Thursday, December 24, 2009
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Good friends
I went to Atlanta and I have to say that Atlanta is one of my favourite cities...
...I was there earlier this year, met some friends and went back to see them.
It is FUN and fun is what I had and if I wasn't dancing, exploring or eating food I was chillin'.
We got to cooking, I even baked a cake, ate and ate and of course went out to amazing shows. Random shows too.
One night we went out just to see what was happening and after leaving a cheesy bar where you hear 'hip hop' so bad that they are using samples from songs that came out last year. My friend and I stumbled upon a live show, (okay - not exactly stumble, but let's just say he knows whose tweets to follow - the man himself) Maseo from De La Soul doing it up at a club, the show was free, the crowd was between the ages of 35 and 55 and he was playing vinyl mixing set after set of fantastic classics. There was a sign saying 'trucker bangin' and a few people had t-shirts that said the exact same phrase. We were trying to figure out if we ran in to a family reunion, a trucker reunion or perhaps a new band that called themselves 'trucker banging' because at one point a few people decided Maseo wasn't good enough and asked him to play some tracks they could 'rap' to...well, some people have talent and some don't. I don't think I have witnessed so much heckling, people were literally begging for them to stop. They did eventually.
Then a couple days later we went out to see Rich Medina.
It was cold, raining and a Tuesday night, the show didn't start until midnight, but folks still made it out to dance to excellent afro beat, funk, soul and a dash of hip hop.
It helps when you are in company of people who like the same music as you do and enjoy food as much as you do and have the same politics and sense of humour as you do. Life becomes simple, or at least simpler - especially when you don't have to get up in the morning and go to a job.
Thanks to my peeps in Atlanta for a good time! Miss you!
...I was there earlier this year, met some friends and went back to see them.
It is FUN and fun is what I had and if I wasn't dancing, exploring or eating food I was chillin'.
We got to cooking, I even baked a cake, ate and ate and of course went out to amazing shows. Random shows too.
One night we went out just to see what was happening and after leaving a cheesy bar where you hear 'hip hop' so bad that they are using samples from songs that came out last year. My friend and I stumbled upon a live show, (okay - not exactly stumble, but let's just say he knows whose tweets to follow - the man himself) Maseo from De La Soul doing it up at a club, the show was free, the crowd was between the ages of 35 and 55 and he was playing vinyl mixing set after set of fantastic classics. There was a sign saying 'trucker bangin' and a few people had t-shirts that said the exact same phrase. We were trying to figure out if we ran in to a family reunion, a trucker reunion or perhaps a new band that called themselves 'trucker banging' because at one point a few people decided Maseo wasn't good enough and asked him to play some tracks they could 'rap' to...well, some people have talent and some don't. I don't think I have witnessed so much heckling, people were literally begging for them to stop. They did eventually.
Then a couple days later we went out to see Rich Medina.
It was cold, raining and a Tuesday night, the show didn't start until midnight, but folks still made it out to dance to excellent afro beat, funk, soul and a dash of hip hop.
It helps when you are in company of people who like the same music as you do and enjoy food as much as you do and have the same politics and sense of humour as you do. Life becomes simple, or at least simpler - especially when you don't have to get up in the morning and go to a job.
Thanks to my peeps in Atlanta for a good time! Miss you!
A Microcosm
The infamous French Courter in New Orleans is like stepping in to another city that perhaps could be found around the corner in a small, 'quaint', 'charming' city in France. It was built up higher than the rest of it's surrounding area.
Well, because New Orleans is surrounded by water, there is the Lake, then the river, then the marshland, then the ponds. If you dig but 2 feet you will run in to water.
(I felt like I was driving through the back country when in vehicles in New Orleans because the roads are literally and forever marked by the water that sits threateningly underneath the ground - yes before Katrina, just a trademark of the landscape. In fact the graveyards are quite beautiful as most of the tombstones are built up and when walking in one you feel as you are walking in a city as some tombstones are two stories high - I wondered though where are the people buried who couldn't afford them?)
So now you see why the people who could afford it, built their homes up, their businesses up, and literally, thier graves up. If you look around, most homes are built a bit up, but it doesn't help if you live in the lower 9th ward, or the 9th ward or Gintilly or Treme or (list goes on) It is a class thing, which most often coincides with a race thing. So even if your home is built up a bit, you most likely will be under water.
Asides from the water one must wonder how much of a complex the 'upper' class really has...
