What a wonderful week we’ve had in New Orleans! The weather continues to be perfect, the food and music as terrific as always.<\/p>\n
At the end of our journey here, we decided to view the Katrina exhibit at the state museum. After our talks with people who had lived through that awful time, we wanted to learn more about what happened and how people coped.<\/p>\n
The museum did a wonderful job of presenting the story so that outsiders could get at least a glimpse of the devastation and its aftermath. People walked for miles through swirling, dirty water only to be told they could not cross the bridge out of the city. A doctor told of having to listen to the dying gasps of patients\u2014sometimes lasting hours\u2014trapped in a hospital without electricity or working generators to run respirators. Tourists were routed to a section where criminals waited for rescue after being released from flooded cells. Guards with rifles stood guard and oversaw the distribution of water bottles and snacks\u2014but only to the criminals, who then boarded buses and rode away. The stranded tourists, who had been walking for hours without food or water, were told to move on to another area to wait for buses that never came. People who made it to the Superdome sat, stood, or lay on cement with thousands of others crammed into the structure, without food or water, no bathroom facilities, and no lights or power. Feces and urine covered the floor; the smell was overpowering.<\/p>\n
Returning to their destroyed homes, people wielded hammers, sawed boards, shoveled trash that used to be treasures, cleaned, painted, and built a new city. Gradually new neighborhoods formed, old friends reconnected. Parts of the city, notably the lower Ninth Ward, remain in ruins.<\/p>\n
In the face of all that, after so much suffering, with the destruction of whole communities, the people of New Orleans came back to rebuild their city, preserve their culture, play their music, and rekindle the joy of life here.<\/p>\n
After being swept into the intensity of the Katrina story, we stepped out into the sunshine to the beat of a jazz trio on the square to marvel at the people dancing, singing, talking, laughing, in strange and colorful costumes, living their lives and enjoying their noisy, joyous city. What a marvelous place, this resilient, culturally rich, and effervescent city!<\/p>\n
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What a wonderful week we’ve had in New Orleans! The weather continues to be perfect, the food and music as terrific as always. At the end of our journey here, we decided to view the Katrina exhibit at the state Continue reading Day 12: Last Day in NOLA<\/span>