Mardi Gras in New Orleans (12-17 February 1999)

Back to Fabian's

Well, I guess I made it back in one piece. I got to tell you, New Orleans (NO) ruled and 
kicked all else I have experienced. I am just going give you some of the good, not so good 
and lethal things that happened to me and the people I was with.

Friday 990212

This was at first ment to be my leaving day, but Cooper, the guy who asked me to come over to 
NO for Mardi Gras said he would go on thursday. I had my mid term in history on friday so I 
could not go. I made 94/100 on it by the way. Anyway, I needed a ride to NO and one of my
classmates, Winston, said he had a ride for me. But it turned out that they were 7 guys in 
that car already so I was stranded. I met with some international students on the coffe 
hour on friday afternoon and they had room for me in one of their cars. So I ended up going 
with them. I talked to Winston and I was supposed to met up with him at St Charles/Fourth on
saturday. I got his cell and beeper number too, just in case I got lost or something. And it
turned out to be something alright.

Saturday 990213

We left Lafayette around noon and arrived in NO
at 4pm. I said bye to the guys who took me there
and wandered off on my own. I got a cell number
for one of the guys in the group, again just in
case. They had also told me where St Charles were
so I found it directly. But what I had not 
realized was that St Charles is one of the 
longest streets in NO. And Fourth Street was some
20 blocks up from Canal Street, a cop told me. 
Well, I just started walking, luckily there were 
not any parade going on at the moment so I could 
walk in the middle of the street. Otherwise it 
would take me the rest of the night just getting
to St Charles/Fourth. It did take me 45 minutes 
to reach Fourth and when I got there I realized 
that the afternoon parades had finished and the 
place was deserted. I just had to walk back the 
same way I came. So what to do know?  Winston was 
gone so I tried to call him on the cellphone but 
that turned out to be the wrong number and his 
beeper number did not work either for some 
reason. At the end of this day I stongly
mistrusted American payphones because they did
not do anything good to me. I also tried to call 
my rides cellphone but again it did not work. I 
was all alone in the middle of New Orleans!! I 
tried to call Coopers parents but noone answered 
and when I started to leave a message on the 
answering machine the line broke down, again for 
some strange reason it seemed. By this time panic 
started to crawl up my legs. What was I to do?  
So I sat down and thought things over. First I 
went and checked the cars in which I came to NO 
in, they were still there. I had a emergency plan 
then, if all else fails I just needed to sit down 
by the cars and go back to Lafayette with them 
later that night. But I did not want that! I went 
up to acop and laid it all out to him, that I was 
a Swede, I had lost my friends and needed help. I 
figured they couldd give me an address to Coopers 
parents house if they would get the telephone
number. But he was not to keen to help a lost 
Swede at that moment. All he said was that I 
could go to the police station on Royal Street. I 
knew where that was so I headed over there. A 
nice police woman helped me out. She called and 
talked to Mrs. Evans, Coopers mom, and she gave 
me a hotell room number and the hotell where 
Cooper was (Le Pavillion, room 730). The police 
lady told me how to get there. Appearently it was 
close by, so no sweat. But by the time I got to 
Canal Street there was this parade going on and 
that ment Canal was impossible to cross. I had to 
walk around the whole parade area. It took me 1,5 
hours to reach the hotell. When I finally got
there it was 9:30pm. I had been walking around NO 
since 4pm! But I was happy that I had found 
Cooper and that I did not need to use my 
emergency plan. Cooper and his friends was 
partying the night away. I told myself to stay of 
the alcohol the first night. It turned out to be 
a wise choise. After spending some time in the 
hotel room, which actually was a suite, we headed 
down on Bourbon Street to check out the 
craziness. We did that and boy, it was crazy 
alright. Alright, here is how it goes in general. 
During the afternoon parades people catch as many 
beads as they can. Some lucky guys will catch 
them big nice beads. These big fancy beads is 
what counts later on down on Bourbon. The girls 
will do pretty much anything to get those beads 
from you and they will do it too. It was all 
over. Girls showed their tits and other parts of 
their body and they would get beads for it. 
Everybody seemed to do it and that is how it 
worked. Once a girl was about to do it the place 
around her got crowded with guys trying to get a 
peek. It would be some 20-30 guys around her and 
some had cameras and even video cameras with 
which they took pictures and documented the whole 
thing. It was fun and crazy!! As far as I am 
concerned showing your t'n'a for plastic 
necklaces is not worth it, but I can not say I 
complained. It was a lot of fun just watching 
people around you do all those things. And it was 
not just the girls who did it, some boys showed 
their tool and ass for chicks with beads. It was 
all crazy and all fun. We passed by Playboy's 
balcony and they had spotlights on the girls and 
they showed it all for nothing. So the place in f
front of the balcony was packed shut with people. 
Once you got into the crowd you were a passenger 
with no will of your own. I liked it though, 
being showed around by invinsible and, as it 
seemed, invisible forces. Some guys could not 
take it though and there were fights all over the 
crowd. But we got through clean and in one piece, 
all of us. After some hours down there we 
decieded to go back to the hotel. But Cooper had 
left the key in the room and we were looked out. 
He tried to convince the manager that he was the 
grandson of the lady that had the suite. Coopers 
Grannie have been having a room at Le Pavillion 
for 16 years but the manager did not listen to 
that story. Cooper had lost his ID too, so he 
could not identify himself. He got pissed with 
the manager and called him an asshole so he was 
thrown out of the hotel. Now what? "Lets's go get 
the other key at Grannies house" Coopers brother, 
Alex, said. So we did. On our way to the cars we 
passed a RV and out of it was this hand with a 
cigarette in it. Cooper thought it was a womens 
hand so he went over there and stroked it. It was 
a man's hand and the guy inside got really mad 
and started cursing and yelling. Cooper answered 
with the same amount of curses and shouts. We 
just walked on and Cooper came along. When we 
walked up to the car, two guys from the RV came 
out and started with us. We were 6 guys and they 
were 2, but still they had an attitude. I had my 
back on it so I did not see what was about to 
happen. But one of Coopers friends, Deston, saw 
that something was not right. One of the dudes 
had his hand behind his back. So Deston tried to 
cool everything down, saying that Cooper was just 
drunk and stupid and that we did not want to 
start anything. We got into the car and when we 
drove away the guy turned around and he had big 
nasty gun in his hand!! I was chocked, I almost 
got shot in NO and on my first night!! When I 
came around I realized that Cooper was driving 
and he was drunk as a skunk. I started protesting 
and tried to get him to pull over, but the other 
guys just cheered him on. I got pissed and 
started screaming at him to stop the car and so 
he did. He pulled up to a gas station and I took 
the wheel. Now I am notsupposed to drive, I know 
that since I am not insured if something happens. 
But better drive those minutes than letting 
Cooper take the car on the free way and kill us 
all. So I drove the rest of the trip back and 
forth to Grannie Evans. We got the key and got 
into the room. That ended the first day in NO and 
Mardi Gras for me.





