South Carolina meets South Louisiana

So, my uncle and older cousin came down to New Orleans for their very first Mardi Gras this past week. For them, I can imagine it was like stepping into the world of Oz...literally because on Fat Tuesday along with the many other extravagant costumes were the the lion, tin man, scarecrow and Dorothy parading through Canal Street drinking what looked to me like Hand Grenades and catching beads from the Truck Parade. So my family and I (very much not new to Mardi Gras) took the two to the Riverwalk to eat charbroiled oysters from Drago's (wow, deliciousss!!) which they were not so keen to try but eventually did, and then took them to Bourban right after. Their faces when women were popping out of windows, almost naked was timeless. My uncle and his camera soon became infamous as he could not help himself but take pictures of every strange costume or strange looking person on the street. What was even funnier was that we caught cops snapping some shots when they thought no one was paying attention to them. After a while (and a couple of cheep beers) my cousin began to get into the spirit and was hootin' and hollarin' for beads from people on the balconies. Hurricanes, Hand Grenades, jello shots...they tried them all and could not believe that people were allowed to walk around in public with alcohol. Everything about Mardi Gras and the Louisiana carefree easygoing culture seemed to just blow their minds, lol.
Later that same day we took them to get some of New Orleans best Po-boys at Johnny's. Besides the craziness of Mardi Gras, one thing I did note on was how disgusted they were of all the trash that is left behind after a parade. They were absolutely appalled at how the people seemed to have to sense to throw their trash away in trash cans. I tried to reason with them and explain that is does all eventually get picked up but they were set in their environmentalists ways. Overall, the guys had a great time and were exhausted and not ready to go back on Wednesday. I think we showed them how we do it down in the real South.

Here is a clip of Mardi Gras 2009 on Bourban Street, a little laste of how crowded and crazy our trip was:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cp3lvvX4mdo