DATELINE: New Orleans, Louisiana

A week before we hit New Orleans (correct pronunciation: ‘N’orlins’), I got an email from a concerned British friend saying the following:

“I cannot emphasise how careful you should be – stay in the French Quarter, do not leave it on any account! And even then be really careful. It’s not just ‘haha America scary, people have guns’, it’s actually really bad… in four days there [in August 2006] we met two people who had been mugged at gunpoint and one whose friend had been shot dead.”

That concerned us a little. As did the fact that my guidebook described the French Quarter, for decades the legendary, beautiful home to musicians, artists, and indeed tourists, as “comparatively safe” (what a comforting modifier there). Even in New Orleans itself a cafe owner bid us goodbye not with a traditional ’see ya’, ‘goodbye’, or ‘have a good one’, but ‘be careful’. ‘Be careful’? What kind of thing is that to say to your clientele?

Well, we were careful – but not paranoid; not to the point that it stopped us having a wonderful time in New Orleans. It’s two and a half years since the devastation of Hurricane Katrina – and the greater devastation of federal incompetence – reduced a great city to its knees, and the Big Easy is still moving slowly, creakingly, back to something approaching normality. Recovery is manifested in the ubiquitous gold, green and purple that visually tags and unites the whole city – and in the music, dancing, and irrepressibly welcoming party spirit of Mardi Gras, which we accidentally stumbled upon the start of.

But beyond the French Quarter, some areas remain entirely un-populated for whole blocks, family houses are still left as crumbling wreckage, with flotsam-ridden yards, almost every street is scarred with pot-holes that could swallow your whole wheel, and crime is still a major problem. Last month three guys with AK-47s held up an armoured bank truck outside a middle school playground around the corner from where we were staying – in the middle of recess. Their getaway was aided by the fact that the NOPD literally could not carry out a proper Police chase: the roads are just too messed up for that, thanks to a combination of neglect, Katrina, and the army humvees that pounded the streets in the aftermath of the hurricane.

There aren’t many political lawn signs about – and those that are there are for local Mayoral and State races. Which hardly surprises me: would you have much faith in the federal government right now? Like the sardonic t-shirts in the tourist shops say: ‘FEMA Disaster Advice: ‘Run bitch, run!’. No-one really wants to talk about politics – but the very presence in the city of all the young people we meet, none of whom are New Orleans locals, is one of the most profound political statements you could ask for. They struggle to make rent in an ailing economy, put up with the painful slowness of the city’s recovery, tolerate the ignorant attitudes of outsiders and live with the real fears of insiders, and all because there is nowhere else in this vast, diverse land of opportunity that they would rather spend their youth.

Erik, our gracious host, is a supremely talented young pastry chef, originally from New York – though he has lived all over the USA (”I think there might possibly be one state I haven’t been to”). He survived Katrina, which is another story for another time. For now I’m wondering if local anger at the federal government is motivating a groundswell of interest in the election. Erik thinks not.

“You’re not going to get much out of people during Mardi Gras man. This is our time to enjoy ourselves. Because Katrina…” he tails off, trying to find the words, “…it’s fucking depressing man. I don’t want to think about that shit. I don’t like to talk about it much either. Normally if people ask about Katrina I just lie and say ‘nah dude, I wasn’t here for that’. It’s just too bad, it’s too depressing.”

The room falls silent, and we stare sadly at the floor, still trying to comprehend the horror of it all. But Erik grins broadly, affectionately, correctively.

“But I came back man. I fucking love this city. I had to come back.”