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New Orleans can be a good move if you play your cards right. I would suggest Kenner or Metairie, which both have a pretty balanced population and judging by crime you'd think that they were hundreds of miles from NO when Metairie is just across a canal and Kenner lies on the other side of Metairie.
New Orleans can be a good move if you play your cards right. I would suggest Kenner or Metairie, which both have a pretty balanced population and judging by crime you'd think that they were hundreds of miles from NO when Metairie is just across a canal and Kenner lies on the other side of Metairie.
That is because of Harry Lee. The thugs know he doesn't mess around. Now the West Bank is a different story as they are getting overrun by the thugs flooded out from New Orleans.
I will limit my comments to New Orleans in general -- as I have merely visited several times and not lived there post-Katrina. I did live in the Uptown area of New Orleans prior to the hurricane.
Simply put, if you are not a huge fan of the following, whereby all else plays second-fiddle in your other priority scheme, you are sure to despise living in NOLA long-term and will rue the very day you relocated there:
...stellar cuisine: world-renowned and regionally pre-eminent -- you eat out ALL THE TIME; indiginous New Orleanian folk art; garish costumes worn any old mundane day; parades, second lines, jazz funerals; Mardi Gras and other festivals which 'take over' the city for weeks, months on end -- turning the city center into a veritable carnival/ circus/ jubilee -- events which you must work into or around, but cannot avoid; highly eccentric, bombastic, and peculiar "characters" wandering about your 'hood; *old* European and southern architecture; oak trees and spanish moss covering the landscape -- the melancholy sublimity of nature-meets-swamp; FuNkY TimE iN YeR HoUsE!; the Saints; being surrounded by water and under constant threat of hurricane or flood, yet throwing caution to the wind and living on the edge with a suitcase always packed and ready to evacuate when Ray gives the order; huge stinging caterpillars falling from oak trees in June; shotguns adjacent to mansions, shanties abutting Antebellum structures; graveyards built above ground that tantalize the fantastical mind, lending a surreal haunt to otherwise placid neighborhoods; pothole-ridden roads that lend an extra UMMPH-adventure in the funky drive about town; the CLANNNK of a streetcar; the fact that a 'streetcar' is called a "streetcar," and not a "trolley."...
This is not to say that New Orleans de-values the conventional American 'qualities of life' per se: qualities such as safety, pristine cloistered cul-de-sac'ed neighborhoods, and public education; it's just that NOLA is from another time and place, of another ethos altogether. Everything about it is old and deep-seated, for better or for worse. It is all about its mystique, its vibe. It is family-oriented, just not in the stereotypical Leave it to Beaver Way. It is rough and tumble. No matter how you slice it or where you choose to live, you will come face-to-face with the teeth of thuggery, racism, and violence at some point. It is tension-filled: extremes of haves and have-nots, old-line racism, and economic malaise. It has fallen on hard times recently; but NOLA's history is one of hard times, coups, petty politics, and strife.
Yet somehow there is a LOVE, a spirit of generosity, and a jubilation that permeates the city, and for the most part negates all the bad. The funniest, warmest, most soulful people I have ever known have either been born and raised in NOLA or have spent time there. It is a city which demands an elevated humanity -- a spirituality of sorts -- from its people.
It has been said that New Orleans is a rare place: one which an individual does not choose to live in; rather, which chooses the individual as its resident.
My advice is: if NOLA is not beckoning you -- if you are not overwhelmingly romanced by her charms and feel hopelessly impregnable to her embrace, then you are not one of her chosen ones... let the notion go and stay in Oakland County, where I hear it's wonderful.
Sincerely,
SP
Last edited by san phlegmatico; 08-14-2007 at 01:00 AM..
Your post is the only one I've read (anywhere on this board, I think) that actually cites an example of what I live every single day. (what a freakin' relief, THANK YOU) Transplanted home girl/boy makes the mistake of thinking that since my skin is white, I'm going to be an easy target, I'm going to let them stomp all over me. I will say, that even though I despise this "acting out" of mine (which is really just self defense), the look on their faces when the "white girl" snaps is PRICELESS. ("white girl" = their words, not mine) It sucks to live here. I am not this person. And this is not our real town, Ponchatoula.
