Don’t think, just enjoy
New Orleans is a city of contrasts that defies definition
NEW ORLEANS—“This isn’t a poor American city. It’s a rich Caribbean city.”
Local tour guide and author Wayne Curtis says this to me as we chat about the contrast between the poverty you see on the outskirts of this mad party of a city and the rich-looking, joyful, drunken, outlandishly enthusiastic gumbo of dancing girls, giant drinks to-go and soul-stirring music that passes for a normal night in the Big Easy.
The point immediately sinks in. Maybe you can’t compare Chicago or Miami with a Hurricane-battered, semi-tropical boiling pot of Caribbean/Creole/CajunAcadian/Black/Irish/Native American/ Haitain/French/modern American stew that’s poised at the mouth of one of the mightiest rivers in the world.
And maybe it doesn’t matter. New Orleans, for all its delights and history of entertaining world artists such as Degas and Tennessee Williams, isn’t a town where you should spend too much time thinking. This is a town for doing, and a town with a rich and colourful past that deserves exploring.
So we’re off on our two-hour tour of this city’s fabled French Quarter.
But first, some Canadian content. I had no idea, but the most un-restrained city in the U.S. basically was founded by two brothers from north of the border. JeanBaptiste Le Moyne, also known as Sieur de Bienville, and his brother, Pierre Le Moyne, or Sieur de Iberville, two of 14 children born in Montreal to a Frenchman who had moved across the ocean to Quebec around 1640.
The brothers were part of a French expedition exploring the lower reaches of the continent. The story goes that Iberville wasn’t too sure about his ships navigating the Mississippi River.
Bienville is said to have gone ahead and ultimately found a bend in the river he thought suitable for an outpost. The city was founded in the early 1700’s and Bienville was the first governor of the Louisiana territory, as well as the founder of European settlements in nearby Biloxi, Mississippi and Mobile, Ala.
There’s a statue of Bienville in the lower French Quarter, and there are streets named after both he and Iberville.
There might be no city in America that’s so famous for its drinking culture. You can buy a 20 oz. beer to-go on Bourbon St. for $3 and slurp it as you pass by the girlie bars and Irish pubs, such as Pat O’Brien’s, where they are said to have invented a sweet, overly fruity rum drink called the Hurricane.
I ask Curtis about the Antique Guns and Swords shop (437 Royal St.), former home of Antoine Peychaud’s Pharmacy and a place some credit as being where the cocktail was born when Peychaud mixed brandy with bitters.
Curtis has done research on the subject, and then some, and insists it’s not true. References to the word cocktail as a drink date back to 1803, the year he says Peychaud was born.
We pause to listen to a band of street musicians outside Brennan’s, home of the famous Bananas Foster dish, and then slide down to the Omni Royal Orleans hotel, a stately, handsome inn that was formerly the St. Louis Hotel, dating to 1835. The interior is gracious and airy, but the best feature might be the rooftop pool area, where you get terrific views of Jackson Square, the French Quarter and the muddy, mighty Mississippi.
(I later look up the history of the Omni Royal Orleans, and the website says the cocktail was invented at the Saint Louis Hotel. Go figure.)
Curtis explains how the French controlled Louisiana for years but didn’t quite know what to do with it. At one point, a Scotsman named John Law took over selling the place, painting photos of a gentle land of giant fruits and beautiful women for gullible folks around the world to drool over; not unlike California developers did in a bid to get the Tom Joads of the world to pack up their belongings and head out from Oklahoma.
“France never quite got it together,” Curtis said. “They were focused on Santo Domingo and Haiti.”
The Spanish had control of Louisiana for quite some time, and Curtis points out the site where Spanish leader Alejandro O’Reilly (how great a name is that?) executed six Frenchmen who had rebelled against Spain’s efforts at control. He also talks about the brick buildings and physical layout of the city, which owes much to Spanish rules and influence. Today, visitors still can find cracked white tiles on walls and fences. At Jackson Square, perhaps the spiritual heart of the French Quarter, the signs read “Plaza d’ Armas,” a changeover from the French “Place d’ Armes.” Lest we overload on history, Curtis takes me to the pretty Royal Blend coffee shop on Royal St., tucked into the back of one of those typical, ohso-pretty courtyards that dominate the old part of the city. “There was a pretty strong sense of culture here with the French, Spanish and Creole people,” Curtis explains after going over the architectural styles in the area. “They had good food. They had opera. They were appalled by the manners of the early Americans.” Somehow, this city has managed to make it all work. There are issues, but races seem to intermingle more here than in many U.S. cities. It’s an accepting kind of place. Easy going. Relaxed. Liberal.
“In the 1920s, this was the only place for off-kilter people to go in the south,” Curtis tells me. “And it’s always been a racial melting pot.”
You can gaze for hours at the fanciful black ironworks on the balconies in the French Quarter. Curtis explains the difference between wrought iron, which is made by hand, and cast iron, which is manufactured in bulk and doesn’t carry nearly the cachet.
We stroll past Jackson Square, with its spraying fountains and the statue of General Andrew Jackson and the black-iron fence splashed with colourful paintings of jazz musicians.
We stroll further east and suddenly the raucous New Orleans disappears into a gentler neighbourhood with quiet shops. We amble past the Ursuline Convent, which dates to 1752 and is said to be the oldest building in the Mississippi Valley. The dormers and slanted silver-coloured roof remind me of Quebec City.
As much as the French influence can still be felt here, a visitor from Canada balks to hear locals pronounced “Chartres Street” as Charters. “Charters”? Really, guys?
On my second and final full day in town, I line up with the tourists for powdered sugar beignets and café au lait at the famous Café du Monde. I remember Curtis telling me the beignets came from Acadians expelled from the Maritimes.
Bienville and beignets. Two city icons, both of them via Canada. Hey, New Orleans; you’re welcome.