Day 8 Cajun History

I woke up a little late this morning, but not to late to get me some of Rocky Sonnier's famous Bayou boudin, cracklin and hogshead cheese. That's his speciality and he makes it from scratch. I sat around and talked with him for a couple of hours about music. He knows everyone and everyone has stayed in these cabins and played here. I'm sitting on a bench outside my cabin to write this blog. Rocky's got pictures in his cafe of musicians sitting and pickin' on the same bench.... Merle Haggard, Hank Williams Jr.. Jo-el Sonnier and a host of others. While I was there, Sam Broussard, guitar player for Steve Riley and the Mamou Playboys, came in and told Rocky he was meeting his other bandmates here to drive to the airport. They were going to tour in Russia. Rocky asked him if I got my guitar would he give me a quick lesson in playing my favorite Jole Blon. I hustled to my cabin and grabbed the guitar.

When I got back, Mr. Broussard wanted to ask all about the guitar, but I knew his van would pull up any moment. He asked about every part of the guitar and took his time checking it out. I got out my phone camera and got some video of him playing a very smooth melody of my favorite Cajun song. I wish I could play like that!

You can see the video at
http://www.youtube.com/rebornguitars

After the van pulled up and Mr. Broussard left, Rocky and I continued to talk music for an hour or so. He took me out to his truck to listen to some cassette tapes he had made of various groups..... old stuff, bootleg recordings and such. We talked everything from Jimmy Rogers-the Singing Brakeman to Jerry Lee Lewis-the Killer.

Rocky drew me a map to a museum about Arcadian history in the next town. I made the trip and was the only person in the museum. They had a 30 minute movie that stared every hour and I got there just in time to watch it. The theater held about 200 people, but I had the place to myself. I took my customary seat in the back row by the door and watched the film.

It was a great film and really brought the Cajun history to life. It followed the french peasants as they migrated to Acadie in Nova Scotia (New Scotland) in the late 1600. They settled and prospered and at the time were called "The Happiest People on Earth". But, they were caught in the middle of continuing strife between England and France. The area changed domains back and forth, until the area ended up being ruled by the British. The Acadiens were allowed to stay on the land and were allowed to remain neutral in any wars with France. This happy time lasted for 45 years. But the Arcadiens prospered so well, the views of them changed by the British rulers. In 1713 they were required to sign an unconditional oath to England. The Acadiens refused and were rounded up and imprisoned. Abandoned by France, the people were loaded onto ships. Of 6000 that were put into the hulls of ships, only a few thousand lived through to be scattered about the British colonies. Families were torn apart and separated to ensure there would be no rebellion. As groups were deposited in the various colonies, there were sick and dieing of small pox and malnutrition. Since they were French catholics, they were not welcomed by the English settlers. Most perished under the most horrible conditions - stripped off their lands, separated from their families and tossed out among strangers.

France finally intervened and helped transport the scattered survivors back to France. But these people were no longer French and could not assimilate back into french culture. They had their own language and longed for Acadie, their old homeland. These displaced people later migrated to the Spanish controlled area of Louisiana. This area is now called Arcadiana. The name Arcadians was elided to Cajuns, like Indians was elided to Injuns. That small group that first came to Louisiana are the names of the old families - names I've heard everyday since I have been here.

I spent most of my day in the museum and the nearby Cajun cultural center. I met an old fiddler named Merlin Fontenot. I sat and talked with him for an hour and a half as he played every song I could think of. He told me about his life playing fiddle everywhere from the Grand Ole Opry to New Orleans. He told me about playing Ava Maria at his sister's funeral, standing right next to the casket. He said he loved that song, but could only play it once through before he broke down and cried. Even with my limited musical experience, I now the feeling of playing music while mourning the passing of a loved one.

I spent the last of the evening sitting with a couple from Houma, the center of the BP oil spill. They told me how people lost their jobs and livelyhoods when the shrimp and fishing was closed. They made sure to tell me that it is still not back to normal, but BP is long gone. They quoted me BP's exact dollar profit for the past ten years. The gentleman looked at me and said, " 25 billion.... I don't even know ho many zeroes that is"

I don't either....

