A thought for you singer types out there: What would you do if you ever lost your voice...terminally?
Over the course of two days my friend Sarah gave me a taste of New Orleans, and I mean this quite literally (I may have gained five pounds from this trip alone, but boy this food is worth it). On day one- boudin, alligator crawfish Étouffée, fried crawfish...the works. Day two- pounds of boiled crawfish, fried pickles, fried twinkies and an evening on Bourbon Street drinking world-famous, or infamous, rum-punch Hurricanes and sweet-tea vodka drinks called Fireflies. I, like many Louisiana-natives and typical Americans- had my cake and ate it too. I do not recall the last time I experienced such a plethora of foods. New Orleans certainly is a culinary hotspot, and I was sure to have my share, because, when the Hell am I ever going to be back in New Orleans?
And Bourbon Street is everything you would expect from the "Girls Gone Wild" commercials...and no, I have never purchased any of the videos, but late-night television gives me the knowledge of such imagery...ahem. Beads, booze and breasts littered the area. There was an overall essence of carelessness what was seemingly more intoxicating than the sugary alcoholic beverages I was consuming. Though little of the traditional imagery of New Orleans exists on Bourbon Street to my observation- the brass bands, the marching, the Cajun food...all of that can be found elsewhere, I suppose...think "Times Square" with a little more hands-on fun and culture.
Overall- a worthwhile experience.
I awoke this morning feeling restless...and bloated. I left the town early to get back on the road and to find a new adventure. Trying not to wake Sarah, I snuck out the room as quitely as possible and headed to the car. The clouds over Baton Rouge darkened and I knew it was time to depart. Within striking distance of the Big Easy on I-10 the storm brewed heavily and rain dumped across the highway. Lighting bounced around the sky like Jamiroquai and my visibility vanished while large trucks with drivers of larger personalities covered my windshield...nearly causing a pretty messy accident. Luckily, the storm passed and I passed through the city.
...a little shaken.
I pulled off to a little town called Westwego to settle my thoughts, and what I beheld three miles off of the highway gave me new perspective on the "real" Louisiana. I pulled into a dusty parking lot of what appeared to be a strip mall of independently operated seafood kiosks. There must have been thirteen of these little shops- linked one by one on both sides of the parking lot. In large metal bucks were piles upon piles of crawfish and a variety of different crab- fat crab, king crab, and blue clawed crab being most prominent.
I was drawn to one little shop in particular, appropriately called "The Crab Shack." A tall blonde by the name of Michelle is the proprietor, or the Queen Crab, so to speak. Her lips wore a friendly grin though her cheeks displayed an expected enervation; the news from the Gulf of Mexico has not been exactly invigorating for those in the seafood business for the last month or so. "You like the crabs, baby?" she asked of me, hoping for a sale. I explained to her that I was a classical musician on a short vacation and driving across the country to experience the real America...and real American issues. "Well, talk about real American issues, do you have a camera?" I nodded. Next, she gave me a disheartening instruction. She waved her finger in a couple of circles around the crab-strip and said; "Take a picture of this. All of this. In a couple of months, you can thank BP and the American government for this not being here anymore."
This prophecy led me to ask her how dire the situation is- not from the perception of Fox News or the White House, but from those in the actual business of seafood in the Gulf. Michelle listed some estimated statistics. "People do not understand that the Gulf of Mexico is responsible for nearly seventy percent of all nationally-caught seafood distribution in this state, and that does not even take into account how much crab we export to other states that market our seafood as their own, like Chesapeake Bay. So much of our crab cannot be sold because of the pollution and many of my friends in the business have had to make drastic cuts and price hikes in the last two weeks alone. It's scary- and no one realizes it."
She went on, and put the government and national media on the block. "When President Obama was here he had an entire entourage of media and BP sent in four hundred men to publicly work on correcting the spill. They were on hand- displayed and visible to the public eye. When Obama left, so did the media, and the BP representatives working on the crisis dropped to fifty. It is shameful."
Michelle did not stop there- insisting that BP was also capable of nipping the spill in the bud right from the beginning, but because they would have lost so much capital, and spent so much money on alternative methods of capping and pumping that it was for financial reasons that BP was not as proactive as they could have been. She insisted, "it was for money reasons - and now we're all having to pay."
Yet, Michelle seemed hopeful. "According to the news there may be a solution but it is not likely. My fishers and I are going to continue to sell the best product we can, though our numbers are low and our prices have to go up. I live five miles from the Gulf and visibly see the oil coming up on shore. I am scared for our industry but I am also afraid for my house and my health. I won't be able to afford to live - this is not just a job, it's our livelihood. Seafood is not just a part of us, it's what we are."