The French Quarter is a tourist attraction, it has character, there are tours speaking of the history, the architecture is amazingly beautiful and there is a street that never sleeps basically called bourbon street where people I think drink 24/7. With all this going on, I unfortunately find it a bit tacky, especially when you are looking at it and observe closely. The sleazy men, the white owned businesses that appropriate black culture and hire black people to represent the food, the tourists running to voodoo shops giggling at the deities and dolls and most disgustingly those who are culture whores and literally live in the buildings that were once slave quarters, but are now upgraded condos.
Oh, what a dream.
But just outside the French Quarter is one of the, if not the oldest black community in North America - Treme. It being right outside the French Quarter says a lot about how the neighborhood was conceived by itself. The French Quarter being a place of bondage and enslavement and Treme signifying the the 'freed slave' who literally bargained, bought and aquired land literally blocks away from their enslavement.
This is significant in consideration to the idea that slavery did not end, (did it ever end?) closer to 1865, especially being in the south and Treme was essentially established as a free area for blacks in the 1700's. I am not a historian and I am in complete acceptance that this is just a blog and I am probably missing many points on many factors pertaining to black history in general. But I am just trying to get to a point of how this community had a head start from most black communities. A free place for black folks, a place of early economic growth, one of the most, as one may say, pioneers of black culture in North America in general, the creation of jazz, of creole food, language and many other art forms in general and by art I do not mean frivolities, but craftsmanship and community and growth in itself.
I am not here to be an expert or to write an essay, but it brings up many questions of how such an early community, no not a community that was thriving in the 60's and was destroyed, but a community that literally set the tone for free blacks in general, a community that was thriving and vibrant in the 18th century, and sure there is tremendous history and culture that is still celebrated to this day and in fact Treme was affected by the flood, but still was able to keep the 2nd liners that run every week TO THIS DAY. But how, the forces of white imperiliasm and colonialism are omnipotent and strong. It is this force of evil that I am still trying to disect. Ha ha, okay, I haven't had much sleep and am obviously overwhelmed at the magnitude of oppression.
And of course one could ask the same thing about natives and how civilisations were literally wiped out.
Why doesn't colonisation in it's different periods and timeframes and gentrification have names like Katrina and why are they not compared to natural disasters themselves?
Man made disasters of America...
A community that was black owned in the 1700s but still has survivors. Treme, is now mostly white owned.
So where is the story in the media or even in the many books that came out after Katrina or even the more progressive graphic novels that came out - where is that story of a man I met who stayed in his home (a home he rents) that is owned by a white man. Who stayed in his home and endured the flood for 3 weeks? The one who was alone and made a light out of three car batteries, the one who didn't get the money that was promised to him because he is not a home owner and the damage was 'not that bad' and as long as FEMA comes around every year to check on the house and it looks okay, the owner can get away with providing atrocious living conditions and get that large pay cheque every month.
Yet still, people go on and they keep telling their stories and they keep living, and it is quite symbolic of how the white man's world really is just the French Quarter and just outside, and a bit lower, where the paint is chipped, what appears to be on the margin really is the culutural force that is forever resilient and has more history and celebration and meaning then the French Quarter ever will. People come from all ove the world to see the French Quarter, but really, they are coming to see Treme.
The French Quarter is in black face and there will always be tickets to the show.
Well, because New Orleans is surrounded by water, there is the Lake, then the river, then the marshland, then the ponds. If you dig but 2 feet you will run in to water.
(I felt like I was driving through the back country when in vehicles in New Orleans because the roads are literally and forever marked by the water that sits threateningly underneath the ground - yes before Katrina, just a trademark of the landscape. In fact the graveyards are quite beautiful as most of the tombstones are built up and when walking in one you feel as you are walking in a city as some tombstones are two stories high - I wondered though where are the people buried who couldn't afford them?)
So now you see why the people who could afford it, built their homes up, their businesses up, and literally, thier graves up. If you look around, most homes are built a bit up, but it doesn't help if you live in the lower 9th ward, or the 9th ward or Gintilly or Treme or (list goes on) It is a class thing, which most often coincides with a race thing. So even if your home is built up a bit, you most likely will be under water.
Asides from the water one must wonder how much of a complex the 'upper' class really has...
The French Quarter is a tourist attraction, it has character, there are tours speaking of the history, the architecture is amazingly beautiful and there is a street that never sleeps basically called bourbon street where people I think drink 24/7. With all this going on, I unfortunately find it a bit tacky, especially when you are looking at it and observe closely. The sleazy men, the white owned businesses that appropriate black culture and hire black people to represent the food, the tourists running to voodoo shops giggling at the deities and dolls and most disgustingly those who are culture whores and literally live in the buildings that were once slave quarters, but are now upgraded condos.
