All that jazz - New Orleans

---

I'm sitting in the common area of 'Jo & Flo's candlelit hostel', a run down hostel in a poor part of New Orleans. There are only 3 people staying in the hostel - myself, my roommate Bryan and an Irish guy who's in another room. Now it just so happens that Bryan is crazy. And I don't just mean 'a bit wacky'. He spends all day scribbling words (what looks like Arabic) on sheets of paper, and swings from being perfectly normal one moment to babbling incoherently, non-stop, about absolutely nothing the next moment. Adding to this interesting situation, the hostel is a dive, and the electricity's temperamental. Nice.

Anyway, it's cool to be in New Orleans - home of Jazz, blues, drinking, and poverty. I arrived here with J, a German guy I met in Austin, and once we'd stuck our bags at the hostel we headed out into the city in search of Bourbon street, where a lot of New Orleans' partying happens. We weren't quite up for a heavy one that night - too exhausted after the 20 hour train journey from Austin - but went back the next night for a better attempt at drinking. This included trying out a hurricane, a New Orleans cocktail that includes rum, more rum and some fruit juice mixers. It was yummy. We also spent some time in the day wandering round the French Quarter, the most central and historic part of the city, which has lovely old architecture and some interesting shops. I wanted to try out some of New Orleans' famous cajun cuisine, but there seems to be literally nothing vegetarian that you can get on cajun menus. Ah well.

Yesterday we took a tour out to honey island swamp, one of the many swamplands in Louisiana state. It was pouring down with rain, which added to the atmosphere of the swamp. We got a boat tour of the area. It was actually beautiful to look at, didn't see any alligators unfortunately, but we saw a snake and some wild birds. On the bus ride over to the swamp we got a glimpse of some of the devestation caused by Hurricane Katrina two years ago. Although a lot of downtown New Orleans wasn't too badly hit by the hurricane, you can really see the damage on the outskirts, with roofs blown off, windows smashed, brick walls blown down. There was such poverty in this city even before Katrina, it's just mindblowing how much damage it did... and how badly Bush and his administration reacted to it. EVERYONE I'VE SPOKEN TO IN AMERICA HATES BUSH. And I don't blame them. How did he get elected? Twice?!?! That man needs to be impeached for crimes against humanity, the environment, democracy, for being a warmonger, and for saying things like 'most of our imports now come from abroad'. I know everyone makes slips of the tounge sometimes but this man is the fucking president of the most powerful nation on earth! It's absolutely terrifying that such power is in the hands of a man who once said 'children learns'.

J left for Miami this morning. I went to the New Orleans historic voodoo museum, it was crazy, loads of mad voodoo artefacts like skulls, scary wooden statues and beads. I loved it. It explained the history of voodoo in New Orleans and how it originated from slaves brought over from Africa. Tonight, I think I'm going to check out some jazz. *Puts on beret and stripy t-shirt, clicks fingers and sips on latte*.

---

Comments

[Mark]

Hey bro, Just to say I'm loving reading about your travels so far. Austin sounds amazing! Sounds like you've met some wacky characters and been through some really valuable experiences. I'll drop you an email soon to say hi and let you know what I've been up to. All well in general! Speak soon, Mark