Amusings

The New Orleans International Hostel was located one block off of St. Charles Avenue… In Uptown New Orleans.  I wouldn’t recommend it.  Patronized mostly by bohemian European backpackers on a budget, I stayed in a shared room with 2 bunk beds and 3 other people.  

And that is how I met Medhi.

Medhi was a thin, dark-skinned guy with glasses and a peach fuzz mustache… Who looked like an IT guy from the middle east.  Medhi had just graduated with an MBA… And was staying at the hostel during the two week gap in between the university dorms kicking students out for the summer… And his flight back home to Morocco.     

I had landed in New Orleans only a couple of hours earlier… In search of an apartment to live in… When I started school in a month.

For weeks prior, I had scoured the classifieds on the Gambit Weekly website… Looking for apartments to rent.  And before arriving, I had made several appointments to see apartments.  Each apartment and location had its own pros and cons.  Did I want to live in a French Quarter cottage?  Or a studio apartment overlooking passing streetcars?  How long was the commute to school?  And how far away was it from the neon and shenanigans of the French Quarter?  

To reach the hostel from the airport, I carefully followed a printout of turn-by-turn MapQuest directions… Passing by neglected shotgun houses and brick housing projects with threadbare grass… Driving through the heart of New Orleans… By way of the anus and lower intestine.  

The hostel was very European in custom… Such as… Every time you came into or left the hostel, you needed to obtain your room key, attached to a baseball-sized globe of wood, from the front desk clerk.

When I opened the door to the room, I saw Medhi lying on one of the lower bunks reading a book.  We introduced each other… With almost instant rapport.  I explained my apartment search… And probably through a combination of boredom, curiosity, and novelty, he excitedly agreed to help me on my search.

And off we went.

Prior to my arrival, I had already arranged several meetings to see apartments that afternoon.  However, after meeting the landlords and seeing the apartments, I was not thrilled with any of them.

Medhi suggested that instead of seeing properties individually, it might be worthwhile to stop in at a realty office and see if there were any new properties that hadn’t been listed yet.  And that’s how I met my future landlady, Sarah.

Sarah was manning the desk as we walked into French Quarter Realty.  She owned several properties… And was also an artist who displayed her work at a gallery on Jackson Square.

Sarah wanted to show us an apartment of hers that had just become available.  And, in a matter of minutes, Sarah was giving us a tour of the apartment.

The apartment was accessed through a tall wrought iron gate on the side of a house built sometime in the 1800’s… In the Bywater area of New Orleans.  It had a large secluded courtyard shaded by banana trees… And was equipped with two window air conditioners.

Upon walking in, I was not impressed.  The apartment was musty and smelled of stale smoke.  The walls bore the scars of plaster patches and nail holes.  The carpet was plagued with cigarette burns.

Medhi looked at me wide-eyed… 

“This is a good apartment!” he whispered to me. 

“Are you sure?!” I questioned as I looked around.

Medhi went on to explain that it was right next to the French Quarter… It was large and had a courtyard… And the rent was cheap.  Sarah agreed to replace the carpet… And we went back to French Quarter Realty to sign the lease papers.

I now had a place to live.  I was relieved.  So… What now?

It was Medhi’s last night in town… His flight back home to Morocco left tomorrow.  And… I don’t think we set out to have a ‘Last Night In New Orleans’ experience… But that’s exactly what happened.

***

Medhi and I hopped onto the St. Charles Avenue streetcar… One block from the hostel.  The streetcar follows St. Charles Avenue through the Garden District… And drops riders off right at the mouth of the French Quarter… Canal and Bourbon.

During the twenty minute streetcar ride, my eyes were windows.  I had been to New Orleans before… But always as a guest.  This time… After signing my lease… I was now a resident.  As we hopped off of the streetcar and onto Canal Street, Medhi made an offhand remark that the streetcar stopped running at midnight.

We crossed Canal Street and made a beeline straight for Bourbon Street.  And here it was… In all of its neon glory and sour milk smell.  We wasted no time in acquiring two Big Ass Beers from a street vendor… And enjoyed sipping them while strolling down the street and absorbing all of the carnival sideshow ambiance.

Carnival barkers with signs offering cheap beers stood outside every bar… And scantily-clad women leaned out of gentlemen’s clubs and beckoned every passerby.  It was late afternoon and most places were still largely empty.

I have no recollection of what happened next… But Medhi and I entered some sort of time-space wrinkle on Bourbon Street… And came out of it several hours later.

“Do you know what time it is?” Medhi asked.

The afternoon had faded into dusk… And was then enveloped by evening.  By this time, Medhi and I had sauntered into several places along Bourbon… Heard several bands play… Including rock covers as well as traditional New Orleans jazz… Had countless beverages of all types… And lost track of time.  In an era before cell phones, this was not an unusual occurrence.

“No idea.” I replied.

Medhi brought back to the forefront the fact that the St. Charles streetcar stopped running at midnight.  He then immediately started asking everyone if they knew what time it was.

“11:45” came back as a reply.

Suddenly Medhi and I were on a mission… To try and swim out of the stench on Bourbon Street… And catch the last streetcar of the evening.  Medhi and I sprang into action… Which was admirable given the level of inebriation that he and I were currently experiencing.

We hustled like determined mall walkers back to the mouth of Bourbon and across Canal Street to the streetcar stop.  But, then I got the bright idea… As we passed a tourist shop on Canal.  If you’re having a good time… It might be fun to continue it.

I darted into a shop on Canal Street… And straight to the back of the store where the beer coolers resided.  I grabbed a six pack of Heineken bottles… And raced back to the front to pay for it.  Medhi, who was standing on the sidewalk outside in front of the shop, could see the streetcar stop from where we were.

