2008 Woodie Awards
'Big Easy' still awesome after storm
Two years after Hurricane Katrina, tourism returns to New Orleans
Sarah Lavery
Issue date: 6/6/07 Section: Features
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Lake Pontchartrain surrounds the 20-mile-long bridge into New Orleans. The sight of rippling water fills my peripheral vision; everywhere I turn - forward, backward, right, left - all I can see is blue.
And then the outskirts of the city come into sight, and I feel as if the years of images from CNN and newspapers have come alive. None of the dilapidated houses have any windows, several boast large red Xs across their front doors. The word "HELP" remains on top of a few roofs, written in chalk, spelled out with bricks, evidence of families forced on top of their homes to avoid the flooding.
It's been nearly two years since Hurricane Katrina. The subject rarely appears on the news anymore, replaced now by constant trouble overseas. Kanye West's famous "George Bush doesn't like black people" statement now lives in pop culture infamy; what he was talking about, however, is no longer a hot button issue.
But outside of the city, it looks like the hurricane could have happened yesterday.
Amidst the years of Katrina coverage, New Orleans has become a forgotten tourist destination. Many falsely believe that the city was somehow totaled entirely, or that it just ceased to exist.
The heart of the city, the French Quarter, was only minimally damaged by Katrina's wrath. At the highest point in New Orleans, the Quarter was spared of the flooding after the levees collapsed, and though the surrounding land has a long way to go before reconstruction is achieved, this area, chock-full of restaurants, antique book stores, outdoor markets, and characters that seem straight out of a Tennessee William's play, sit ready and waiting for tourists.
Things aren't looking good for my trip to New Orleans. I was curious to see the Katrina aftermath, but I didn't expect my first impression of the city to be so dire. I was traveling to explore the gem of the South, to sample food from one of the country's top-ranked destination for dining, to see William Faulkner and Tennessee William's favorite haunts. I was going there, basically, to boost New Orleanian tourism, not to join the reconstruction effort. I wasn't sure it was possible to have fun, eat wonderfully and still be respectful of a tragedy that is, obviously, nowhere near over.
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