Oh, what a dream.
But just outside the French Quarter is one of the, if not the oldest black community in North America - Treme. It being right outside the French Quarter says a lot about how the neighborhood was conceived by itself. The French Quarter being a place of bondage and enslavement and Treme signifying the the 'freed slave' who literally bargained, bought and aquired land literally blocks away from their enslavement.
This is significant in consideration to the idea that slavery did not end, (did it ever end?) closer to 1865, especially being in the south and Treme was essentially established as a free area for blacks in the 1700's. I am not a historian and I am in complete acceptance that this is just a blog and I am probably missing many points on many factors pertaining to black history in general. But I am just trying to get to a point of how this community had a head start from most black communities. A free place for black folks, a place of early economic growth, one of the most, as one may say, pioneers of black culture in North America in general, the creation of jazz, of creole food, language and many other art forms in general and by art I do not mean frivolities, but craftsmanship and community and growth in itself.
I am not here to be an expert or to write an essay, but it brings up many questions of how such an early community, no not a community that was thriving in the 60's and was destroyed, but a community that literally set the tone for free blacks in general, a community that was thriving and vibrant in the 18th century, and sure there is tremendous history and culture that is still celebrated to this day and in fact Treme was affected by the flood, but still was able to keep the 2nd liners that run every week TO THIS DAY. But how, the forces of white imperiliasm and colonialism are omnipotent and strong. It is this force of evil that I am still trying to disect. Ha ha, okay, I haven't had much sleep and am obviously overwhelmed at the magnitude of oppression.
And of course one could ask the same thing about natives and how civilisations were literally wiped out.
Why doesn't colonisation in it's different periods and timeframes and gentrification have names like Katrina and why are they not compared to natural disasters themselves?
Man made disasters of America...
A community that was black owned in the 1700s but still has survivors. Treme, is now mostly white owned.
So where is the story in the media or even in the many books that came out after Katrina or even the more progressive graphic novels that came out - where is that story of a man I met who stayed in his home (a home he rents) that is owned by a white man. Who stayed in his home and endured the flood for 3 weeks? The one who was alone and made a light out of three car batteries, the one who didn't get the money that was promised to him because he is not a home owner and the damage was 'not that bad' and as long as FEMA comes around every year to check on the house and it looks okay, the owner can get away with providing atrocious living conditions and get that large pay cheque every month.
Yet still, people go on and they keep telling their stories and they keep living, and it is quite symbolic of how the white man's world really is just the French Quarter and just outside, and a bit lower, where the paint is chipped, what appears to be on the margin really is the culutural force that is forever resilient and has more history and celebration and meaning then the French Quarter ever will. People come from all ove the world to see the French Quarter, but really, they are coming to see Treme.
The French Quarter is in black face and there will always be tickets to the show.
Where are the people?
It is quite a shock to grow up in a small town like I did and even migrate to a larger city and have a large native population and then cross a man made border to find that natives do not exist in some people's minds.
How easy can it be to erase a community all together if you just close your eyes really hard?
If you look at the demographics, you will notice the native population is below 1%.
When Katrina hit, we saw people, there was focus on different communities, but what about the 'invisible' nations?
For example how many people are really talking about Choctaw and their experience with the hurricane?
How easy can it be to erase a community all together if you just close your eyes really hard?
If you look at the demographics, you will notice the native population is below 1%.
When Katrina hit, we saw people, there was focus on different communities, but what about the 'invisible' nations?
For example how many people are really talking about Choctaw and their experience with the hurricane?
Why does everyone want to be an indian these days?
I was able to visit a museum in New Orleans focusing on the history and traditions of the Mardi Gras and specifically around black folks who dress up as natives. At first I misunderstood the concept, I thought the people in the parade were a mix of black and native (black indians) and that was the celebration in itself, but then I learned that it is really black people dressed up as natives and the beautiful thing about it is celebrating the fact the native people took in black people who were escaping slavery. (am slowly learning specifics around which nations/tribes)
It is the celebration of the two coming together in solidarity and how they have helped one another out really stretching across the continent before the concept of borders.