“The streetcar is here!!  I’ll tell them to wait for you!!” 

Medhi yelled as he ran off toward the streetcar.  The clerk ringing me up did not seem to have the same sense of urgency as Medhi and I… And I helped him put the six pack into a plastic bag.  And out the door I went.

Once on the sidewalk outside the shop, I could see the streetcar in the distance at the end of the block.  People were queued up to get onboard.  Upon seeing this… And with the six pack bag in hand… I started to sprint as fast as my Birkenstock Air Jesus sandals would take me… Which apparently wasn’t too far.

Running in sandals… As fast as you can… While being extremely intoxicated… Is simply not a good idea.  My head and my feet were out of sync and I tumbled to the sidewalk… Smashing the six pack under my left hand.

Stunned… But not deterred… I stood up… With my now bloody hand still through the hooped handles of the bag.  People were still queuing up and getting on the streetcar… And I decided to walk the rest of the distance… Albeit at a quick pace.

As I drew closer, I began to assess my bodily situation.  I was still carrying the bag of smashed beers… And the inside of my hand was dripping with blood.  A homeless lady standing near the streetcar stop began unrolling a length of toilet paper that she happened to have handy.  I accepted her generosity and wrapped the toilet paper around my injured hand.

Things were looking up… Until I tried to get on the streetcar… And the streetcar driver saw my dripping and bloody hand wrapped in toilet paper holding a leaking plastic bag of smashed Heinekens.

“Oh, hell no!  You are not getting on this streetcar!”

The streetcar driver yelled at me while still standing on the sidewalk.

I learned quite a few things while living in New Orleans… Local customs that I was not aware of initially… One of which was… That streetcar drivers are the ultimate authority… They rule the roost.  And if she said I wasn’t getting on that streetcar… I wasn’t getting on that streetcar.

The doors to the streetcar squeaked and slammed shut.  And left Medhi and I standing on the corner… Along with the usual strange cast of characters that inhabit Canal Street late at night.

Medhi and I shrugged at each other… We were walking home tonight… A mile and a half.  I opened the bag to see if anything was salvageable.  To my surprise, only two out of the six beers had gotten smashed.  Two beers each for the walk.  And so we set off.

Since the streetcar had finished running for the evening, Medhi and I decided to walk up St. Charles Avenue along the neutral ground… aka the streetcar track.  The city was quiet by this time… And Medhi and I were quite boisterous as we walked.  I remember quite a bit of laughing and weaving as we followed the streetcar track uptown.

A while later, we had finished our warm beers.  As we passed a bank branch along St. Charles, a voice beckoned out to us from near the well-lit ATM machine.  Medhi and I went to investigate.  The voice belonged to a woman… Who stepped… Or rather limped straight-legged… out of the shadows from behind the ATM.

I’m not sure that Medhi and I ever learned her name… But I’m pretty sure that it was Peggy… On account of her prosthetic leg… Hidden under her jeans.

It turned out… Peggy was a hooker… Who fished for clients next to the ATM.  And apparently, an ATM is a pretty good fishing spot late at night.

Peggy let us know what she was selling… Oral pleasure at forty dollars a pop.  This was new territory for me… But Medhi seemed to think that Peggy was a fine and upstanding entrepreneur… And worthy of our patronage.  A quick ATM transaction later, Medhi and I had the capital required for the business deal to proceed.  

Medhi was first… And Peggy knew the best place… Which happened to be… Right where we were… In front of the bank… Along St. Charles Avenue.  Peggy and Medhi found a place in the shadows beneath an oak tree… And I took up residence on the sidewalk in front of the bank… Keeping an eye out for anyone who might interrupt this business deal.

A minute later, Peggy yells out,

“He can’t get hard!!”  

Well… That threw an unseen monkey wrench into our well-manicured plan.  Peggy seemed to think that we were ripe for getting busted in our current locale… And asked if we had a place to go.  And, with that, we set off for the hostel which happened to be only a block away. 

Medhi pointed out that we needed to get our room key from the desk clerk upon arrival.  

“I’ll try to cover up my mouth.” said Peggy.

And it was at that moment… I realized that Peggy was missing a front tooth… One of those minor details discovered after the ink on the business deal is already dry.

Medhi and I, followed by Peggy, walked into the hostel.  After a somewhat quizzical look from the front desk clerk, we explained that Peggy was only staying for a moment… And secured the room key.  

We entered our room as quietly as possible… Which probably wasn’t all that quiet given Medhi’s and my level of inebriation.  Our roommates… Two guys from Sweden… Who barely spoke English… Appeared to be fast asleep.

Medhi and Peggy wasted no time in starting up where they had left off previously… On the bottom bunk… While I laid quietly on the top bunk.

Suddenly, one of the Swedish guys in the other bunk… Woke up… And realized what was happening.  He started to object very loudly… I’m assuming in Swedish… At the business deal being conducted in the other bunk.  And this caused the other Swedish guy to wake up and begin objecting.

And… Like a flash… Peggy was gone.  And all was quiet again.

I looked down at Medhi from the top bunk.  We both shrugged at each other without a word… And passed out in our respective bunks.

A few hours later, I woke up with a dry mouth… And the hangover rust in my head.  I opened my eyes and tried to take stock of my surroundings.  The Swedish guys were gone.  And Medhi was just finishing packing his bag.  His flight home to Morocco left in a couple of hours and he was leaving for the airport.

I don’t remember my goodbye to Medhi.  There was no exchanging of cell phone numbers or email addresses… Those things were not commonplace then.  

I just remember Medhi reaching up to shake my hand… With a wink and a nod.  

I have no idea where or how Medhi is today.  But, I’m pretty sure… That if we ever met again… We’d be fast friends.