Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, January 29, 1995 TAG: 9501310007
SECTION: TRAVEL PAGE: F-6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: ROBERT CROSS CHICAGO TRIBUNE
DATELINE: NEW ORLEANS LENGTH: Long
They all wore strings of cheap beads - dozens of strands in all colors of the polyurethane rainbow, piled so high that I could scarcely read the obscenities printed on their sweat shirts. The revelers swilled beer from plastic cups, yelled across the lobby, belched and sang rude songs.
Obviously, members of the Senior Class.
Even though I'm fond of New Orleans, which offers about as much urban exotica as you can get with a domestic air fare, the mass appeal of Mardi Gras had always puzzled me. So a friend and I decided to go down there last year and try to make some kind of sense out of it.
To do the thing correctly, you put on some kind of mask and hit the streets. Thus disguised, you can get away with behavior that would induce cops in other towns to Mace you into submission like a foaming cur.
Disguises work only during daylight hours, however. ``After 6, that's when the masks come off,'' one sheriff's deputy would inform me. ``You can be drunk on the street till then. After that, we pick you up.''
From our hotel window, we saw convoys of buses racing down Poydras Street, shepherded by blue-flashing motorcycle posses. We found out later that they were whisking ``krewes'' to their parade starting points.
As Mardi Gras freshmen, we couldn't delve into all the subtleties of the krewe culture, but, clearly, they enjoy considerable clout. We soon learned most krewes operate in near-total secrecy, so it took a couple of days just to discover why they misspell ``crew'' so abysmally.
In 1857, a group of upper-class transplants from Mobile, Ala., thought they could impose some decorum on the New Orleans Mardi Gras, which had degenerated into little more than a carnal riot over the previous two decades. Mobile had refined the pre-Lenten festivities long before New Orleans learned to carry on the old French tradition in any organized way. New Orleanians just took it as an opportunity to kick out the jambs before the somber reality of Ash Wednesday, the day after Mardi Gras, literally Fat Tuesday. (This year, Fat Tuesday falls on Feb. 28, with the parades beginning on Feb. 17.)
The gentlemen from Mobile formed a secret society called the Mystick Krewe of Comus, figuring some fanciful Olde English spelling would lend a touch of class to the general debauchery. The name Comus added a high-minded element, paying homage to Komos, the Greek god of revels and mirth.
Krewe of Comus staged a big parade that year, its Olympian theme carried out by rococo floats, masked marchers in gaudy costumes and toga-draped swells riding ornamented carriages. Comus also sponsored an elegant masked ball and elected a king and queen. Courtiers arrayed themselves around the grand ballroom in elaborate tableaux illustrating choice bits of Greek mythology.
That opened the floodgates for imitators and for the New Orleans Mardi Gras as we students know it today: Parades, floats, bands, costumes, parties, formal dances ... all arranged and financed by private societies. Laymen such as myself are expected to come and watch, spend lots of money and bray like idiots.
Krewes favor names like Hermes (messenger of the gods), Diana (Roman goddess of the moon), Endymion (fertility), Poseidon (sea), Bacchus (wine) and on into even more outrageous excesses of whimsy and self-importance.
The New Orleans Police Department has even formed the Krewe of Parking - a nod, I suppose, to the god of fire hydrants. Krewe of Parking doesn't parade, it tickets. And it erects barriers blocking almost any street a driver might care to take.
My roommate and I caught our first major parade Saturday evening, Feb. 12, because one of our instructors - a bellhop - advised, ``Don't miss Endymion. That's one of the biggest and best.''
As our main text, we frequently consulted Arthur Hardy's Mardi Gras Guide, a slick magazine that explains more than anyone but scholars would ever want to know about this annual carnival (``from the Latin carnivale, loosely translated as `farewell to flesh,''' Hardy instructs). The Mardi Gras Guide told us that Endymion started in 1967 as a neighborhood krewe in the Bayou St. John-Gentilly district and subsequently ballooned into a ``super club.''
Its 1,300 members now command prime time on the main city parade routes and ride on 27 ``super floats'' that carry them along Canal Street and the other main downtown venues on a twisting course leading to the Superdome. There they dismount and stage a dome-filling extravaganza featuring name acts from the lowbrow pantheon of show biz and enough food to sate all the alligators in Terrebone Parish.
But ordinary spectators, let alone raw neophytes, seldom make it to gatherings like that, either because (a) they aren't invited or (b) they're too shaken and exhausted from witnessing parades, which is a participant sport.
According to my tattered, beer-stained notes, the view really didn't matter. Endymion likes to dazzle the crowds with huge floats, so the parade loomed above us, colorful and cartoonish. The whole effect was like witnessing hours of 3-D graffiti splashed across 27 mobile garage doors.
