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| February 2012 |
| Billie Silvey |
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| Burial Practices |
| Voodoo |
| Mardi Gras |
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| Cuisine |
| Jazz |
| I've always been proud of the French side of my family, the LaRoes. My father was named Cecil LaRoe Wesley for his mother's family. We named our son Robert LaRoe Silvey. Even our granddaughter, Katyana LaRoe Hall, preserves the family name.
I studied French for two years in high school in anticipation of the time when I would visit relatives in "the old country." Unfortunately, the closest I've come was a layover in Charles de Gaulle Airport on our way to Italy and muddling through some Voltaire. I never was able to speak more than a few sentences of the language, and that with an excruciating West Texas accent. Still, I always felt a special connection with New Orleans because of its French heritage. Even though Lousiana adjoins my native Texas, I never visited New Orleans until 1991, when I was invited to speak for a women's retreat hosted by the Hickory Knoll Church of Christ. At first, it seemed far from what I expected, no moss-shrouded live oaks, no richly flavored seafood. I stayed with the Laguna family in a regular house in a regular neighborhood. The first meal I had there was at a German restaurant The retreat, which was held across Lake Pontchartrain via the causeway, had a Mexican theme and featured a big Mexican dinner prepared by the men. What I failed to understand was that my experience was more basically New Orleans than I realized, a warm mix of hospitality, flavor and variety that is with me even today through the gifts the women gave me: soup mugs with recipes for Seafood Gumbo and Creole Jambalaya printed on them, a package of perfectly-flavored dried beans and a gray-green slate tile from an old roof hung with yarn and bearing a print of the Rue Royale. |
| Later, I had some of the more typical New Orleans food.--beignets at Cafe Du Monde (left) and softshell crab po'boys. Gumbo, jambalaya and etouffee are other typical New Orleans dishes, as well as all kinds of fresh and saltwater seafood. |
| My first real sense that that New Orleans was not your typical American city came as I walked down Bourbon Street, washed by waves of jazz pouring from every doorway. I'd long appreciated jazz, our most influential native American music. I love its beat, its syncopation, its freedom, the democracy of its solos and the fact that, however far it seems to wander from its initial theme, it always manages to return to a satisfying conclusion. |
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| New Orleans Culture |
| The city is so low and its water table so high that traditional burial is impossible. In a heavy rain, caskets would pop out of the ground. That's why graves in New Orleans are above ground, as seen in this historic picture of graves being decorated for All-Saints Day. Some are mausoleums (right background), while others are individual tombs, looking like miniature buildings ranged in tight blocks, the so-called Cities of the Dead (left foreground). |
| One of the most frequently-visited tombs in New Orleans is that of Marie Leveau, the 1830s Voodoo Queen. Leveau was known for her intricately wrapped seven-knotted tignon or headcovering. Voodoo originated in the West Africa nations of Benin, Togo and Ghana, and was brought by slaves to the city. Voodoo practices include spirits, gris-gris or talismans, dried animal parts and sacred dances. |
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| Mardi Gras (Fat Tuesday) is the most popular celebration in New Orleans. Held the last Tuesday before Lent, it is celebrated with costumes, masks, dances and parades. In the late 1700s, the French celebrated Mardi Gras with masked balls. Later, krewes, or neighborhood societies, began designing floats for the parade, which developed into a tourist attraction in the 1900s. |
| A few of the gracious women from the Hickory Knolls Church of Christ. I'm fourth from left. |
| Beignets and coffee at the Cafe Du Monde |
| Buddy Bolden's Jazz Band |
| New Orleans cemetery |
| Marie Leveau |
| Historic Mardi Gras parade |