New Orleans 2008 - "New Year's Eve Part 1 - Gator for Lunch, Snails for Dinner"

The plan for day two was to start out with beignets for breakfast down at Cafe Du Monde, and then see what tours and activities we could do to entertain ourselves until things got rolling later that night. Unfortunately, everyone else in town wanted beignets too, and the line stretched much longer down the block than we were comfortable with.

Our alternative was a restaurant off of Jackson Square called "The Alpine." Our Katrina group ate their the last night we were in town, and it was just enough off of the beaten path such that we were able to walk in and get a table without a wait. This is what a gator po boy sandwich looks like:

A little on the spicy side, but very very good. Nothing beats New Orleans French bread.

Now well fed, we were up for a trek out to Chalmette to see what had happened to the houses I worked on after Hurricane Katrina. We grabbed our maps and the rental car and hit the road.

I had originally estimated that the entire trek out there would take about 2 hours. Forty five minutes out there, and 45 back, with a few minutes for pictures at each place. The group I had worked with was eager to see photos and learn all that had happened since we were there. Kristin and I quickly realized that this was going to be a more daunting task, as none of the street signs blown over or around in the storm had been replaced. There were a few more people on the roads, and a few more businesses open, but overall very little had changed since we were there almost 2 years ago.

I figured that one of two things would have happened in the time since we were there. Either the houses would have been demolished entirely, or they would be rehabbed and have happy people living in them. What surprised me most was that little to no progress had been made at all.

Our first stop was at Rowley Elementary School, where Hilltop rescue had established their base camp. At the time, the school's first level had been washed out, and there was nothing but raw studs and limited light. Chain link fence surrounded the school to protect it from looters. A FEMA camp next door housed approximately 100 trailers, with armed guards posted at the entrances to prevent the infiltration of gangs and drug dealers.

Today, the school is back to normal. The barbed wire is gone, and lower windows are no longer boarded up. However there are not enough children in the area to support it as an elementary school. It's currently being used as an alternative school, with the hopes that at some point it will be needed for it's original intent in the future. You will note that more than 2 years later, the FEMA park still stands.

This house, which faced the school really moved me. While many people spray painted their cell#'s on their houses as a means for contact, these folks clearly were not going to be coming back. There is a sign written on the wall in the car port that says, "Don't worry- Mom is OK."

Today, it is the only one on the street that was demolished. A handful of residents have moved back.

From there it was on to Mr. Duffy's house, which was difficult to recognize since there were only about 5 houses in the entire neighborhood still standing. Almost everything in the area is now a concrete slab, but the Duffy house and the house across the street are still standing.

This was how it was when we first got there in 2006 and worked:

Today, the grass has been cut, and the tools outside of the garage give the impression that someone is working on it, but it clearly is not inhabitable:

I was pleased to see that my personal favorite house across the street had been rehabilitated and had residents living in it. This was the house where we took our breaks at ate lunch on the steps:

This was it in 2006:

And this is it in 2008. I definitely like the former color. :)

We saw the same thing at the LaMarque House a few blocks away. Unlike the Duffy neighborhood, where most of the houses had been demolished, the shells of houses still stood with a few more residents.

This was the LaMarque House in 2006:

Here's what it looks like today. The windows have been replaced, and the interior has been covered in plastic, but the search insignia is still painted on the wall next to the garage.

That was all we had time for that day. I made one more trek out to Chalmette before we left, and was able to find the street where the shrimp boat landed in the middle of the neighborhood. This tract of houses backed to the levy, and had the most damage. The boat below landed here, 15 miles from its mooring, or any other body of water that could support it.

How would you like to see this coming at your front yard? The boat burned down about a year sgo, so I didn't take photos of that area. Very little on the street has changed. Time prevented me from getting out to the last house, but overall I felt the trek was successful.

While I was happy to see that none of our work was demolished the moment we left town, I was somewhat disappointed to see so little progress in that time. All the more reason to go back soon.

But there was little time to dwell on it, it was time to get ready for new year's eve. Talk to you soon,

K