Day 7, The Devil Went Down to Georgia (kinda)

I had a bit of a "The Devil Went Down to Georgia" moment this morning. The devil was these @#@$# cicadas. They are soooooo loud. They team up and when several of them are screaming, it drowns out everything....whether it's the pretty bird songs or my less-than-pretty guitar strummin'. It was deserted and peaceful around here this morning, so I grabbed my guitar and sat out on a bench to practice some of my new Cajun tunes. As soon as I started, the cicadas jumped in. First one - then two - then three.... It was so loud that I snapped - Bring it on cicadas!!!!! I played louder, then they played louder. I played so hard the strings were about to snap. The cicadas gave it their all and I played even harder. Louder and louder and louder we went.  This went on for a couple of minutes, then something thumped on the bench.....then another and another and the trees went silent. I stopped playing, wiped the sweat from my eyes and studied the bench. There were 3 dieing cicadas spinning circles on the bench and ground. Their wings were shredded and all they could do was spend their last minutes walking quiet circles on the ground. I had won. I'm sure the other cicadas heard everything and I predict I won't be having anymore cicada troubles.

I walked up to the little stores to get a soda. The radio was playing a Cajun music station. While I was there, that annoying emergency broadcast signal came on. There was a severe thunder storm alert for our area between 3-6 pm. I was supposed to be in the Baton Rouge area at 4 pm so I decided to grab a shower and leave early to beat the weather. I was nervous about the drive anyway and having to drive in a storm really worried me. Driving on freeways is my nemesis.

Within a half hour I was on the road. I made it to Baton Rouge, but between there and Prairreville, It caught me. I managed to get to a Walmart parking lot and watch it rain. It rained hard with lots of lightening. I ran into the Walmart to get a coffee and the thunder shook the place. But, I seemed to be the only one that noticed (or cared). I think it is more exciting for a California boy. I thought it was the end of the world at the same time as 80 year old ladies were parking their cars and going in to shop.

After the little pit-stop I drove the last few minutes to my friend John's house. He and I became acquainted last year when he was looking for a cross-in-nature graphic for some T-shirts. He had email me through my web site (www.thecrossweb.com). One thing led to another and eventually to guitars. He bought three guitars on Ebay and had them shipped to me. I restored them and sent 2 of them to him. He gave one to a group that sends guitars, for free, to missionaries all over the world. The other has been at his house, waiting to bless the right person. Well, the right person came along a couple of weeks ago and John set it up for me to meet her while I was here and present the guitar to her. It's kind of a long story, but the new owner, Angela, hoped to get a guitar for her birthday. She knew someone that knew John, and everything fell in place. Amazing Grace is the first song she wants to learn, so I played my Delta blues version for them while John recorded it with his iphone. Its pretty darn interesting that his phone only recorded the video... no audio...hmmmm

I always say that I would rather someone didn't take a guitar unless they LOVE it. Well I could tell right off that she loves it. It looked perfect in her hands.

For the past year or so, John and Susan have been working on building a chapel on his property. His yard is full of giant 150+ year old oak trees. The little chapel is nestled in between the trees. It's not completed, but it is beautiful. It is built from reclaimed Cyprus, with thick beams and other wood that he has salvaged. There are old columns on the front and pine flooring from old buildings around New Orleans. The layers of worn paint on the old wood give the place a subdued, but colorful look. It has stained glass and cathedral windows. The coolest part is that it even has a copper steeple complete with a huge cast iron bell. This my kind of building!

No entry here would be complete without a paragraph or two about food. John treated us to dinner at "On the half shell". OK, are you ready? We started with oysters with assorted toppings. They were all excellent, but the ones with sundried tomatoes were particularly good. For the meal, I had blackened Mahi Mahi with a creamy crab sauce, salad and a corn side dish with a french name that I can't remember.

