Falling for The Big Easy, Part 2 - New Orleans/Suwanee/Winston Salem/Newark

On Saturday I was introduced to my first ever Po Boy sandwich. It was so called because it was fed to striking streetcar drivers who couldn't afford a square meal. They would come to a diner and the waitress would shout to the kitchen "Here comes another one of them poor boys." If the Kitchen staff were in a generous mood then they would cobble together stale bread and any fried leftovers and they could forage from the floor.

The name was, predictably, abbreviated to Po Boy and is New Orleans' signature Sarnie. I loved it and it echoed many of the city's most salient qualities. Namely it was cheap, unpretentious and unhealthy.

For the the evening, Tommy had been lucky enough to secure us the VIP box at the Tulane College football game. It's safe to say that I know more about brain surgery than I do about American football so I asked him to explain a few of the rules at lunch. With the aid of detailed napkin diagrams, plasticine models, videos, and much patient explanation, he set about his task. But by the end of lunch, I still knew more about brain surgery.

In the afternoon we visited a real life bayou outside of the city. Tommy had been here many times before and had promised a veritable treasure trove of local wildlife. But it wasn't to be. We walked for almost an hour and saw nothing except rather bored looking banana spiders. Tommy was already beginning to apologise profusely for failing to deliver me me a single item of interest.

Nature had, in her fashion, decided to wait until the very end of the walk to deliver the goods. They came in the form of an 8 foot long alligator wearing a toothy grin that could only be described as deeply menacing. Although no part of him moved, occasionally the membrane on his eye would lazily peel across and you knew that he was just conserving the requisite energy to tear your arm clean off.

The other walkers on the path soon had their fill of gator photos and pissed off. As soon as we were alone Tommy turned to me, wide eyed and with a grin almost as broad as the gator's and said.
"Shall we fuck with him?"
Without a moment's hesitation we began throwing whatever organic detritus we could forage in the general direction of our new found friend. He didn't move a millimetre.

I'm quite certain that a whole chapter of the Darwin Awards has been dedicated to such nakedly idiotic behaviour as molesting alligators. I have to say that it's incredibly good fun and we were only throwing twigs and acorns so there was no danger of actually hurting the poor creature. During our exertions I concluded then that if I'm doing this now then I'd likely be doing this kind of dumb shit until the the day I die. Which won't be long if I keep trying to piss off grumpy alligators.

After some time we reached the conclusion that he didn't give two fucks about us and so we made our way back. En route we were greeted by an adolescent gator (who we also fucked with just a tiny bit). We then, unsurprisingly, proceeded to get chased and hissed at repeatedly while running in the manner of excitable schoolgirls.

Our final reptilian encounter was with a Coppermouth snake, one of the most venomous and aggressive in America. Even people in Alabama don't fuck with Coppermouths, they just shoot at them. We kept our distance as it locked its fearsome gaze on what I was quite certain was my groin.

The college football game in the evening was an extraordinary event (by my standards at least). Tulane stadium has a capacity of 10,000 and was completely full. This is considered microscopic in college stadium terms. Some are as large as 120,000 and are full to capacity every week end.

To put this in perspective, the biggest sporting event in the British university calendar is the varsity rugby match between Oxford and Cambridge. This draws in maybe 25,000 in at best. Far smaller than the average crowd at even the most minor college football game.

To add to the sense of spectacle, the opposing team had brought a 100 person strong band with them. It was an all black college form the south and I was reliability informed that it was one of the top bands in the country. Their performance did not fail to raise the hairs on my neck. It was all so wholesome and felt anchored in a glorious epoch when cars looked like spaceships and you could guiltlessly drink martinis at lunchtime.

By the end of the game I was still none the wiser on its seemingly endless parade of silly rules but I certainly had a few observations on the sport. In many ways, American football fans behave much more like English rugby fans as opposed to the lumpen savages that tend to support their namesake. At one football game in London I saw a 10 year old girl shout "YOU FUCKING CUNTS!" Repeatedly for 90 minutes, warmly encouraged by her doting father. That certainly wasn't the case for this sport, even down in the bleachers.

