Athough I posted about the 504 already on Saturday, things took a strange turn yesterday that i wanted to share.

After laying in bed re-reading my old posts from 2006, I realized that I never posted about my summer there.  It is absolutely bizarre to me, that the most soul-shaping experience of my life to-date has remained unchronicled.  Completely without a tale or a voice or an existence.  Here I am linking to old posts from my week in Naw’lins and yet the following summer would help shape the woman I am today.  So much about my experience was too difficult to talk about.  If you hadn’t lived it, seen it, tasted it, touched it, or smelled it, trying to share this kind of a story was next to impossible.  When I returned home after my first trip, I don’t think I spoke about it for months afterward.  I emailed friends and family, told them I was alive and that I’d be in touch.  It was just too much to process.  Too much to live that kind of existence - without running water and electricity and access to a damn grocery store - and then fly back here, to be carted to the store by my friend standing in front of the ice cream section, silent, incapable of choosing for 30 minutes.

I stared at the selection.  Something about that moment shook me.  Here these people are living with absolutely nothing and my privileged ass just got back on a plane to the world of 427 kinds of chocolate ice cream.  I can guarantee you that returned Peace Corps volunteers feel the same.  I have heard it directly from them.  That living a life, so unlike your own, so unlike what you know, is completely jarring to your system.  You live in a new climate with new dialects and culture and food AND under the microscope of a horrible tragedy.  Working alongside exhausted volunteers; doctors, nurses, fundraisers, advocates, all wanting things to be different.  Not different like it was.  Cause the way life existed in that city couldn’t last forever.  We wanted it all to be different and better, but not less New Orleans.  We just wanted things to just be whole.

Although my summer in New Orleans included a buttload of health education, hands on social work in the clinic and more dish washing than I would ever wish on my worst enemy, the most striking part of my return trip was that I didn’t go it alone.  As I mentioned in my original post, I met a fellow volunteer from California with whom I kept in touch and who proved to be my lighthouse on my darkest days.  The second I got off the plane in March, back to DC, we spoke at least once a day.  We talked about the progress in the city (or lack thereof), the people we met, the grassroots efforts we brought back to our campuses.  And we tried to process that feeling of “survivors guilt” and that nasty word privilege that neither of us would ever use to describe ourselves, until we learned what the term “without” meant.  As I came back here with a vacancy behind my eyes and a burning hope in my heart, he stood by me, on the phone, all the way across the country.  We made each other laugh and sometimes we reminisced but eventually we moved forward.  It was time to heal our wounds and keep doing the work we had dedicated our lives to.

Before either of us could spell beignet, we were back on the plane that summer to rekindle our commune love and get back on the ground running.  Although progress had been made, there was still great need for improvement.  Although news reports made it look like the city was full of degenerates screaming at the government for not helping them, 110% of the people I met blamed NO ONE.  Not Nagin.  Not the governor, not even Bush.  They’ve got a resolve in that city, that I don’t know if I’ve witnessed anywhere else.  It’s a little, “Yeah life sucks and then you have a crab boil.”  These people are fucking tough as nails and although the chips were stacked against ‘em, they never let on.  They kept crabbin and drinking and prayin and dancin.  So easily does that become infectious.

Despite my undying support from my new(ish) boyfriend, the city was constantly tense and so were we.  Our residence was riddled with crack heads, former inmates, vagrants … and was under Military Law. I was living in this country and had an automatic rifle shoved in my face more times than I would like to recount.  The weather was hard on us, the cockroaches and rats were a lot to handle, showering outside in makeshift structures got old, having things stolen from us, biclying 3 miles to work in the rain everyday … everyday was a chore.  From sun-up to sun-down we had obligations.  On most days, even when I worked at the clinic for 10 hours I came home and washed dishes for 3 hours.  B would help in the kitchen, provide nighttime security, tuck me in at night with a knife under his pillow and took care of me in a way I can’t even fathom to this day.  One hot, sweaty day in August, he returned to California. I stayed on, moved to a safer location with my new med school friend and continued the daily grind at the clinic.  Being able to watch the screening of Spike Lee’s documentary IN THE SUPERDOME was an experience I will cherish the rest of my life.