I said goodbye to John and Angela and headed back to the highway. The storm had passed here but the sky was beautiful. The highway turns into a causeway and travels above the water for about 15 miles. I crossed a huge bridge over the Mississippi river. In about an hour I was back to the cabin. It started raining just as I pulled the car to a stop. I grabbed my stuff and ran for the door. I spent the rest of the evening sitting on the porch, listening to the rain on the tin roof and watching the lightening streak across the sky. At one point, there was lightening bolts about every 5 seconds.

No need for TV or a remote - I was watching the original "Big Screen"

Day 6, Rayne LA the Frog Capital of the World!

The cabin I'm staying in is operated as a bed-and-breakfast. I went into the small cafe about 100 yards from my cabin and was warmly greeted by Rocky and Lisa, the owners. "What you want fo breakfast Rawge?" I opted for the Boudin and Cracklin breakfast plate. It was a heaping plate of pork with scrambled eggs and toast. If I keep it up, I'll have to buy two seats on the plane to get home.

After the meal settled a little bit, I drove to a nearby town called Rayne. This cute little town has two claims to fame- It is the frog capital of he world and it has the only Christian cemetery that is layed out North to South.

The story has it that about 75 years ago, they moved the St. Joseph's Catholic church from Poupeville to the current site at Rayne and a cemetery was laid-out to the south of the relocated church. Christian tradition dictated that graves were to be laid out from East to West. The east metaphorically represented the beginning of life with the rising of the sun and the west metaphorically represented the ending of life with the setting of the sun. But something went wrong in Rayne. It's likely that the gravedigger did not have a compass and the priest was too busy to oversee the work of a common laborer. Whatever happened, by the time the mistake was discovered, too many people had been buried. It would have been very costly and disruptive to the relatives of those burried so the citizens allowed the cemetery to remain as it had originally been placed. I have walked many graveyards and had never noticed the East-West alignment. Apparently anything different is such an oddity that Robert Ripley included the St. Joseph's Cemetery in his famous newspaper cartoon early in the century. Even recently, the graveyard was filmed as an attraction in "Ripley's Believe It or Not!" and people come from around the world to see the only cemetery in the Judeo-Christian world that faces north-south rather than east-west.

The cemetery seemed small compared to Rayne's frogs. There are frogs everywhere - murals, statues, books, store names, and even a frog casino. It seems most every wall in town has a frog mural. I saw frogs leaping, frogs dancing and even frogs playing music. At one point in history, Rayne exported more frogs and frog legs than any other place in the world.

I met an old gentleman on the street and asked about the frog farms. He told me that most of the frog farms had closed down. His daddy once raised frogs, but other crops made more money. I had never considered frogs as a crop. Next year I may have to put more thought into my garden plans.

Most folks that know me, will know I like to get a haircut when I'm travelling. I've gotten haircuts in New Your City, Seattle, Mexico, China Town SF, San Diego, New Orleans and other destinations. I had been here 5 days and still hadn't been able to get a haircut. The same gentleman on the sidewalk point up a small street and told me there was a barber shop less than a mile away.

I drove up the street a bit and easily spotted the revolving barber pole. I could have stumbled into most any barber shop, but I found one called "Mullets". The sign on the front said "Business in front" and the back side of the sign said "Party in the rear".
I walked in and met Marquis, the owner. I told him I needed a haircut. He asked If I wanted a mullet, but before I could answer he said if I did, I would need a note from either my wife or my Mom. I sent out a text, but apparently Rhonda's fax machine is broken because nothing ever came in. Without the requisite permission paperwork, I ended up getting a great "regular" hair cut. It was a classic barber shop cut, with a lot of attention to detail. It took about a half hour and cost $12.

I drove back to Breaux Bridge looking pretty nice with my new haircut. It was outrageously humid outdoors, so I took a nice nap in the cabin with the AC on high. After I woke up, I sat inside the screened porch and watched the lizards catch the bugs crawling along the screen. The screen has a few holes so there were as many lizards and bugs on the inside as on the outside. I wish they would climb the trees and eat a few of the cicadas. These little insects are so loud at night. One will start and then another and another until it's all you can hear. They seem particularly put off by my guitar playing and can drown it out completely if they try.

