The 1 Year Anniversary of Katrina's Landfall... how a city copes

I'm not there but I wish I was still sitting amongst the rubble and mould that still surrounds the City of New Orleans. My heart hurts for my friends who still live and work there and I feel useless in my office back in Melbourne. Our newspapers and TV media have no idea. As I flicked through the crap they report and reprint from the Washington Post. I've tried to pitch my stories but no one is interested in a first hand eye-witness account of carnage. I guess it's not so lighthearted as the reporters on Sunrise!

So here are some links to the city I just left and want to go back to...

The Times-Picayune http://www.nola.com has dedicated every day of news to information about the rebuilding of New Orleans, to serve the community who needs to know what is going on. There is such a mis-match and disconnect of information from City council, State government, Federal Government, NGOs and other organisations. Residents are confused about the new planning procedures that sees Rockefellar foundation chipping in to pay the bill to rebuild a city. An interesting plan, let's see what happens. I invite any comments about the planning process. My own thoughts are more negative. But then, even for me, an outsider, it's tough to find anything happy to write about.

It's true, it's still a flattened city, and across the skyline at night, my friend Ezra pointed out the neighbourhoods with restored electricity (the flickering sight of street lights) and those who remain in darkness. If that happened to you, how pissed would you be?

People ask about why it hasn't been rebuilt. Well, check out the previous posts... They spell the reality of the state of the United States. Something that could happen anywhere in the world as we turn to privatisation and removal of responsibility of government to serve the people. Instead, governments just want to fight wars. Thanks Howard... I know u do too... What happended the Australian higher education system, our primary and secondary schools? Why are some of the people I used to work with in meanial jobs still illiterate, even though they went through the Australian School system? yes, they are white australians... What happened to our Health system? Why is it so hard for me to see a doctor. I have a tooth ache now and no money to go fix it, and I have a tertiary education and a job.

So, when I think of New Orleans... I wonder, how many people are still left in the rubble. As I left the city 3 weeks ago, they were still pulling out dead bodies. How can that be? How can people be so forgotten by society? It's not just a travesty of the City of NOLa, but the world. We forgot a city that needed help. Just because... why? Because they are Americans? We need to stop the racism towards other countries. People say to me, as an Australian, how can you go to America, how can you empathise with people who went to war? Well, these people didn't go to war, their president did, their administration did... my question is... how can we generalise such complex issues into simple forms and blame these people who are suffering like the Tsunami survivors. The fishing communities in the Bayou's bear resemblence as indigenous indians, to the indigenous communities in the Andaman Islands. I still wonder, how the richest nation in the world can forget it's people. I hope we never do, but we are already beginning to... have a look around you.

People remain resilient. They are troopers. They have so many battle to fight in the South. The South has always been predominantly black, with a history of slavery and a culture that has not completely healed from this time. Like we can not say 'sorry' to the Indigenous peoples we committed genocide against in Australia, there is a need to reconcile with the past as well. Here lies an opportunity to rebuild and to fully understand a history that may hinder the 'build back better' dreams of disaster recovery planners. It gives me something to think about in the history of the country I grew up in, when I read about the history of slavery in Louisiana.

Peoople call it apathy - it's not apathy, I see people trying their hardest to rebuild whilst the system they are trying to work with, is working against them. Insurance - well, most were informed not to take out flood insurance as the flood walls and levees were supposed to protect them - to keep the rivers might away from the people. Well, I guess one can not harness nature. but we continue to do so.

There is no power, no water, nothing... in may of the neighbourhoods, still... Why? The conspiracy grows to become a reality. There are no public transport services because if you put services in, people might just return to these areas. If there was electricity and running water in St Bernard and the Lower 9th Ward, parts of New Orleans East, Gentilly, then perhaps, just maybe, people would return. If there were local businesses, trade services, equipment to gut and demolish, then rebuild a home, then, perhaps people would return home. But the truth in the matter is, it's not a conspiracy - the city does not want people to come back.

Has it affected the poorest of the poor? Yes and no. Yes, poor people - the economically poor, the educationally poor have been affected. But the spiritually rich have also been affected. There is 80% home ownership in the Lower 9th Ward. They own much more (financially) than I can ever imagine in my lifetime! So are they poor? What is poverty in New Orleans? There are wealthy people who have lost everything. Sure, they have savings and a means to rebuild, but many can not face returning - they are traumatised by the event that destroyed their lives, yanked them into a whirlwind of chaos and threw their children out of schools... not to return, because they see no future in a City with few services for them and their children. It's a falacy to say that it affected only the poor. IT AFFECTED EVERYONE FROM ALL WALKS OF LIFE - STATUS - RACE - CREED... The more it becomes a race and status issue, the more people will believe it is. Why not channel the energy into collaborations, partnerships, lobbying the government to do something about the plight of EVERYONE. Mobilise and move forth and conquer???

We are no longer fighters. We agitate and we talk and talk... but no one does anything. Pick up a hammer and start putting nails into walls and building a home, not a coffin. I want to go back to pick up a hammer and build stuff.

So what of this Casino to be placed in the Lower 9th Ward? Someone tell me about it please!!! I'm dying to find out.

The New York Times has a special: http://www.nytimes.com/pages/national/nationalspecial/index.html