The type of misbehavior and complete lack of decency you describe is exactly what I make reference to in many of my own posts. We live about 30 min. west of Covington. Post Katrina, THIS TOWN IS NOT THE SAME, this town is no longer the peaceful, lovely, kind place it was prior to the storm. It's an animal house that, after two years, has turned ME into an animal. (I'm ready to kick somebody in the face) It pains me a great deal to admit all this, as I've been raised in Louisiana, and because of how hard we worked to save for building this house, and how long we spent dreaming of living here. But when the handwriting's on the wall, well, it's kinda in your best interests to read it.
As to the biracial couple issue, it sickens me also to see good people treated like crap. Skin color, how stupid and outrageous for such a superficial, immaterial feature to even be considered! The truly important thing, whether you are white as toothpaste or black as my hair dye, is this: Are you KIND and GOOD?? If you are, you're my kinda peeps. But if you're not and you make the mistake of bothering me or my family, IT'S GOING DOWN.
(don't even get me started with actual events, you would be GALLED)
IloveNOLA: We love us some Harry Lee, he's the bomb!! Yep. Even still got his "magnet" on our fridge from a Mardi Gras parade several years ago. (it's a blow up of his face, and he's wearing a cowboy hat) Wild west would definitely describe Harry Lee. Of course, living here would also describe "wild west". (LOL, sorry. Couldn't help it)
Hi San Phlegm: THIS post of yours is much better in tone than the other (no arrogance, criticisms, errant assumption, or sweeping generalizations) and I think it's very well written, with just the right balance of information and opinion. You really p'ed me off in the other forum. Sorry. K-ville is getting to me.
I will limit my comments to New Orleans in general -- as I have merely visited several times and not lived there post-Katrina. I did live in the Uptown area of New Orleans prior to the hurricane.
Simply put, if you are not a huge fan of the following, whereby all else plays second-fiddle in your other priority scheme, you are sure to despise living in NOLA long-term and will rue the very day you relocated there:
...stellar cuisine: world-renowned and regionally pre-eminent -- you eat out ALL THE TIME; indiginous New Orleanian folk art; garish costumes worn any old mundane day; parades, second lines, jazz funerals; Mardi Gras and other festivals which 'take over' the city for weeks, months on end -- turning the city center into a veritable carnival/ circus/ jubilee -- events which you must work into or around, but cannot avoid; highly eccentric, bombastic, and peculiar "characters" wandering about your 'hood; *old* European and southern architecture; oak trees and spanish moss covering the landscape -- the melancholy sublimity of nature-meets-swamp; FuNkY TimE iN YeR HoUsE!; the Saints; being surrounded by water and under constant threat of hurricane or flood, yet throwing caution to the wind and living on the edge with a suitcase always packed and ready to evacuate when Ray gives the order; huge stinging caterpillars falling from oak trees in June; shotguns adjacent to mansions, shanties abutting Antebellum structures; graveyards built above ground that tantalize the fantastical mind, lending a surreal haunt to otherwise placid neighborhoods; pothole-ridden roads that lend an extra UMMPH-adventure in the funky drive about town; the CLANNNK of a streetcar; the fact that a 'streetcar' is called a "streetcar," and not a "trolley."...
This is not to say that New Orleans de-values the conventional American 'qualities of life' per se: qualities such as safety, pristine cloistered cul-de-sac'ed neighborhoods, and public education; it's just that NOLA is from another time and place, of another ethos altogether. Everything about it is old and deep-seated, for better or for worse. It is all about its mystique, its vibe. It is family-oriented, just not in the stereotypical Leave it to Beaver Way. It is rough and tumble. No matter how you slice it or where you choose to live, you will come face-to-face with the teeth of thuggery, racism, and violence at some point. It is tension-filled: extremes of haves and have-nots, old-line racism, and economic malaise. It has fallen on hard times recently; but NOLA's history is one of hard times, coups, petty politics, and strife.
Yet somehow there is a LOVE, a spirit of generosity, and a jubilation that permeates the city, and for the most part negates all the bad. The funniest, warmest, most soulful people I have ever known have either been born and raised in NOLA or have spent time there. It is a city which demands an elevated humanity -- a spirituality of sorts -- from its people.
It has been said that New Orleans is a rare place: one which an individual does not choose to live in; rather, which chooses the individual as its resident.
My advice is: if NOLA is not beckoning you -- if you are not overwhelmingly romanced by her charms and feel hopelessly impregnable to her embrace, then you are not one of her chosen ones... let the notion go and stay in Oakland County, where I hear it's wonderful.
Sincerely,
SP
this was an absolutly wonderful way to put things
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