When it cooled down in the evening, I drove into old town Breaux Bridge for dinner and music. There was a 3-piece Cajun band playing at Cafe Des Amis. I had spoken with the guitar player earlier in the day and he told me the food was incredible. Well, it was! I had the crabmeat stuffed Gulf fish - a fresh Gulf fillet stuffed with a creamy crabmeat filling then topped with a lime beurre. It came with bread, steamed vegetables and comfit tomatoes. The waiter helped me pair it with a nice chilled chateau-d'coorslite. For desert I had Gateau Sirop (Syrup Cake) - a taditional cajun sweet, spicy moist cake with roasted pecans and homemade vanilla ice cream.

I stayed until the band took their first break, tipped them and gave them some props on their music. I drove back to Bayou Tech before dark, so I could make sure to find the little place. I spent the evening on a bench by the bayou, drinking Gatorade and listening to the bullfrogs and cicadas.

Yes, as most of you know, I'm a bit afraid of the dark and being in the swamp doesn't help it any. Trust me, I had an LED flashlight, a backup flashlight and backup batteries.

Day 5, Downtown Breaux Bridge

I spent the day in downtown Breaux Bridge. Its a nice old town, with antiques shops, cafes and artist's shops. I visited the visitor center and they pointed me to a little park on bayou Teche. I walked to the park and there was a giant statue of a snake. It was about 75' long with a plaque that gave the story of Bayou Teche. The legend says that hundreds of year ago there lived a giant snake. It wasn't measured in feet but in miles. It's head was in Morgan City and the tail stretched here to Breaux Bridge.  The snake was very dangerous and killed many indians. The indians decided to attack it and kill it. The warriors prepared their great battle with arrowheads made of gar (fish) bones as there are no stones in the bayou. The battle lasted many days, but the serpent was mortally wounded. The legend says that the snake writhed for several days as it died. As it coiled and twisted in the last few days of it's slow death, it wallowed out the narrow bayou. Teche means snake in the native Chitimachas language. The back porch on my little cabin sits over the site of that dying snake.

There were some people fishing near there so I walked over to see if they were catching anything. Nothing but gar they told me. The alligator gar is a local fish that gets to be several feet long, but it's not very good to eat. I've been fishing twice since I've been here and we caught several gar. I caught a nice sized Gaspergoo and was pretty excited, but unfortunatly it's not good to eat either. The Lousiana trifecta of trash fish is the Gar, Gaspergoo and Choupic (shoe pic). One more and I'll have the set.

I visited one of the above-ground cemeteries in town. The earliest cemeteries were underground burials, but there were problems with the coffins bursting up through the ground and floating away in times of heavy rains and floods. After some unfortunate incidents, the cities began using above ground crypts for burial. Many of these seem to be only big enough for two coffins, yet there may be half a dozen or more names on the memorial stone. This happens as after a year and a day, the crypt may be opened and the old coffin and body broken up. The remains are then stored in a hollow area under the lower crypt. There is little left after only a very short time due to the extreme heat in the tombs.

These cemeteries are very pretty and make for great pictures. I had a great time just walking around and reading the markers. The cemetery is full of old french names like Landry, Cormier, Leblanc and Bergeron.

I had dinner at Point Breaux's. The stuffed crab and bread pudding was good, but the cajun music was great. Guess what? The first song they played when I sat down was Jole Blon!

On my way back to the cabin, I filled the rental car up with gas... $3.33 a gallon! Heck I might let he car idle all night with the A/C on so it's cool in the morning.

I killed the evening sitting in front of the cabin and trying my best to describe California to a couple from France.

Day 4 Breaux Bridge

As I left the 4-mile bayou area to drive up to Breaux Bridge, I've noticed a few things about this whole bayou area - everyone owns between 3-10 boats, most everyone has an interesting mailbox post, and a good deal of the houses are built on tall foundations or outright stilts. About every other house has some manner of Catholic statuary in the yard and people like to wave. They also like to talk and a 2 minute story can easily take an hour. A five minute story and you better find a seat and some shade.

