Locals take pride in deflowering New Orleans Newcomers.
Deflowering New Orleans Newcomers
New Orleans locals (I hesitate to say “natives,” so let’s just go with locals) wear their pride for the city up front. We put everything about New Orleans up on the front porch. Like the meme, we take our crazy out front and give it a cocktail. While locals may disagree, this feeling, this sense of pride, isn’t unique. Our perverse ways of showing it aren’t unique.
There’s one thing particularly unique about New Orleanians though. When it comes to our friends experiencing the city, we like to watch. Yes, we’re voyeurs. We take folks out into the wilds of the city and watch as waves of sensations crash over them.
Not just carnival
The most common experience we like to watch is when we take friends to Carnival. That’s only two, maybe three weeks, though. There are so many other opportunities to watch this phonomenon.
That first time walking down Bourbon Street. The whir of a passing streetcar. That roast beef po-boy. Half a muff at Napoleon House. Walking into Snake and Jake’s. Stepping into St. Mary’s Assumption. Walking around the Garden District. Sitting along the river, at The Fly, at The Moonwalk, down in the Bywater.
What all these have in common is the desire of a local to watch. We’ve seen these things. The thrill may not be gone, but there’s a greater thrill in the first-time reaction.
Carnival
A first-timer’s Mardi Gras ranks high on the list of local voyeurism. We love to see the reactions. That fiber-optic Muses shoe passes by.Indians who Won’t Bow Down come down the street. Elaborate costumes in the French Quarter. Sensory overload! We want to see their face. It’s like watching a lover as pleasure hits them. What’s causing the pleasure becomes less important than seeing, hearing, feeling their reaction.
Nothing is perfect
Whether it’s sex or gumbo, nothing is perfect. We come in with the notion that our newcomer friends will see and feel what we do. It’s not always the case. The perceptive New Orleanian knows this. They move on, from the current sensory experience. We plan the next potential smile. And we always watch.