Fast forward to the fall of 2006 … our relationship ended.  I was broken hearted for a very long time as I knew our shared experiences made us soul mates on a very different level that would probably never be matched.  I have a “don’t speak to exes” policy that has served me well to date.  However, feeling immediately cut off from this man, with whom I shared the most important moments of my life tore at my heart.  Despite our future plans, we would graduate from school without each other by our sides.

Yesterday, as I received word from our former volunteer organization in New Orleans, I forwarded the message onto he and our friends.  He replied.  We chatted online for almost 4 hours.  We caught up, talked about our families, our schooling and job situations.  And then we both opened up.  Like a gaping wound … or a levee busting at the seams, we started apologizing.  We were sad it didn’t work.  We were regretful things ended the way they did. We both admitted how hurt we were, how damaged we felt after the fall out.  I listened to cnn live all day and all we could do was worry and share and catch up and remember the love we shared.  We forgave.

New Orleans, I will be forever indebted to you for shaping my character, for helping me understand humanity at its best and worst moments.  And for introducing me to the best kind of love I have ever been given.

And for that, I am grateful you are ok today. I will be back!

As I await for news of Gustav’s travels, I lay in bed unable to sleep. It is 3am and my thoughts, heart and soul are in New Orleans.

I wrote about my time in New Orleans and although words were aplenty, the emotions I felt during my short time there vacillated on an almost daily basis. The guns, the violence, the corruption, the flying cockroaches. The coconut cake, the Lebanese Tea, jazz in the streets and a warm smile wherever I went.

I spent my spring break of 2006 in this wonderful city, helping to rebuild the lower 9th one respirator at a time. One bandage. One clean bottle of water. One outbreak at a time. That summer I quit my job dishing out sex advice and peddling birth control to return to the clinic full time. To bicycle to work, across the river, on the ferry. To treat ailing residents, injured volunteers and recently arrived immigrants. For a million dollars I wouldn’t change that experience for the world. In fact, I probably think about The Big Easy at least a couple times a week. The friends I met. The iced coffee and summer storms; cloves smoked, geckos caught.

Regardless of where Gustav ends up, please read the Hurricane Laws before you jump to conclusions about this fascinating city and it’s unique residents.

NOLA, I am praying that you come out on top. That your Po’ Boys are always hot, your music always free and your faith always strong.

Only in New Orleans can things end on a happy note:

This family used the same boards to protect their front door every hurricane

FEMA

Decimated

This house collapsed in front of me

I can still smell this in my nose, taste it in the back of my throat. Black mold kills

mmm beignets

Gorgeous summer storm clouds

Spanish Moss

Skyline

*504 is the area code in New Orleans

So I really am delighted to have sparked so much curiosity in Lebanese Tea drinkers around the world who have found their way to my little ‘ol blog. This is not a “yay, now you can hear me wax poetic on the interweb” kinda moment. I truly am genuinely happy to be providing a good recipe to searchers out there. (Not to mention, someone IN LEBANON googled “Lebanese boobs” and found their way here. I find this hilarious because although I discuss the Lebanese (in their relation to tea) and I discuss boobs (in relation to my own awesome rack), I have never discussed the two together. So Mr./Mrs. Lebanese boob searcher, I am sorry your search brought you here … and not to a sweet pic of hot Lebanese boobs.
Where was I? Oh right … the tea …. the damn tea!! Ok, my original post with the recipe can be found here. But an anonymous visitor posted a comment on that post with another helpful recipe for iced tea and I thought I’d post it here. Don’t forget my people, the delicious secret to Lebanese Tea is the rose water. Don’t forget THE ROSE WATER !!!!
And remember, Mona’s Cafe on Frenchman St. in New Orleans deserves all the credit in the world for introducing me to this lovely beverage. I, my friends, did NOT invent Lebanese Tea. Nor Lebanese boobs, sadly.

From reader BBSTAK:
Iced Tea Recipe - I too found your site by Googleing (New word meaning to search) Lebanese Tea. Here is a great iced tea recipe - Take 1 gallon jug of water. Pour some, like a quart or so, into a sauce pan. Add 1 cup sugar or splenda and bring to a boil. Add 4 (or 5) Family style tea bags, caf or de, I use Luzianne. Cover, remove from heat, let steep and cool, like over night. When cool remove tea bags and squash out tea into pot. Add tea to the water in the 1 gallon jug, refrigerate and presto 1 gallon of great iced tea.

Thanks BBSTAK!!

