WWII Museum

In the middle of all this southern/ Louisiana history is located the "National World War 2 Museum".  It was so interesting and informative.  When you enter you are given the identity, including dog tags, of someone from the United States who fought in the war.  Then you "get on a train and wave goodbye to your loved ones as you head off to basic training."  Once you get off the train you are free to roam the museum - one floor being all about the war in Europe and another floor being all about the war in the Pacific, etc.  You can use your dog tags at the computers to hear stories about your specific soldier's experiences.

The following pictures and quote gave me chills.

sweet smells, beauty and atrocities

Next on our sight-seeing extravaganza was touring the Oak Alley Plantation.  This meant a mini road trip away from the city, which was nice and peaceful.  As we were driving Reggie said he thought he could smell sugar cane, which brought back memories of his childhood in Hawaii.  Sure enough we found out that Oak Alley, and all the plantations in the area were sugar cane growers.  When the harvesting is done the fields are burned; we saw a few fires in the distance on the way back.

Oak Alley Plantation is absolutely beautiful.  Not only are there huge oak trees all over the property, but there are 2 long rows lining an impressive pathway up to the big house.

 We toured the house and found it very interesting and impressive.

Our favorite part of the house was the "courting candle" pictured below.  When a young suitor came to visit their daughter the father would let the girl know if he approved or not by the candle.  The boy could stay as long as the candle burned to the top of the holder.  If the dad liked the boy he would twist it all the way up and the boy had a longer amount of time to stay, and he would be invited back. If the dad did not like the boy he twisted the candle all the way down, meaning he only had a few minutes till the candle burned to the top of the holder, and the girl knew the boy would never be allowed in the house again.  We wished we had had one of these when our 3 oldest girls were "courting".  I'm happy to say that Lester, Andrew and Ross would have been granted a long candle to burn.

After seeing the splendor of The Big House we went out to the slave quarters.  All of a sudden it hit us and things were put into perspective.  Just a few of the horrific details:  it is a rarity, but records had been preserved of the names of each slave on Oak Alley plantation and how much they were worth/how much the master had paid for them.  Each "house" was divided in half, by a wall, and about 5 or 6 people lived in each half.  They worked at least 12 hours a day for the master, and then had to make their own meals, clothes, etc. after that.  The field hands work was physically the hardest, but the house slaves had the burden of having to "look good" as they were a reflection on the family's status when people came to visit.  There was one cabin reserved for sickness, meaning germs were easily passed to all who were in there.  The stories go on and on and on.  Oak Alley pays tribute to these people by being as truthful as possible about the plantation, and honors them by listing their names on the inside wall of one of the cabins.

November walking in New Orleans by tour

A great way to see New Orleans and hear of it's history is to take a walking tour.  The city provides these and employs the guides to ensure that the information is accurate.  Each tour has you walking about a mile and lasts about 2 hours.  We did the "Music of New Orleans" tour and loved it!  Our guide was great.  The beginning point/place to meet up was a VooDoo lounge.  (They have several of these throughout the city).

Our guide had a device on him that would play snipets of the music he was talking about.  We would walk a ways, then he would stop and give us a lot of information, then we would move on to the next spot.  The first stop was "Congo Square" in the Louis Armstrong park.

 He told about how the slaves were allowed to congregate here on Sundays and play their music and sell food they had grown in their own little gardens.  One thing I found very interesting is that Louisiana had different laws regarding slaves.  He said that for the other states, slaves were first taken to Haiti for up to 2 years to "break them" of their heritage and identities.  But for Louisiana the slaves came straight from Africa and so were able to hold onto their memories better and were allowed to express them.

And of course we learned a lot about Louis Armstrong and his predecessors in Jazz music.  Even though Louisiana pays tribute to him now, we were told that during his life time, even after he had achieved so much fame in music, movies, etc., when he came home things were still segregated and life was very frustrating.  So eventually he decided to make Chicago his home. 

Our tour then took us through the Treme', which is the oldest African-American neighborhood in the United States.  There was a lot more to learn about the evolution of Jazz music, along with information about the history of this neighborhood through the days of slavery, the civil rights music, Hurricane Katrina, and plans for the neighborhood today.

This building which is still standing, but not open, is an original slave trading/auction block.

This beautiful old building in the neighborhood is the future
home of the "NOAAM" which stands for the New Orleans
African American Museum

A beautiful church in the neighborhood.  They still hold services, have
concerts, etc.  In front of the church is a big iron cross with original
chains and shackles hanging from it that were used on slaves.
There is so much in New Orleans that is emotionally hard to see
regarding our country's history of slavery, but I think it is important to
face it as a way of paying tribute to the people that endured it.

lodgings

The "piece de resistance" (I thought some french words were appropriate here!) was our hotel that we got to go back to each night.  Through some kind of sheer magic Reggie was able to arrange a once-in-a-lifetime stay at "The Roosevelt".  Our room was so big that for the smallest moment we were tempted to call all the kids and say "hurry down here - we've got room for everybody!"  Instead we teased them with a face-time tour, and showed them what they have to look forward to if they stay married for 30 years!  Our room actually had what I have always said is the key to a happy marriage - two televisions - ha!ha!  After time to spread out, him watching sports and me watching sappy Christmas shows, we cuddled together in our matching hotel bathrobes in front of a movie that we could both agree on.

We were there just in time for the holiday decorations.

 

Saturday night in the French Quarter

To finish off our Saturday we went to The French Quarter.  It was crowded, and crazy! - a bit overwhelming for me.  But it was fun walking through the narrow streets together, taking pictures of the beautiful architecture and noticing how every street name was french.  Definitely a unique place.

The main/biggest/widest street - CANAL STREET