Tourist excursion #1

You may remember an earlier moment of was-that-self-pity? When I bemoaned my inability to see more of Katrina’s devastation. I wasn’t counting on the kindness of friends and relations.

I may not have mentioned to you that my cher frére , i.e., big bro, is a hydrologist with the EPA who has been mobilized to the Gulf for about five months off and on, starting last November. Now let me mention how very proud I am of the work he has been doing, which has included working over 100 hours per week, some 100,000 refrigerators (all that freon) and overseeing instant landfills. At least maybe some of them won’t be Superfund sites someday.

So part of my excitement about visiting to New Orleans was that I might see him. Might because his deployment is just about over. He knew it would be over by July 1, but didn’t have a firm date. My good luck continues: his deployment ended this Wednesday, 6/28. So, he tells me he wants to take us out to dinner. I plan that he can pick the restaurant, but we will pick up the check. Sunday afternoon, we finish up our sessions at the convention center. He tells me “they” will pick us up at out hotel, and to bring our bathing suits if we have them. I have already heard a little about the woman, B., he has met down there.

On Sunday, cher frere tells me that they have decided against going to a restaurant. B. is currently caretaking a mansion in the Uptown neighborhood. So we drive to Uptown, the residential neighborhood home to Loyola and Tulane Universities. B. and my brother tell me Uptown wasn’t hit that badly by Katrina. Then they show me how to read the spray-painted X symbols still on some houses. The quadrants give the date of examination of the house, the total number of dead at the house, and some other info, like gas and electric. We see one or two houses per block where the owners have not returned and/or not painted over the X. There are lots of blue roofs, debris piles, overgrown yards, boarded up businesses. There are signs: “We’re back”; “Not coming back”; “Back in August”; “Moved to Houston”. The signs are still the easiest way to communicate with your neighbors/friends.

We get to the mansion. I do mean mansion. The kind of place to which they sell tickets. Jaw dropping. Was once the governor’s mansion (long time ago). Gorgeous garden, pool, hot tub, huge porch, high ceilings, woodwork on woodwork, stained glass, antiques, art. I am afraid to sit in a chair. I forgot the camera! I am so sorry, as now you will never believe me.

Oh, cannot leave out Zoe and Miss Ross, two incredibly spoiled but still very sweet and adorable Shih Tzus (picture isn’t them but coloration is right).

So I got to bond with dogs. Cher frere had purchased a big mess (10 pounds?) of enormous shrimp off a Vietnamese-American owned boat on the Gulf. He and B. make an incredible meal. The four of us eat all the shrimp. We can’t possibly eat dessert. We need to sleep, so it’s back to the Holiday Inn for us.