I’m up late and caught Oprah’s show on health care in America. I’m too tired to get into it but it was really, really good! I am so fired up that I’m writing to her right now. This is what I blabbed:

Although I am blessed with amazing comprehensive HMO care, I still see the issue of health care access in America from a different set of “glasses”. I am fortunate enough to receive important screening MRIs and sonograms due to my family history of breast and ovarian cancer. Never once have I had to pay more than a $20 co-pay for my procedures. However, I work in a public clinic, in the Nation’s Capital and am astonished everyday by the disparities I see, in the coverage offered in America. I have fabulous medical care because my breast cancer genetic mutation is terrifying enough for my middle-class parents to pay for. I work for a clinic who serves the poor and if I HAD to pay for my own coverage, I would be in line next to the patients I serve, as a member of the working poor. I simply cannot afford my own insurance.
One important thing that needs to be highlighted is that although experts on the show claimed we are increasing life expectancies and decreasing chronic disease rates, this actually only speaks for white America. As the white population in this country lives longer, their fellow Americans of color are dying at staggering rates. Whether insured or not, health care CONTINUES to be an issue of race and class, due solely to access to simple care. Providing preventive care – like mammograms, cholesterol screening and prostate exams - would save this country billions of dollars everyday. It is cheaper to keep us healthy, then pay for the dying. Why does no one see this?
And lastly, one of most terrifying pieces of this entire debate that no one has addressed is the mere health WORKER shortage in this country. Because of medical school entrance standards (which includes all health professional schools), the cost of attendance, the shortage of professors and the despicable interest rates on student loans, those who dream of serving our fellow man, face insurmountable hurdles. Should we start providing care to the 50 million without it, we simply don’t have the infrastructure to do so.
In the field of public health we spend an immense amount of time studying health worker issues and although I love public health, I also want to become a nurse. You could not imagine how difficult it is to want to serve those without, and not be able to. Nursing school is expensive and very difficult to get into.

Sadly, this is a multi-faceted issue that is going to necessitate a paradigm shift on many levels. If it were up to me, I’d pass out medical care on the streets (in fact, I did in New Orleans for 2 months) but I am concerned about the “logistics” of such a proposition. As baby boomers grow older, this nation is victim to abstinence-only education which increases STD-related cancer and HIV deaths, an administration who funds research based on “faith” and not science and we continue to eat our way to the coffin, we are doomed. Although I am thrilled to see the issue of health care on the forefront of the presidential debates, not one candidate has discussed the simple question of HOW? HOW are we going to serve all those in need?

A year and a half ago as I was wrapping up my last day in New Orleans exiting Audubon Park, my friends and we ran into a sweet, unassuming man standing on the corner, carrying a bottle of wine, waiting to hale a cab. This man, in a neighborhood with giant expansive houses with wrought iron balconies and sweeping circular staircases and hanging ferns, knew that we were out-of-towners. So he chatted with us and we told him about our work in the lower 9th. All the bicycling, the hundreds of respirators we passed out, the umpteen interviews, the stories and the dirrty hippie commune. This man, who truly proved to be an angel, told us of his escape from the storm.
As he began to speak, he insisted that the 6 of us squeeze into a cab with him downtown. We were looking for a good authentic New Orleans restaurant to spend our last meal in this fine city. We squeezed into the cab like a bunch of Indians on a rickshaw, me sitting between he and the driver.
He tells us about his helicopter rescue after his wife and dog fled to Mississippi. On his way out of town, his friend flew the copter into the lower 9th ward. There, the man saw someone hacking away at the roof shingles, from inside their attic. He saw a hand waving for rescue and he could do nothing. This man sat next to me and wept into his hands, clutching his chest as he recounted the horror and guilt he has lived with every single day since. The chopper couldn’t fit another passenger and even if it could, there was no safe place to land.
Here this man - old, white and wealthy had a flooded home and was born into the right neighborhood - sat there suffering a deep depression that could be cured. How do you erase the guilt of knowing that you had the resources to get out? The wherewithal to help others, without the real possibility of rescuing those hacking away their roof shingles to safety ….
In this 10 minute cab ride, the man told of us of his pro-bono legal work with displaced resident, saying it’s the only thing that gets him out of bed in the morning.