We had caught glimpses of enough earlier parades to understand that most of them have interchangeable parts. First come the foot soldiers and cavalry in the form of mounted sheriff's patrols, high-school bands, Shriners driving ridiculous little toy cars, high-stepping baton twirlers and tap-dancing flambeau bearers.
Of course, none of the Mardi Gras parades could be considered ordinary in the July 4th/Labor Day sense. For one thing, these paraders hurl things at you: beads, doubloons (coins stamped out of cheap metal), plastic cups, whistles, Frisbees, cheesy baseball caps, squeeze bottles, plastic dolls. ... And people go into a frenzy trying to snag that junk.
``Hey, throw me somethin', mistah'' is the traditional plea, but veteran paradegoers know all sorts of gimmicks to attract more than their share of trinkets. ``Bill, Bill, ovah heah!'' a woman in front of me drawled at the paraders. During a lull in the action, she explained that a lot of guys are named Bill, so it stood to reason that somebody on a float would lob a few beads in her direction.
``The krewes throw so much stuff now that you're bound to catch some things,'' Mardi Gras Guide Arthur Hardy assured me. ``People will bring a sign that says `From Peoria,' or something, and sometimes the riders on the floats will purposely throw to tourists to make sure they have a good time. Visitors won't go home empty-handed.''
Paraders frequently work themselves into a generous mood early in the day, a plainclothes policewoman disclosed. ``The city passed an ordinance to let them strap people to the floats so they won't fall off,'' she said. ``Some of them have been drinking since 8 in the morning, so by this time, they're three sheets to the wind.''
Corbin Bernsen of ``L.A. Law'' fame looked steady enough in his white vest and tuxedo shirt as he moved from one side of the lead float to the other, waving wildly, grinning and looking very much like a gleeful attorney who had just won a whopping divorce settlement. The woman next to him, busily tossing beaded necklaces, was rumored to be his mother.
Set off by marching bands, drill teams and other parade fixtures, the Endymion floats struck a pop-music theme. Giant fiberglass caricatures of musicians glided by, representing rock and reggae, rock legends, blues, Elvis, the Beatles, the Grateful Dead, Latino rock, folk rock, disco and even a regional style called swamp rock.
The next day, we rambled around the French Quarter, always within earshot of other parades - relatively modest daytime parades, serving as an emotional buildup for the next big nighttime, celebrity-studded extravaganza. Hardy told me later that the smaller parades cost at least $50,000. Large, wealthy krewes might pump as much as $3 million into theirs, commissioning new floats from such outfitters as Blaine Kern (budget-minded krewes usually rent) and footing expenses for their show-biz headliners.
During Mardi Gras, New Orleans becomes the U.S. capital of gapers block. Men wander the streets dressed like women or ludicrous clowns; women disguise themselves as chickens, hula girls, Crayolas and giant condoms.
In the French Quarter, the crash of an uproar provokes curiosity every couple of minutes. Hotel guests stand on balconies, throwing beads to clumps of passers-by, who immediately congeal into a crowd. Nasty arguments break out over who caught what, cabs honk at horse-drawn carriages, drunks careen into and out of honky-tonks, party animals prance on verandas - shedding inhibitions and lots of other things.
On Monday evening, we decided to watch a parade from a different angle, but all the different angles had been roped off for private bleachers erected by the big hotels. It seems their guests receive space on a reviewing stand.
Those seats offered just the perspective we wanted to get a close-up look at the inaugural parade of Harry Connick Jr.'s new krewe, Orpheus. The famous New Orleans crooner had promised a star-studded entry, running the gamut from Dan Aykroyd to Vanessa Williams with Little Richard somewhere in between.
We sidled into position beneath a hotel's grandstand scaffolding and schmoozed the guard. She was turning away anyone who failed to show a room key, and the benches above us were filling up fast. Trying to hide our anxiety, we stood around and chatted with the officer awhile. Then we offered her a plastic cup filled with hot coffee. The guard took it, thanked us and walked away.
We climbed to our seats just before the bands and drill teams signaled that the Orpheus krewe would come along any minute.
After the Tuesday parades, crowds on and around Bourbon Street appeared somewhat listless. Those who hung in until midnight, we freshmen included, finally got to see the Krewe of Parking in all its glory. Police squad cars swept up Bourbon, forcing us onto the sidewalks. Over loudspeakers, members of the NOPD krewe intoned, ``Clear the street. Mardi Gras is over.'' Bringing up the rear, mechanical street sweepers and an army of sanitation workers attacked the glittering piles of detritus.
On Wednesday, we packed, pausing now and then to look down at the clean, empty boulevards, admiring the way New Orleans starts Lent with a farewell to trash.
by CNB