In my observation, she is not exaggerating. The parking lot of the seafood square was bustling with people. Whereas the South has their BBQ, the Southwest has their Tex-Mex and us Northerners fight to the death over pizza and baseball- this population is crazy about crawfish and crabmeat. The parking lot was consistently full of Louisiana natives asking about how much a pound, and what the best boil recipes were. Despite all the bad reports, was Michelle being a bit pessimistic?
In fact, citizens and small business owners in Southern Lousiana are concerned that their culinary traditions will come to a screeching hault. Take Kevin, for instance. Kevin is the owner and head chef at "Westwego Seafood found on Westbank Expressway. According to his business card, his independently-owned restaurant is popular for its "seafood plates, hot suasage, hamburger, gumbo, po-boys and seafood; fresh and boiled." I was hungry and was not ready or willing to part with Cajun cooking. I ordered a Catfish Po-Boy (an ex-girlfriend from the Mid-West made one for me once and I was curious how it compared in authenticity) and a bowl of seafood gumbo. It was delicious...the catfish seasoned just so, and the gumbo full of flavour- crab, andouille, chicken, rice and all the spice to make it just right to this New Yorker's palate. I, documenting all of my culinary exploits, had to take a picture. Kevin noticed and became excited that his food was being captured for posterity. "Pictures of the food eh?" This led to a conversation that blew my mind about how fast a market can turn on itself without any control.
"Look at the menu. Half of the stuff on the menu I cannot even get from any distributors anymore because the spill shut down most of my supply," he admitted. This obviously affects the price of the seafood that is available to eat. For this owner, a pound of small shrimp costs him $5.19 a pound, up from $3.75 a mere three weeks ago. A gallon of fresh oysters are now $47.00, up from $30.00 just three weeks ago. This in turn raises the prices of his menus items - most of which are not for sale anymore due to suppliers being out of stock.
Also according to Kevin, not only is supply extremely low, but demand is also low because of a growing concern of seafood contamination. "Everyone comes in and asks me if the seafood is okay. Some people walk in, get scared, and walk out. I do not know what to do."
What seems to be surviving in this area is crawfish. Because of their locally protected habitats (lakes, not the Gulf), 'no crawfish were harmed during the production of his catastrophe.' But the season ends in late-June, and Kevin does not know where to turn next. Though he received a degree in computer science in March of 2001, he recently opened his business and will see it through the tough times.
"It will be interesting to see how Lousiana ends up in five years time because of the spill. I am behind on my student loans and will have a harder time paying them off because my business is hurting badly. I had to lay off four employees and am now running shop mostly on my own. I hope the government takes part in the responsibility. I wonder what BP will do with their billions of dollars to help out the local economy that they are destroying."
Kevin excused himself from the conversation and gifted me a tray of crawfish boil in thanks for the conversation and this article. He proceeded to talk to me about what makes crawfish so fun to eat- and an individual lesson on how to correctly eat them, including, pardon the expression, "sucking of the head" to release all the crustacean's unique piquancy. As I was eating a large family came in and ordered a large array of Kevin's available items- Po Boys and crawfish boils. After they left I asked him if that was inspiring to him; people excited to eat his food in large amounts. "I don't know Eric. On a given Sunday I could make $800 easily before the spill. I just barely sum at $200 today."
After all of this, and yet another day's worth of food-baby syndrome, well worth it I might add, I had to stop and cogitate about how similar the music industry is to struggling seafood sellers here in Louisiana. What we do is strictly a commodity to most consumers, but to those in the business it is a lifestyle. What is someone drove a fist to my larynx for some unforeseen reason and I was faced with a threatening predicament that would peril my own livelihood...my sole purpose on Earth? What would I do? What would I do?
To a common citizen like I, who was no knowledge about the oil industry's science or capitalistic intentions, I cannot give any suggestions to solve the oil spill and to save suffocating shrimp in the Gulf. How could I when the top scientists cannot even execute an effective plan of attack? However it is important for us as United States citizens to continue to support our Creole friends down here in southern Louisiana. Particularly those of us Northerners who are seemingly comfortable with our meat and potatoes...remember the mad cow disease scare a few years back? This is just as much of a crisis, if not exponentially worse. Continue to read and keep your eyes open- this is, in fact, a national disaster, and though you may not feel its wrath now, as Louisana's economy sinks deeper the shockwaves will be felt all over. It is sad - but we can pray for a speedy recovery.
I also pray that BP and our national government is acting accordingly and efficiently. Honestly. Not out of hidden agendas with financial incentive. America spends so much money in the fight against international terrorism. Any selfish, malicious ignorance that causes problems like this, the mine accidents, the housing market crash...Fannie/Freddie...etc...etc...is that not terrorism against our own people?
Garrison Keillor's monologue continues to play in my mind during this trip and over the course of the last week or so. I suppose it is good to plan for the plan, but better to plan for the unplanned. And to be quite honest, boiled crawfish is pretty damned tasty. I do not expect to be eating too many fried twinkies after I leave, though.
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