All these people just doing their thing in New Orleans.
Cooper is in the middle of all this. [above]



Me on the big bed in the suite. [below]

Sunday 990214



Valentines day. We watched parades all afternoon 
and at night we went down on Bourbon as usual. 
The King of Creoux were Jim Belushi, famous 
people on big floats. We went by the suite a
couple of times that night to refill and sit down 
and chill for a while. Grannie Evans had bought a 
lot of booze and snacks for us. I did not spend 
so much money this weekend in NO because the 
Evans family urged to pay for all my expences. I 
tried to pay for myself but they would not have 
any of it, so I let them do it. I can always do 
something else for that money I guess. Like going 
to New York and shop some cool stuff for myself. 
Carson, one of Coopers friends, screamed "Fucking 
pigs!!" at a passing poilce car during the 
afternoon, they stopped and caught his ass and 
slammed him up against the car. He was told a lot 
of not doing this and that and then they let him 
go. He was just smiling and saying it was a cool 
thing. He was a crazy guy that Carson. Later at  
the hotel we went up on the roof and the guys 
pulled out a joint and lit it. I was offered it 
but I said no thanks. They argued with me while
but I was firm and told them I would not touch 
that stuff because I know what it will do to you. 
So they chilled about it. On Bourbon things were 
as crazy as ever. We met a group of girls from 
Alabama and we started talking to them, or 
rather the guys talked to them. After a while I 
got tired and I asked for the key and went to the 
hotell. I fell asleep and woke up when the guys 
got back. But they were not alone, the Alabama 
girls were with them. I went to sleep again and 
the next time I woke up I was not alone in the 
bed. Deston, another of Coopers friends, and one 
of the girls was making out next to me. I just 
said to them that if they wanted the bed to
themselves it was fine and I got up. Three guys 
and three girls were having things with each 
other all over the suite. I was up and running, 
so was Alex, Coopers brother.  He was bored and 
we decieded to go back to Bourbon.  One of the 
girls went with us. We walked up and down for a 
while and then decieded to go to a bar. I had 
left my ID in the room so we did not get in 
anywhere. We ended up at the bar on the hotell 
that the Alabama girls were staying at. We sat 
there until they closed and threw us out. It was 
06:30am and Alex and I went back to the suite. We 
woke up everybody and the girls went. That was 
the end of that day.





Monday 990215



Grannie Evans woke us up and kicked us out of the 
suite because she was expecting guests. We went 
to the house and fell asleep again. Woke up late 
in the afternoon and I and Alex went down to St 
Charles/Eight to check out the parades. The Queen 
of Creuox on one of the parades were Sandra 
Bullock. It was kind of cool to be 10-15 feet 
away from a girl like her. Cooper was already 
there and all the other boys and girls. We 
watched parades for some time and then we went to 
this funk and jazz club called Tipitina's. We 
stayed there for the rest of the night. There 
were some good music playing, two bands performed 
("All that" and "Galactica") and the drinks were 
cheap. It was fun andcrazy. We stood around, 
danced and digged the music and the drinks. It 
was all good. Later Alex and I went down to 
Bourbon but we went home instead because the next 
day was Mardi Gras Day and you want to be there 
for the whole day. So we went to the house and to 
bed.