The truth of the matter is, is that most black people are mixed with either white or native or both. Everyone I talk to here and I mean absolutely everyone is mixed with native. I met someone the other day (who is visibly black) but whose grandparents were an interesting couple: his Grandfather a Cherokee Chief and his Grandmother was straight from Germany.
When I first started asking questions towards my Dad and his sisters that is one of the first things that was mentioned to me was that we had native in us. It is like we are proud of it. I was told Blackfoot, the Blackfoot Nation stretches from KKKanada down the the states, but then there is also another tribe called Blackfeet which who identify as both black and native.
But then, when I spoke with my Great Uncle he said Cherokee, many people actually say Cherokee and I thought to myself, well, why is it just Cherokee, when there are hundreds of other tribes? Is it because it's such a well known tribe, and so people just say Cherokee? But then I learned that the Cherokee nation is one of the only nations that accepted black people in to their culture.
Quite interestingly enough more recently the Cherokee Nation 'expelled' black folks from their nation. 'Why' is another topic at hand. I am still learning the inner complexities of the relationship between black and native people, one that is very venemous and sacrd, but more so elusive.
Slavery, was one factor in which it wasn't just exclusive to black people, then there was the census records and how natives were punished for not being on the reservations so many identified as 'mullato'. Then there is the intermarriages, the kinship, the solidarity, the struggle. It seems quite obvious that european settlers at the time were quite threatened by the union of native and black folks and I think when there was that communion between the two it was using fire with fire. It was a way of resisting and literally surviving because when there is a 'black indian' at a time when natives were 'free' and blacks were slaves, yet natives were not considered citizens and blacks didn't have reservations, but they had plantations...
...A complex nation
It is the celebration of the two coming together in solidarity and how they have helped one another out really stretching across the continent before the concept of borders.
The truth of the matter is, is that most black people are mixed with either white or native or both. Everyone I talk to here and I mean absolutely everyone is mixed with native. I met someone the other day (who is visibly black) but whose grandparents were an interesting couple: his Grandfather a Cherokee Chief and his Grandmother was straight from Germany.
When I first started asking questions towards my Dad and his sisters that is one of the first things that was mentioned to me was that we had native in us. It is like we are proud of it. I was told Blackfoot, the Blackfoot Nation stretches from KKKanada down the the states, but then there is also another tribe called Blackfeet which who identify as both black and native.
But then, when I spoke with my Great Uncle he said Cherokee, many people actually say Cherokee and I thought to myself, well, why is it just Cherokee, when there are hundreds of other tribes? Is it because it's such a well known tribe, and so people just say Cherokee? But then I learned that the Cherokee nation is one of the only nations that accepted black people in to their culture.
Quite interestingly enough more recently the Cherokee Nation 'expelled' black folks from their nation. 'Why' is another topic at hand. I am still learning the inner complexities of the relationship between black and native people, one that is very venemous and sacrd, but more so elusive.
Slavery, was one factor in which it wasn't just exclusive to black people, then there was the census records and how natives were punished for not being on the reservations so many identified as 'mullato'. Then there is the intermarriages, the kinship, the solidarity, the struggle. It seems quite obvious that european settlers at the time were quite threatened by the union of native and black folks and I think when there was that communion between the two it was using fire with fire. It was a way of resisting and literally surviving because when there is a 'black indian' at a time when natives were 'free' and blacks were slaves, yet natives were not considered citizens and blacks didn't have reservations, but they had plantations...
...A complex nation
Don't talk to strangers
First day my cousin took me around New Orleans,
Actually let me stop here, let me remind you, I am meeting many family members for the first time, I saw a picture of my cousin when he was a teenager, but he is 47 now. So when my cousin came to pick me up, he forgot to mention what vehicle he drives, I am waiting on the corner and this guy drives up ( i had just finished speaking to 'cuz' on the phone) the guy who drives up honks at me and pulls around the corner and stops, so I run to the the truck excitedly and say my cousin's name...the guys shakes his head, but has a creepy smile on his face. I literally had the door open and was about to hop in. So I just closed the door and left.
Awkward.
NO!
...Creepy...
2 seconds later my cousin shows up with his daughter.
So...first day my cousin took me around New Orleans showing me the different neighborhoods, focusing on the ones that were flooded, including his. I got to meet his wife and 3 kids, two were still in high school. All were very open to talking about their 'Katrina experience.' They had evacuated, just left for three days expecting to come back home, they were shocked to find their house in 8 feet of water. Everything was gone. They had to go through moving to different states, staying at different shelters, being turned down from hotels in other states because they were from New Orleans. Finally they ended up in Arkansas and lived there for three years. Yes Conway.