The coolest thing about the area is that everything has a pretty name - Assumption Parish, Atchafalya, Lake Haha, Fordoche, Bayou Teche, Mamou, Jonesville..... Ok, Jonesville doesn't sound pretty, but it is here.

The drive up was about an hour and a half. I managed to find the Bayou Cabins with no GPS and no map. Dumb luck pulled me through again. The cabin office was closed so I called the number on the door. Miss Sonnier said she was expecting me and wold be right over. I was to wait where I was, but my cabin was the last one on the right. While I waited I went over to have a look. The cabin was rotted and falling over. It was mostly covered with Kudzu and a good portion of the tin roof was rusted through. Ok, I'm thinking that they did give me a discount. When Miss Sonnier pulled up, she looked at me and said with a grin " Oh did I say right? I ment left". My cabin is actually really cool. It has a screened in front porch and a deck on the back that sits on the edge of the bayou. The whole little place is decorated with old advertising signs, old bicycles, and farm implements.

My friend John came over in the afternoon with his skiff. His deckhand was working her regular job, so she couldn't make it. With that,  I offered to fill in. Until then, I hadn't realized that his pretty deckhand was the only one on the boat that knew how to keep the dry stuff dry, keep the important stuff inside the boat, and which end of the map was north. But to our credit, the two of us managed to spend several fun hours on the water and find our way back to the same place we started. We probably didn't really need that stuff that blew out and john's wallet and phone will surely dry out in a few days.

Afterwards we had a great dinner of stuffed crab, crawfish bisque and something else that I can't spell but sounded something like fit to play.

I finished off the the evening sitting on the porch with my guitar trying to play the famous cajun waltz, Jole Blon
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Jolie blonde, regardez donc quoi t'as fait, Tu m'as quitte pour t'en aller, Pour T'en aller avec un autre, oui, que moi, Quel espoir et quel avenir, mais, moi, je vais avoir?

Jolie blonde, tu m'as laisse, moi tout seul, Pour t'en aller chez ta famille. Si t'aurais pas ecoute tos les conseils de les autres tu serait ici-t-avec moi aujourd 'hui

Jolie blonde, tu croyais il y avait just toi, Il y a pas just toi dans le pays pour moi aimer. Je peux trouver just une autre jolie blonde, Bon Dieu sait, moi, j'ai un tas.

In English
Pretty blond, look at what you've done, You left me to go away, to go away with another, yes, than me, What hope and what future am I going to have?

Pretty blond, you've left me all alone To go back to your family. If you had not listened to all the advice of the others You would be here with me today.

Pretty blond, you thought there as just you, There is not just you in the land to love me. I can find another pretty blond, Good God knows, I have a lot.

Day 3, Church in Franklin Parish

Today started with an early knock on the door. It was a gentleman that live up the road. I haven't had phone service since I've been here and he had a message from the guy that owns the trailer. I was to meet him at a little bank in town and he and his friend were taking me to his friend's church in a little town called Franklin. Anthony, the trailer owner hadn't been to church in years and his friend was always trying to get him to go. He decided that today was a good day to go.
The church was in a poor part of town, surrounded by a beatup trailer park and run-down houses. We were a few minutes late and I could hear music coming through the little white church walls. We walked in and found a seat in the back row. There were about 25 people and every last one of them were very engaged in the praise and worship. There was a drumset in the corner and some amps, but they were singing to a CD. The music was being led by Pastor Sharon and she had an incredible voice. She sang with her whole body, hands lifted and waving, and eyes always looking up. Everyone was clapping, stomping and singing. The church's bishop was visiting so he delivered the message. He was a classic black preacher and gave a powerful message with lots of congregational call backs - Amen! Preach it brother! Tell us! and Halleluja!. The message was coincidentally (or maybe I just needed to hear it again) the same message I got at my own church before I left - God chooses very imperfect people to do great things - Moses, with all his "baggage" answered God's call and led a million people out of slavery! After church, I joined them for sandwiches, cake and lemonade in their fellowship hall. This was a warm group of people and all of them made me feel very welcome.