   

Alex (guy with sunglasses) in the crowd on St Charles/Eigth. [above]



The bead frenzy along St Charles. [below]

Tuesday 990216



Up until this day the wheather had been cold, it 
was freezing at night and the days were not 
plesent. But this morning the warmth came back 
and it turned out to be a great day, all aspects. 
We went to St Charles/Eight at noon and stayed 
there for the rest of the day. The parades were 
slamming. They threw a lot of beads. I have tons 
if it with me here in Lafayette from this 
weekend. By the time the parades ended I and 
Cooper got left behind for some reason and some 
misunderstanding. We started walking back down 
town and after a block or two we got ourself a 
cab. We went to the hotell. Grannie and Mr. Evans 
were their plus two of their friends. Cooper and 
I ate some snacks and drank a whole lot of 
alcohol. Then we went up on the roof. There we 
met two girls from Indiana and two guys from NO. 
The girls were sisters, Crystal and Shannen, and 
Andy dated Shannen and Scott was Andy's buddy. We 
sat around and talked a whole lot. I went down to 
get a icebox of beer and whiskey with coke for 
Cooper and me. We stayed there quite a while. I 
talked to two teenage boys about manhood and all 
that. They did not get to see the parades for 
their parents and they couldn't leave the hotell 
either. I felt sorry for them and treated them on 
some beer and we talked about high school, 
college, teachers, parents, girls and all that 
for a while. I and Scott were sitting alone when 
Crystal came back from the toilette. We both 
could see something was not right with her. At 
first she did not want to say anything but then 
she told us that the maintenance guy working 
there tried to rape her in the hallway!! I was 
shocked. He had been walking around on the roof 
doing his work and then he pulled some shit like 
this. I was pissed and went looking for him to 
tell him one or two things but he was nowhere in 
sight. Me and Scott talked to Crystal and tried 
to comfort her. She did not want to tell the 
manager because she was all shock up. I told her 
that it was not her fault. She said she had just 
tried to be nice and then the guy had pushed 
her up against the wall and started pulling her 
sweater up. She started protesting and the guy 
let her go. She agreed that I would go down and 
talk to the manager about it and pretend that I 
had seen the whole thing and that I could 
identify the guy, I could because he had been 
running around on the roof the whole night, as I 
said. The manager called him down and I pointed 
him out right away. He denied everything so I got 
really mad at him and told him to his face what I 
thought about it. I saw in his eyes that he knew 
and I knew and that he was lying. They sent him 
home right away. Scott and Cooper came down and 
we worked it out with the manager, I wrote a 
statement and signed it. We went back up and I 
talked with Crystal, she was in chock but she 
came around after a while. After all nothing did 
happen, the guy had let her go the minute she
started protesting. Crystal did good. Later 
Cooper and I wanted to go down on Bourbon again, 
Crystal and Shannen wanted to come with us. But 
Scott and Andy had seen it all before sa they 
stayed. Cooper escorted Crystal and I escorted 
Shannen. I told Andy I would be a perfect 
gentleman, and I was. But Shannen did not want to 
be a perfect girlfriend. Both she and Crystal 
wanted big beads and we went around and they 
showed their stuff to guys on Bourbon and they 
got their beads. I just stood beside them and 
made sure that the guys did not take more then 
agreed upon. It was fun. At midnight Bourbon 
closed down, police on horses and in cars jammed 
the street and pushed people out of there. We 
went back to the hotell. Since it was after 
midnight it was 990217, my 25th birthday. I did 
not want to go to sleep. I tried to get onto the 
roof and into the pool but they closed at 11pm. I 
tried to go to sleep anyway but the room was 
swaying back and forth so I decieded to head down 
on Bourbon on my own. It was my 25th birthday 
damnit!! I just walked around down there for 1,5 
hours, had some pizza and went back. Nothing 
happened. The day was over.

   

My type of float. [above]





Cooper is hanging out in the crowds on St 
Charles. [above]






Wednesday 990217



My 25th birthday. But it was also the day after. 
I just tried to come around the whole day. I 
drank water and ate food. That was my birthday 
for you, not a very good one but I had some 
wonderful days in NO to make up for that. Me and 
Cooper took a Greyhound back to Lafayette. I got 
home around midnight. That was that! Mardi Gras 
was over for this time.



Just a bunch of people.


There you go, that is pretty much what happened. 
It was so much fun. I had a great time though 
there were a few incidents, but nothing really 
happened so I am all cool and I am still alive!


Fabian