He hugs me on the way out of the cab and sends us to Coop’s in the French Quarter for the best fried chicken of our lives. He tells us to rush out and buy, 1 Dead in Attic, a book written by Times-Picayune columnist Chris Rose, describing his experiences after the storm.
His words instantly rest with all of us and we stand in silence, across from Jackson Square. The Quarter is bustling with cars and life and is a stark difference between this tourist trap and the scene in the 9th Ward. We go eat and we sit in silence, staring at our food. I order a cocktail cause really that’s the only thing I am interested in.

My words will never be able to accurately describe this man’s sorrow. He sobbed into my shoulder, 10 minutes after meeting us and continued to be plagued by the visions he saw on the roofs that day. He will forever be in my heart - that sad, kind man. Because of him, I read Chris Rose regularly and I suggest you do the same.

Thanks to my life partner Meg, this article came across my desk earlier today. This is by far the funniest shit I have seen/read IN MONTHS!!! Firstly, it looks like her face has been mangled by two presa cenarios (that was in poor taste, sorry) but seriously, SHE.IS.NASTY!! Secondly, her business idea is actually kinda cute. However, it is against my moral core to have someone else wash and fold my laundry so I wouldn’t go there but I like where she’s going with this.
(Sidebar: when I was in New Orleans with B last summer, he did our laundry during the day when I was busy saving lives (I know, so cute right!!…*sigh* he was so sweet…) and I was weirded out b/c “my boys and his boys were mixing together” like in Seinfeld. I mean, I realize how silly that is considering they’re GETTING CLEAN but it creeped me out.)
And lastly, this is the most amazing thing I’ve read in ages:
“Fleiss threw herself into the laundry business to help distract herself from the loss of her beloved pet macaw, named Dalton, who died recently.” WHAT.THE.FUCK???? HAHAHAHAHA!!!!

Fleiss opens “Dirty Laundry” in Nevada

As I walked home from the grocery today, I saw the dark clouds overhead and felt both excitement and fear. I knew what those clouds meant and only a moment later did they open up and dump gallons on water all over me. Thankfully my umbrella was easily accessible and with my pants already rolled up, I tried to protect my goods from the downpour. When it rains like this, the humidity seems to appear out of nowhere. Sure, it’s been sticky but the moment it starts to rain, the air feels different … both familiar and comforting. Before you know it, the fireflies are buzzing around, lighting my way.
I remember riding my bike in New Orleans through these kinds of storms for what seemed like days on end. At times I couldn’t see the end of my nose, let alone the potholes I was trying to avoid. Though ever since my time in “The Big Easy” (funny, ain’t nothin’ easy ’bout that city), I now tend to relish in summer storms and look forward to the tacky feeling on my skin. I never thought I would get used to it. In fact, almost a year later I thought it was a passing thing. Like even if you experience it once, months later, in a different atmosphere, it would be completely unbearable. Not so for me. … Maybe I’m just sentimental. Maybe that city means more to me, those experiences longer lasting than I ever anticipated.
Sitting now on my porch, listening to the downpour and watching the flashing sky, I couldn’t enjoy this moment more. In fact, what makes it all that much more beautiful is my ability to enjoy the south and it’s quirky nuances … I mean, why live in this place and bitch every moment, right?

For a year now I have been searching high and low for lebanese tea recipes - from people I know, to local markets, to the internet. I recently found some rose water in a very random, very obscure local market. I decided to give it a try and see how it came out. First, I needed to consult my very southern friend Trey about how to “properly” make sweet tea ….
Fill up your coffee pot with say, 10 cups of water and pour it into the section that feeds the pot.
Place lipton tea bags directly into the filter/basket portion of the maker but don’t use a filter, just add the teabags by themselves.
Per Trey’s instructions, I use one bag for every cup of water.
Turn the coffee pot on, let it brew, turn the maker off and remove the carafe from the burner.
Let the tea cool for a good 30 minutes or so and add sugar (preferably Splenda) …. as much as your little heart desires.
Pour the tea into a pitcher of sorts and add rose water. Now … this part is not a “science” … a little bit of rose water goes a very long way. I add just a touch, like maybe a couple tablespoons to a whole pitcher of tea. So as to prevent your tea from tasting like soap, add a little at first and taste along the way!
Set the pitcher in the fridge to cool.
When all is nice and chilly, pour over ice, add a couple pine nuts and you’re ready to go.

Mona’s Cafe on Frenchman St. had better look out … I’ve found the secret recipe!! I am absolutely addicted and although I wish I were back in New Orleans, this is the best substitute around.