The NOLA Space-Time Continuum

     The fantastic thing about being in New Orleans, which visitors can feel when they're here and locals recognize the abscence of when they travel, is that something about the normal laws of time, direction, and nature seem absolutely not to apply here. It may frustrate tourists that things that are allegedly to happen at a certain time never seem to do so. New Orleanians are used to this phenomenon and usually factor in time for anyone or anything to be "fashionably late". New Orleanians quickly become befuddled and flustered when confronted with trivial things like deadlines and schedules, and if New Orleanians recount any sort of negative experience, chances are one of the complaints will be "I felt so RUSHED!"
     New Orleans parades are legendary and held in wide acclaim, and few would argue that nobody knows how to do parades like New Orleanians. You would think that having this much experience would mean that New Orleans parades run smoother and more professionally than any other in the whole nation! ...and yet, this is remarkably NOT the case! Even the largest and grandest parades that roll are consistently plagued with float breakdowns and lengthy periods of non-movement. Yet, no one gets frantic. It's usually not until the parade is stopped for at least ten minutes that people even start wondering what's going on. Typically (and this displays so greatly the resiliance of the people of New Orleans) these incidents are seen not as drawbacks, but opportunities. If a float stops in front of you, you get a few extra minutes to hound the riders for more beads or cups. If they stop longer, you might even get the chance to coerce them into giving you a stuffed animal... which you have an even better chance of if you have time to go back to your ice chest and trade them a beer for something REALLY good! If a band stops in front of you, chances are their dance team will give you a show before putting down their instruments and watching the crowd... which is another fantastic thing about New Orleans parades... There's really no true distinction between performer and audience.
     In other places, there's such a strict line between those watching and those riding in a parade. The parade-goers clap calmly as floats roll monotonously by with riders who plastically wave and pretend to smile. At a New Orleans parade, the crowd hollers and cheers in turns... a rider can taunt the crowd with a prized throw and listens to the yells rise and fall in waves. In areas that don't get barricaded, people are crossing back and forth between floats and bands, running to whatever obscure restroom happens to be available. The riders, in turn, are watching the crowd, cheering along, making eye contact with a single on-looker--who might just be ages away from the float--and using all their might to get that one person a pair a beads when scores of people are literally pressed up against the float in front of them. You look at the bands that pass by and realize that most of the members are wearing beads, which were probably given to them by parade-goers, rewarding them for their entertainment.
     I can remember a specific occassion, standing on St. Charles Ave. by Superior Grill, a fantastic Mexican restaurant in Uptown New Orleans that always gathers a crowd during parades. They build a huge scaffold for parade season and set up a sound system and a margarita bar, and the parade-goers flock around it likes moths to a flame. It was Mardi Gras Day, and we were those aforementioned margarita moths, when one of those parade-pauses occurred. The band and dance team of McDounaugh 35, a New Orleans public high school stopped right in front of us. After doing a couple of numbers, they put down their instruments and Superior Grill cranked up the dance music. Before long, the band members and the people on the street had started dancing together, and my sister was out in the middle of the street being cheered on by the McDounaugh 35 drumline with "Go Whitey! Go Whitey! Go Whitey!" The rest of us had to stop dancing because we were too busy crying with laughter! It was awesome!
     I'm sure if all these parade halts and rowdy crowds were anywhere else in the country, you'd see newslines like "A calm celebration erupts into anarachy! Chaos at what should have been a happy event!" But things like this are accepted, shrugged off, and prized in the place aptly called "The City That Care Forgot". In any other town, doing things like abandoning time-guzzling methods of public transportation would be touted as "progress", but several decades ago, when the New Orleans city government decided to start using more buses and ripping up streetcar tracks, people were appalled. Who cares if buses are more modern, go faster, and can handle more routes? So what if streetcars inch along and take ages to stop? I mean, what are we in a rush for anyway? Our current mayor recently made an announcement that New Orleans was moving forward and making progress by announcing a new project... several old streetcar lines were being put back! Locals are ecstatic about this. What makes me smile even more over this news is how happy we all are about this new progress...that is actually... moving backwards.
     It's easy for non-locals (or "out-of-towners" as they're often referred to... which could refer to anyone from places from Bombay to Baton Rouge... what's the difference if they're not from New Orleans, right?) to get befuddled as to which direction you're actually moving in while in New Orleans, because typical directions don't work here. Nobody from New Orleans uses terms like North, South, East, or West. Ask a New Orleanian directions and you'll hear things like "you go down Canal Street towards the River"... or "towards the lake", "heading Uptown", "like you're going Downtown". It's the Mississippi River that washes away all use of a compass here. The River makes a massive bend on which the French Quarter, which is the original city grid out of which all other neighborhoods grew, sits. That gives the "Crescent City" it's title, because it's poised on the crescent of the River.    
     Across the River is an area comprised of several towns that locals know as "the Westbank" or "the Wank" for short... yet, while the Westbank is actually on the West side of Mississippi River, you have to drive East to get to it. The curve of the River creates this paradox and another very interesting one. Looking at a map of New Orleans, you'll notice that Downtown New Orleans (an area comprised of the French Quarter, Central Business District, and Warehouse District) is actually located NORTH of the area known as Uptown New Orleans. So why is down up and up down? Once again, because of the River. UPtown is UPriver of Downtown. The River bends northwards and then curves back down on its journey to the Gulf of Mexico, turning normal city-planning upside down.
     My advice to New Orleans travelers is this, don't fight it. Go with the flow. Asking the question, "...so is that north or south of here?" will have a local looking at you like you've just spoken some alien language. Just like going to a non-English speaking nation, we appreciate if you at least try to use our lingo. We love showing off our city so don't be afraid to ask a local directions... chances are you'll not only get instructions on how to get there but a list of ten other places you've gotta try. And maybe you'll get a little lost getting there, and maybe it'll take a bit longer to get there than you anticipated, but nine chances out of ten, you won't even care and you'll have caught an authentic glimpse into the lives of true New Orleanians. We just roll on.