I met a fiddler that lives in Morgan City and set up to meet him in the afternoon to play some music. Unfortunately, it rained about 4 inches and I was afraid to try to drive in it. But before it started raining, I took my little pirogue (ok, kayak) around the edge of 4-mile bayou and got some photos of the smaller swamp scenes. I found a little spot that was full of frogs, lizards and dragonflies. The frogs were so thick, they were jumping on my legs. It was cool until I saw a little snake chasing one. After that, I didn't want any more frogs on my pants.

The rain killed my fiddle music venture, but it was a welcome change. It rained so hard on my tin roof that it rumbled inside. I fell asleep listening to it. I woke up in the evening and spent the rest of the time till dark sharing my guitar noise with the frogs and gators from my little wooden dock.

Tomorrow I check out and leave for my little tin shack in Breaux Bridge. It also has a dock on the bayou.

Lousiana Day 2 I saw something in the swamp that will haunt me

Im having some trouble getting photos uploaded using my new tablet and blog app. I have my own IT team, but she didn't want to come on this trip. I got to watch the sunrise in the swamp - it was beautiful. It was as loud as it was striking. Just before the sun comes up, every creature in the swamp starts to call or sing - birds, frogs, bees, crickets--even the fish chime in with a big splash every once in a while. The fish jump so often that I managed to catch a photo of one in mid air.
I drove into Pierre Part. This back-water area is now well known since Troy Landry hunts gators there on the TV show Swamp People. I had made arrangements to meet up with a guy from near Baton Rouge. I had never met him, but had gotten to know him via email and text. I had sent him a couple of Reborn guitars last year and kept in contact. For the past month, he had been texting me phone pics from the area, cafe menus, event flyers and other stuff to help me plan my trip. He offered to bring over his boat and drive me around the swamp. Of course I couldn't pass that up.
John showed up right on time with a boat, an ice chest full to the top and a beautiful wife. I figured out quickly that he and I had a lot in common, not the least being that when it comes to wives, we are both playing way out of our leagues :) But as it turned out, John didn't bring her along just for her looks. Susan proved to be a great deck hand and knowledgeable about most everything I wanted to ask about. After meeting these two folks, I was ready to move here - they both look about half their age. John told me Susan looked so young because he treated her so well, and that she never had to worry or want for anything. The reply look on Susan's face told me it might just be genetics.
Before we headed into the swamp, John and Susan treated me to lunch at Landry's Cafe. I had a mountain-sized plate of crawfish and an iced tea. We also had frog legs and fried gator. Wow what a meal.
After lunch we launched the boat and in short order we were deep in a bayou. The water was narrow, with moss-covered cypress trees thick on both sides. Everything was green and full of life. It was hot, but I could hardly sit my camera down long enough to get a drink. There was something flying, splashing, calling or wiggling almost constantly. I took about 300 pictures. We saw egrets, ibises and bald eagles, turtles and snakes. We saw lots of gators but they were pretty quick to slip under the surface. John did manage to slip us up close to a big one and I got some nice pictures. Later in the day we happened onto and epic bayou battle - a large water snake was locked in mortal combat with a fat catfish. We watched from just a few feet away as they twisted and splashed. The snake had a death grip and was determined that the fish was going to be dinner. They finally slipped deep into the vegetation.
Toward evening, we were deep in the back of a dead-end bayou and I saw something that will likely haunt me the rest of my life. This was the type of sickening site that you just cant shake. On the edge of the water was a large boat that someone had abandoned years ago. Most of it was sunk below the surface, but the bow still swayed above the water. On top of the weathered and moss covered bow, sat a complete drum set. Someone had thrown away a perfectly good drum kit and there was no way for me to salvage it! I'm sure I will have nightmares tonight. Ewww, I shiver just to write about it.