On Thursday morning I had to wake up at 3:00am...yes am! to drive down to buffalo to catch our 6 am flight to New Orleans. We landed in New Orleans at around 11:15 central time, and the heat was incredible it was 40 degrees Celsius and more factoring the humidity. We then took a car to Morgan City, which is an hour outside New Orleans. For those of you who are following the Oil Spill crisis going on down there the city is one and the same. All hotels were filled with American Military who were there trying to fix this problem.
My first great experience in Morgan City occurred in a small local restaurant, called Sussie's. Their specialty was crawfish as some of you may know Louisiana is known for their seafood (is any one actually reading this?). For those of you who don't know what they are see picture below.
For us Canadians who have never seen crawfish, trying to eat one was quite a daunting task. This is when the quirky small town folk came over to help us. We were clearly and utterly confused as how to eat these delicious "critters" as we called them. They taught us how to properly peel and eat the crawfish, they even fed us. The meal was wonderful, and I advise anyone visiting morgan city to visit Sussie's to not only eat a delicious meal but to enjoy the company of the locals themselves.
My next big experience was when I arrived in Downtown New Orleans, when I was visiting Bourbon street. The sights and sounds were incredible. Out of every bar and club was music blasting for the world to hear. This is not just music played from CD, but live bands people with real talent. The streets were packed with people of all ages (well supposed to be 21+ but I doubt that holds true) some smashed out of their minds and others there to enjoy the sound of music all around them. One thing was for certain, the people of New Orleans love their music, but ill get back to that a little later.
The next day I took an early morning bus tour of New Orleans, this bus tour focused on the destruction Hurricane Katrina caused in the summer of 2005. It was amazing to see that its effects were still clearly visible and that they are still trying to build their city back up. We saw many houses who still had roofs missing on their houses. They say only 80% of residents have returned to their homes after the hurricane. Some of the houses do not even look safe to live in. It makes me fully and truly appreciate my messy apartment.
My most amazing experience of them all was in a little Jazz Café by the name of Palm Court. There I saw a trumpeter named Lionel Ferbos who plays there every saturday night from 7-12. The most amazing thing about this gifted man was that he is currently 98 years of age. He will be turning 99 this August. His music was incredible, and with every blast in his trumpet you could see the passion and soul he put into it. He even sang, and as frail as he looks his voice had the power and effect of a much younger man. This man should be an inspiration to us all, and I was truly inspired by him, and I hope to have as much verve for music that this man has. New Orleaners are known for two things, their sea food and their music.
During my trip I got to hear all sorts of music ranging from country to jazz, to blues, to rock. This is truly the passion that unites them all. This really rekindled my passion for music and for live performance, and it puts to shame what we in the Lady gaga era call music. This passion and love I saw for music in this city was genuinely beautiful and I hope to visit very soon.
I would like to wish Lionel Ferbos depicted below a very happy birthday, and hope to one day again see him perform.
Hopefully there is some one who made it this far down this long posting, and if you did I would like to thank you for being so patient. Also congratulations to Ghana for being the first African team to win a world cup match on african soil, hopefully Cameroon will be the 2nd tomorrow.
Hopefully the next posting will be direct from NIcaragua, only 5 more days till I start my journey.
Take Care!
No comments:
Post a Comment