To me, at least, the sport seemed like more of a religious focal point for people to meet, eat and get a bit pissed. Hooliganism just isn't a thing here.

The next day I went to an NFL game between the Oakland Raiders and the New Orleans Saints. I had been informed by Tommy that Raiders fans were a total bunch or rotters. However, closer inspection revealed them to be mere lambs in comparison to the kind of bottom feeding pond scum that 'soccer' has produced. They don't even separate the fans here and you can drink in stadiums. Enough said really.

The Saints game was played in a packed 80,000 seat stadium, bang in the centre of the city. As you would expect, this being America, the food and beverage offering was outstanding. They even had a dedicated Bloody Mary stand, should that take your fancy. Even though I mostly had no idea what was going on, it was an incredible spectacle. Replete with the usual accoutrements of fireworks, cheerleaders, giant flags, cheesy entrance videos and all kinds of 'punch you in the jugular' manufactured drama.

When it came time to leave New Orleans I did so with a very heavy heart. I had somewhat fallen for the place in a way that I hadn't expected from my unrelentingly icy nature. It had everything I wanted from a city, including that X factor that is so lacking in other American cities. I hoped that one day I could spend a little more time here and really get to know the place.

It was time to make my way back 1500 miles north to Newark, with only three days to achieve this feat in the Ford death wagon.

The first leg ended with a lightning quick pit stop at he Ulmans in Suwanee. Despite a very late arrival, Sunny and I still made the time for a gentle moonlit stroll around Edinburgh. I would miss him dearly, and everyone else I was leaving behind for that matter.

My final stop was in the city of Winston Salem, North Carolina. Through connections that I had never fully understood, I have a fairly large extended family based in North Carolina. The way I understand it, they are the descendants of my American grandfather's cousin, Douglas who had sadly passed away recently at the age of 94.

Either way, they were a delightful bunch and it had been 15 years since I last saw them so we had some catching up to do. I was greeted by great aunt Rosina. To say that Rosina was a force of nature would be a grave insult to nature. She was 93 but had the mental acuity better than most 30 year olds.

She was flanked by Jackie, one of her three black carers. Rosina was one of the most loving and kind people I had ever met but was also capable of treating her staff in a manner that was positively medieval.

Her butler Chuck was the very definition of long suffering. Apparently he'd been fired more times than he'd had hot dinners (which probably wast that difficult). I'd heard that she had become a little ornery after her husband of 50 years had passed away suddenly. Apparently before his passing she was known to mutter the occasional 'thank you'.

Yet to me and many others I'm sure, she was a paragon of loving virtue and kindness. My car could barely fit the food she gifted me for my drive to Newark. Although she still had her moments. At dinner I we were talking and it was very apparent that she was from another era.

"Alexayner." (She had a southern accent thick as molasses)
"I've been reyadin in the gossip magazines that coloured and non-coloured people are getting married and breedin' nowadays."
At this myself and her lovely daughter Angela choked on our cornbread and gently reminded her that it wasn't 1850 anymore.
 

At dinner chuck dressed in an oversized white jacket and bow tie and rather nervously served us ribs and salmon. Once I'd gotten over the slightly anachronistic nature of it all I started to mull over the last two and a half weeks.

I suppose my only disappointment with the trip was just how smoothly everything had gone. When I realised just how perilous my mode of transport was I had expected almost certain death. The fact that I was cruising towards Newark up the sumptuous interstate 81 was something of a miracle. That and that fact that America has finally given me a half decent motorway to drive on.

Interstate 81 blazed a glorious trail through the blue mountains and was delightfully traffic free. It was even host to the Gaffney Peachoid of House of Cards fame.

In New Jersey I was more than happy to part with the old girl and return her to her former master. I was sad to say goodbye to America and her many Alabama shaped imperfections. It's no surprise that people love it here. But that could always change. I just hope that it doesn't totally fuck itself come November.