Saturday, October 15, 2005
Returning to New Orleans
I came back to New Orleans with my assistant Amy yesterday evening to have a look around the city, and to assess the situation with my property here in the French Quarter.
The city is surreal, devastated, decimated... it has a post-apocalyptic feel, but most of the people I've talked to have displayed a positive, upbeat, hopeful and energized spirit, and that includes those who have lost all but their lives. So far I haven't fun into anyone who has lost significant others, but I know there are many such people here and have heard that some of them are not doing quite so well.
So many (the majority) of the homes here have been affected, and completely ruined as often as not. Most people have not come back. Driving through the neighborhoods, in areas that didn't flood there is still a lot of damage. There will be a few homes that look mostly unaffected, and then dotted in between are houses that collapsed. It seems somewhat random. And then there are trees, giant twisted sections of metal roofing or siding, streets blocked off, street lights not working or blown around at weird angles. It didn't take us long to spot a tent encampment in Metairie. The first people I saw were two men, one giving the other a haircut out on the grass. The campers looked a little rough around the edges but dignified, alive, not defeated.It was early evening, and I saw smiles, animated conversation, and a few beers being shared.
Here in the French Quarter, which is one of the least-affected parts of the city, things look eerily close to "normal" at first glance. On closer inspection, even here the population is maybe a quarter to a third of normal, and more than half the businesses are still closed. Restaurants are slowly coming back to life, with limited menus, but less limited each day/week. Angeli's on Decatur finally started serving pizza again last night, which apparently created a bit of excitement on our block. They had a coming-back-to-life party with live music and a crowd of people who looked a little more open and grateful for a bit of community happening.
As for my property here, there were a few broken window panes, some things blown around, a few roof tiles off, some rain gutters blown down, and a little bit of incursion of pigeons. But overall, the damage was remarkably light. There were no real water problems, and no sign of the looting that I was mentally prepared for. The power and water were both on and working. Even the cable TV/internet connection is up, and the wireless equipment, TV, digital piano, tools and PC that I hadn't expected to ever see again are all here and undamaged. One day of work will have the property fairly close to where it was before the hurricanes. Amy has been going on about my karma (saying that it's good). I'll just say we've been ridiculously lucky.
We had made arrangements to stay last night with my cousin Frank across the river in Gretna, as we weren't expecting the place to be all that habitable to be able to camp here the first night. But we decided to stay. The usual night-time noise of Decatur Street has already started up again, and we used some cardboard and blankets to close off a couple of holes in the front windows to help with that. But there is a midnight curfew in effect, and by 12:45 the block was remarkably quiet.
Refrigerators are everywhere in the streets. Even in buildings that were otherwise unaffected, most people didn't empty out the refrigerators, and when power was lost, whatever was inside rotted, producing stench, goo, and generally maggots or other infestations. The refrigerators have become the main canvasses for an outpouring of political graffiti. From what I see, I can tell you that the local residents seem none too happy with either the local or national political leaders. One of the refrigerators had a delivery address writ large on the side of it as if it were a large piece of mail waiting to be picked up: George W Bush, White House, Washington, DC.
There wasn't much in our 2 refrigerators here. They're a bit nasty, but salvageable I think.
I spoke with Melanie, my real estate agent, who has more than a dozen properties in New Orleans, ALL of which went under water, including her own lovely home. She remains upbeat and philosophical as she wades through the paperwork and takes care of business. She says she's had a few calls on my property in recent days.
There is a lot of demand for temporary housing, and I think we will be able to offer a bit of that here for a while.
Interesting times.
The city is surreal, devastated, decimated... it has a post-apocalyptic feel, but most of the people I've talked to have displayed a positive, upbeat, hopeful and energized spirit, and that includes those who have lost all but their lives. So far I haven't fun into anyone who has lost significant others, but I know there are many such people here and have heard that some of them are not doing quite so well.
So many (the majority) of the homes here have been affected, and completely ruined as often as not. Most people have not come back. Driving through the neighborhoods, in areas that didn't flood there is still a lot of damage. There will be a few homes that look mostly unaffected, and then dotted in between are houses that collapsed. It seems somewhat random. And then there are trees, giant twisted sections of metal roofing or siding, streets blocked off, street lights not working or blown around at weird angles. It didn't take us long to spot a tent encampment in Metairie. The first people I saw were two men, one giving the other a haircut out on the grass. The campers looked a little rough around the edges but dignified, alive, not defeated.It was early evening, and I saw smiles, animated conversation, and a few beers being shared.
Here in the French Quarter, which is one of the least-affected parts of the city, things look eerily close to "normal" at first glance. On closer inspection, even here the population is maybe a quarter to a third of normal, and more than half the businesses are still closed. Restaurants are slowly coming back to life, with limited menus, but less limited each day/week. Angeli's on Decatur finally started serving pizza again last night, which apparently created a bit of excitement on our block. They had a coming-back-to-life party with live music and a crowd of people who looked a little more open and grateful for a bit of community happening.
As for my property here, there were a few broken window panes, some things blown around, a few roof tiles off, some rain gutters blown down, and a little bit of incursion of pigeons. But overall, the damage was remarkably light. There were no real water problems, and no sign of the looting that I was mentally prepared for. The power and water were both on and working. Even the cable TV/internet connection is up, and the wireless equipment, TV, digital piano, tools and PC that I hadn't expected to ever see again are all here and undamaged. One day of work will have the property fairly close to where it was before the hurricanes. Amy has been going on about my karma (saying that it's good). I'll just say we've been ridiculously lucky.
We had made arrangements to stay last night with my cousin Frank across the river in Gretna, as we weren't expecting the place to be all that habitable to be able to camp here the first night. But we decided to stay. The usual night-time noise of Decatur Street has already started up again, and we used some cardboard and blankets to close off a couple of holes in the front windows to help with that. But there is a midnight curfew in effect, and by 12:45 the block was remarkably quiet.
Refrigerators are everywhere in the streets. Even in buildings that were otherwise unaffected, most people didn't empty out the refrigerators, and when power was lost, whatever was inside rotted, producing stench, goo, and generally maggots or other infestations. The refrigerators have become the main canvasses for an outpouring of political graffiti. From what I see, I can tell you that the local residents seem none too happy with either the local or national political leaders. One of the refrigerators had a delivery address writ large on the side of it as if it were a large piece of mail waiting to be picked up: George W Bush, White House, Washington, DC.
There wasn't much in our 2 refrigerators here. They're a bit nasty, but salvageable I think.
I spoke with Melanie, my real estate agent, who has more than a dozen properties in New Orleans, ALL of which went under water, including her own lovely home. She remains upbeat and philosophical as she wades through the paperwork and takes care of business. She says she's had a few calls on my property in recent days.
There is a lot of demand for temporary housing, and I think we will be able to offer a bit of that here for a while.
Interesting times.
