The New Orleans I Remember
Six months before I started this blog I met a friend in New Orleans, in April 2004. More than a year prior to Katrina, you could see poverty and associated issues but the city was beautiful.
I haven’t been back since April 2004, I hope to do so in 2011 or 2012.
– Steve Patterson
Steve, I happy to tell you that the Faubourg Marigny is still there and wonderful. My husband is a NOLA native and we've been back several times since Katrina. There is change in the city, but change was a constant of the city even before the storm. The quarter is still beautiful (though I don't recall that Walgreen's, but i could have just missed it). Work still remains to be done but the city's re-birth cannot be undersold.
Everyone that has ever been to and loved New Orleans should go back, if not for the city herself, than to remind themselves of what they loved.
I, too, have not been back since before Hurricane Katrina. I watched CNN for three days straight August 29-31, 2005. I couldn't tear myself away from the tv. I went to bed with the sickest feeling in my stomach knowing that when I woke up the city would be gone, and so would twenty-five years of memories of going to NOLA.