country as an escape from reality; we were trying to regroup. Should we go back to Baton Rouge? Kill time and road trip across America? Our camping crusade served as a release from the media, from the constant scenes of death, hopelessness, separation and political strife that were flooding our city from every angle; an escape from the tragic scenes coming out of New Orleans that infiltrated television sets, Internet chat rooms, and radio talk shows. The only time we watched television was when we stayed in the occasional hotel room. Otherwise, we sat by the campfire, cooking baked beans and contemplating the severity of the situation in New Orleans, realizing how lucky we were that our story was not one that would appear on CNN.

Two and a half weeks after Katrina, we finally found ourselves back in Connecticut, trying to focus on becoming students again. My husband temporarily enrolled at Yale, and I wrote my thesis, tutored freshman composition online, and worked on the University of New Orleans' (UNO) Katrina Narrative Project. Through these assignments, I slowly reconnected to the university and to the community of New Orleans, even though I was over 1,500 miles away. If initially I questioned the future of the university, I'm certain now that, as an academic community, UNO has never been dissolved.

It is then that I am reminded of my own privileged standpoint˜someone who escaped unharmed, whose home remains standing, who had a haven to evacuate to, both literally and academically. I think often of the lives of my students, those I came to know well and those who were little more than an introduction during that first hopeful, energized week of the fall semester. How many of these students are left without homes? Where are they now, and will they come back to New Orleans, a city some of them have never left? How many working mothers and fathers, how many students who struggled through high school, how many of them would actually continue their college education? Would they return to a campus where FEMA trailers doubled as residence halls, where commuting to classes meant driving through deserted neighborhoods, trying to keep focused on the road and not the water lines on buildings in the Lakeview neighborhood?

My husband and I returned to New Orleans for the spring, when Tulane and UNO reopened. I'd like to say that our intentions to stay in New Orleans after graduation do not fold because of Katrina, but the hurricane has certainly affected our future decisions. With programs being cut at many of the major universities in New Orleans, we are both applying to Ph.D. programs elsewhere, but we hope to return to the city permanently after we complete our graduate work. For now, though, Parasol's is already packed with locals. The Mississippi is rolling the right way, and my husband and I have big plans for Mardi Gras.

Celeste Del Russo '02 is a graduate student at the University of New Orleans.