Aand... we're here! In New Orleans, I mean.

Or, well, more specifically, in the lobby of the Pan Am building stealing wireless. Anyway.

Rambling under the cut!


One ten-hour van ride later, we've left South Carolina and arrived in the deep(er?) south. Strangely, most people here have accents that would otherwise place them in, say, Jersey. Or Ohio. And, just for posterity's sake, you have to specify Sweet Tea within the French Quarter - dunno yet outside of there, but I will report back!

Being back in New Orleans is strange. I've been here twice, I believe - the first time was as a three-year-old tagging along to a chemistry conference; I ran afoul of some fire ants, and spent most of the trip scratching in agony and then throwing up cheerios everywhere. Mom does not have very fond memories of that trip. Happily, I have very few memories, period. I remember buying a small harlequin doll in one of the shops - porcelain face, white-and-silver jester suit, priced half-off because one thumb was broken - and having a complete stranger hand me a mask on the street, possibly because I was cute? Or because it was a full week after Mardi Gras and he was tired of carrying it? I'm not sure.

The mask has hung on my bedroom wall ever since, the purple, green, and yellow feathers cheerfully clashing with everything else. The second time I visited New Orleans, I was about fourteen and one a family roadtrip. I was right at that age where you try to walk five yards ahead of or behind the family, because they're all just so embarrassing, god, and most of what I recall is food-based. Beignets at Cafe du Monde - which I didn't actually like that much, I hate doughnuts, but their hot chocolate was awesome. Jambalaya somewhere - I honestly can't recall - that jump-started my fascination with creole cooking. My poor family and assorted roommates are still living with the consequences. ("You put garlic and onions in what? Why does the macaroni taste like cajun seasoning?" Oh, Tony Chachere, you are so co-culpable here.)

I remember the architecture much better from this second trip. Mom has some graduate studies in history and architecture, and even hanging far back and pretending she didn't exist, I was able to pick up a great deal about Queen Anne roofs and wrought-iron balconies. I remember the colors - salmon and brick red, sunflower orange and cheerful avocado greens - and the sleek roofs, with gables and cool twisty bits. It makes driving into the city now feel very strange - patches and tarps and mismatched tiles abound, even if the balconies are still trailing greenery and most of the paint has been touched up.

Thus far - I've been in the city less than 24 hours - we've seen only a small segment of the business sector and perhaps half of the French Quarter. (Expect pictures, uh, sometime.) Repair efforts have been fast and thorough, and this is the highest-altitude part of the city. I don't know what the rest of the city is going to look like. I know what the houses and apartments lining I-10 on the way into the city look like, yes - normal, with Lease Now! banners and cookie-cutter suburbs, until, wham, there's a house with no roof, or an apartment complex that hasn't repainted, and this is no longer Anywhere, USA but a city that is still recovering from a massive disaster less than four years ago.

Today was touristy - hence the French Quarter tours, and man, my knees are not happy - but tomorrow we start the service section of the course. I'm... waiting, I guess? Not worriedly, or anxiously, or anything, I just... we'll have to see.