(no subject)

[mojosmom]

I'm so sad. Ever since I first visited New Orleans, many years ago, it has been one of my favorite cities, ever, anywhere in the world. The history, the architecture, the people, the food, the music, the joie de vivre and laissez les bons temps roulez, it's always made me happy. And now it's gone. Oh, I know that much will be rebuilt, and I know I'll visit her again. But what will have happened to so many places I've known and loved? One of my favorite little museums, The Backstreet Cultural Museum, was in Treme, a section that had water to the rooftops, and it was a shoestring operation to begin with. I understand the Marigny is underwater, where one of my favorite bookshops is and where I stayed the first time I went to the Jazz and Heritage Festival. Will there even be a Jazz and Heritage Festival next year? Well, if there is, I'm going, if it's at all possible. I consider it my civic duty to get whatever tourist dollars I can back to the City That Care Forgot. (Just like I went to NYC a few months after 9/11.) I watch the news, and it hurts so bad.

(NOTE: the userpic was created by Natasha17 at BookCrossing.)

Comments

[spedbug.livejournal.com]

I went to the Jazz Festival in New Orleans years and years ago (I finally packed up my purple tee with the pic of an alligator playing the sax - it was so ratty it was nearly a rag - and put it away in a memory box). I'm not much of a world traveller but my girlfriend from school was stationed there, in the Navy, and I went to visit with her. I'm so glad I did.

I have lots of fond memories of New Orleans - the jazz, the history, the bawdiness, the sensuality... Mardi Gras was over by the time I'd arrived but I remember walking through the city and looking up at the balconies, picturing the scene and feeling a part of it, regardless.

New Orleans had a personality - having this happen is like hearing a vibrant and much-loved star has a potentially fatal disease. Will she survive? And, if so, will she ever be the same?

[texaswren.livejournal.com]

I never saw New Orleans. Johnnie had been there, and he's talked for years about us going. I never said no, but I never worked up a lot of enthusiasm either. We aren't partiers, or musically inclined. I would love to have seen the architecture, but, travel is so difficult for us, beyond overnight things. In the end, we never went. As we were waiting for the hurricane to hit, I started to feel a profound regret that we had never made it. When it appeared that they had been spared, we made a promise that we would go next year, after he retired. Now, I wonder if we will ever make it.

[mlbish.livejournal.com]

I'm sad too. I have been there many times and it's hard to believe that everything will be different (read: destroyed) now.

I can't stop thinking about all those people that are just homeless. And it's such a poor area of the country. I'd love to call a few and say, "Come stay at my house for three weeks." But I don't know anyone really well that lives there, and probably the ones I do know would have plenty of help anyway. But there are so many that won't...

[greedyreader.livejournal.com]

NO is one of my favorite places too (as a matter of fact, madame_urushiol and I were planning on a fall visit). It seems impossible to believe it will recover.