My cousin's daughter told me how unimpressed she was having to change highschools from the city to a small town where learning how to skin and cook a racoon was more important than algebra...but hey, I guess I might want to learn how to eat too when it comes right down to survival.
The only family albums they had now, were scrap books made recently focusing on Katrina, how they came back and just rebuilt their home and staying in a hotel during the process. Now their house is new, they admit it's nicer than their older frame, but some of their neighbors haven't moved back, some friends they haven't heard from in a while are not back in town either. There are several photos dedicated to a renunion of them and a former neighbor they were able to reconnect with, but that is just one. My cousin's high school is being rebuilt so he is going to school in a trailer with half of his former high school population.
The population in New Orleans has been cut in half. Literally, if not more. Everyone I talk to says that it is NOT the same, no matter what the media portrays, no matter what person you meet who is an outsider and raves about the mardi gras they went to and how 'New Orleans is still 'happening' because they went to the mardi gras last summer...there are new people from the ages of 19 - 24 moving in and 'having a blast' living in this city not realising they may be living in a family's home.
And in reality, my cousin and his family are considered some of the lucky ones, they have their health, they have jobs, kids are still in school (except all had to be moved back a grade) one is going to college, they have a new home.
Let me remind you and myself that most folks did not own their homes. If you were renting, the hurricane meant a whole different thing to you.
But of course we all know that others couldn't make it out. The disabled, the elderly, folks in jail, hospitals, nursing homes.
I will cherish their stories along with other people who shared their stories.
It has been so refreshing to be around family, from all over who do not mind sharing their experiences with me, the good and the bad.
I am glad they are not strangers to me anymore.
Actually let me stop here, let me remind you, I am meeting many family members for the first time, I saw a picture of my cousin when he was a teenager, but he is 47 now. So when my cousin came to pick me up, he forgot to mention what vehicle he drives, I am waiting on the corner and this guy drives up ( i had just finished speaking to 'cuz' on the phone) the guy who drives up honks at me and pulls around the corner and stops, so I run to the the truck excitedly and say my cousin's name...the guys shakes his head, but has a creepy smile on his face. I literally had the door open and was about to hop in. So I just closed the door and left.
Awkward.
NO!
...Creepy...
2 seconds later my cousin shows up with his daughter.
So...first day my cousin took me around New Orleans showing me the different neighborhoods, focusing on the ones that were flooded, including his. I got to meet his wife and 3 kids, two were still in high school. All were very open to talking about their 'Katrina experience.' They had evacuated, just left for three days expecting to come back home, they were shocked to find their house in 8 feet of water. Everything was gone. They had to go through moving to different states, staying at different shelters, being turned down from hotels in other states because they were from New Orleans. Finally they ended up in Arkansas and lived there for three years. Yes Conway.
My cousin's daughter told me how unimpressed she was having to change highschools from the city to a small town where learning how to skin and cook a racoon was more important than algebra...but hey, I guess I might want to learn how to eat too when it comes right down to survival.
The only family albums they had now, were scrap books made recently focusing on Katrina, how they came back and just rebuilt their home and staying in a hotel during the process. Now their house is new, they admit it's nicer than their older frame, but some of their neighbors haven't moved back, some friends they haven't heard from in a while are not back in town either. There are several photos dedicated to a renunion of them and a former neighbor they were able to reconnect with, but that is just one. My cousin's high school is being rebuilt so he is going to school in a trailer with half of his former high school population.
The population in New Orleans has been cut in half. Literally, if not more. Everyone I talk to says that it is NOT the same, no matter what the media portrays, no matter what person you meet who is an outsider and raves about the mardi gras they went to and how 'New Orleans is still 'happening' because they went to the mardi gras last summer...there are new people from the ages of 19 - 24 moving in and 'having a blast' living in this city not realising they may be living in a family's home.
And in reality, my cousin and his family are considered some of the lucky ones, they have their health, they have jobs, kids are still in school (except all had to be moved back a grade) one is going to college, they have a new home.
Let me remind you and myself that most folks did not own their homes. If you were renting, the hurricane meant a whole different thing to you.
But of course we all know that others couldn't make it out. The disabled, the elderly, folks in jail, hospitals, nursing homes.
I will cherish their stories along with other people who shared their stories.
It has been so refreshing to be around family, from all over who do not mind sharing their experiences with me, the good and the bad.
I am glad they are not strangers to me anymore.
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