Beyond Katrina

Wonderful World Jazz Foundation - Part II

By: Yoshi Toyama

Preservation Hall Kids, 1999

We started sending horns for children of New Orleans, when we saw them with out instruments. ( It was puzzling to me that kids living in the birthplace of jazz had either beaten up instruments or none at all???) The schools used to have good instruments 35 years ago when we lived there, I know for I've seen lots of school bands with shiny horns marching at Mardi Gras.

When we started our foundation, fans of Louis Armstrong and New Orleans Jazz, New Orleans - Pop's birthplace - was one of the most dangerous towns in the USA. A Japanese student, Yoshihiro Hattori was shot to death in Baton Rouge in 1994. Louis Armstrong Park got so dangerous foreign tourists were shot to death there.  In the neighbourhoods where we used to follow Jazz Parades (the sane way), at the entrance of the schools (elementary all the way to highschools) you would see "NO DRUG NO GUNS" signs just like traffic signs.

We made up our mind to do something, and decided to use the message " Horns for Guns" as our foundation's main mission, as well as to enjoy Satchmo's music.

I was born in 1944, my wife Keiko in 1942, and we grew up with Jazz. Our generation had to live through the hardest times after World War II, but we were saved by the happy swing of Jazz, the biggest cultural aids from USA, as well as economical aids from your country. Also, a big part of our generation had the good fortune to have the highest education through your country's study abroad programs,  such as Fulbright. We also were able to have rich life growing up having chances to enjoy all kinds of American culture such as Hollywood films and so on. We, ourselves had a chance to learn jazz in Birthplace of Jazz!!! And every body was so kind including jazz fans, and "Old Timer" Jazz Musicians who were from the same generation with Louis.

I'll never forget when we arrived at Port of New Port, Los Angeles, by immigrant boat "Brazil Maru" which was the most inexpensive way to go to the USA. ( It was unbelievably expensive in the 360 yen to a dollar days -On our salaries of 17,000 yen a month the cost was 100,000 yen one way). Before coming to Los Angeles , we did not know there wasn't any transportation like what we have in Japan  - no trains and buses, so when we first arrived we had to sit on our suitcases and think.

I had a phone number for an Los Angeles jazz club member so I called them. Members of Southern California Jazz Society took us strangers in like we were their family, just because we loved jazz and pops (Louis Armstrong), and because we were going to New Orleans to study jazz. They took us to New Orleans square in Disneyland to listen to Teddy Buckner's Jazz Band play. Buckner looked just like Louis Armstrong. It is unbelievable that we got the job playing the same spot in Tokyo Disneyland 20 years later! They took us on an overnight trip to Palm Springs for the jazz party there. After a week of being treated like VIP's there were lots of tears as we prepared to leave for New Orleans.

The next morning when we woke up, they had gone to work leaving us two strangers in their house, and they even left $10 on kitchen table for us to spend!! Many Japanese--- musicians, scholars, politicians, business men, restaurant owner, artists have this kind of experience from generous American people, and they all wants to say THANKS to USA.

When we started "Horns for Guns" we were starting to feel the USA we all knew was changing and we felt a little sad about that for the people in the USA had not changed - it was still the same happy, generous, great people. I wanted them to know WE Japanese want to Say Thanks to USA, and also we wanted people who live in danger of guns and drugs to remember Louis Armstrong's life. Armstrong learned to play the trumpet in a home for wayward boys and then went on to become the greatest musician ever.

When we started concerts for Hurricane Katrina, our activities were covered by many Television stations and newspapers as they've known about our past activities in sending horns to New Orleans. As a result, many people, bands, festivals, and jazz organizations from all all over Japan have sent us donations.

To Be Continued...

To view other posts by Yoshio Toyama click here.

Yoshio Toyama and his wife Keiko apprenticed for 5 years at Preservation Hall in New Orleans, "hanging out" with the likes of Percy Humphrey and "Sweet Emma Barret" Yoshio's playing and singing style is influenced by the musical legacy of the legendary Louis Armstrong. The couple are currently sending musical instruments and donations from Japan to aid in Katrina recovery through their Wonderful World Jazz Foundation.

Hope Floats in New Orleans?

Over the past few days Beyond Katrina's focus has been to look backwards via the lens of photographer Matthew White's amazing photographs and accompanying stories. As I posted his photo-essays I couldn't help but notice a theme emerging - it is the obselence of of some of Louisiana's most unique settlements and monuments, now part of a by-gone era, no thanks to Katrina's impact.

For counter-balance then, I felt it would be only fitting to pause a moment to look forward to the future. That opportunity came today in the form of an article featured in Baton Rouge's local newspaper The Advocate: The title reads Professor: N.O. ideal for buoyant houses.

Yep, you've got it - floating houses! It's an interesting idea albeit rather unorthodox. But then again New Orleans is a rather unorthodox city. After all we've built this city on rock and roll - and not the kind Eric Clapton is famous for. Hmmm...I see I've got a spot of humor on today!

In all seriousness though,  the Netherlands have already adopted the concept so it isn't that far fetched. I'll say no more - the article is quite interesting and very thorough. You should read it here. Oh and be sure and check back in, leave a word or two in the comment section,  and let me know what you think about the concept! 

A Story to Haunt & Heal...

Following my rant about blogging and storytelling, Rick Portier graciously sent me a story he "penned" about his experience in a Baton Rouge shelter post-Katrina: 

It's amazing what people will tell you when you wink at them through a long piece of glass.  As the quiet half of a television news team, I've had the honor and privilege to be privy to the best and worst moments of peoples' lives.  Even today, more than a year after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita ravaged the Louisiana coast, those stories have the power to haunt and heal.

I was one of the lucky news crews, or so I thought.  I wouldn't be heading into the teeth of Katrina.  My bosses needed me to document events here in Baton Rouge.  After a week in evacuation an evacuation shelter, I was wishing I was in New Orleans.

The one place news coverage fell short was telling evacuees stories.  Those days in the shelters were truly the most emotionally draining days I have ever experienced -- even more tragic than 9/11.

A never-ending line of people stretched half way around the Baton Rouge River Center.  To a person, they were tired, frustrated and lost.  Some had bed head.  Others wore bed clothes.  Some carried small bags.  Others had only the clothes on their backs.  Each face held a story of fear, fear of the storm they had fled, fear of what they fled to, and fear of an uncertain future.

The line continued inside through a maze of armed police and National Guardsmen.  Evacuees murmured questions about procedures and loved ones as they began the paper trail that would help them re-connect with missing family members...if they were still alive.

In the main arena, 5000 people who had just lost everything they had ever known; homes, possessions, family paced the floors with expressionless faces.  Imagine fitting all you own between two cots on an eight-by-eight slice of linoleum.  All had harrowing stories.

My reporter and I set-up shop.  We rolled tape on anyone who wanted to talk.  Surprisingly, there were many who wanted to unburden their souls.

One of the first to step up was a hulking black man with hands the size of bear paws.  The expression on his face was incongruous with his size.  What could such an imposing man have to fear.  His massive shoulders hung with the weight of his new world. His family was safe with him.  He was worried about his neighbor.  As the waters rose in his neighborhood he heard cries from across the street.  His bed-ridden neighbor had not heeded early warnings.  Now the nearly 300 pound man was trapped in his home.   The water in the street was waist deep.  The sobbing man in front of my lens waded across the street and carried his neighbor to his own home. He pushed the man through a window as the water rose near his chest.  Inside the house furniture floated across the living room.  It was clear they didn't have much longer.  He loaded his neighbor onto his back and climbed to the second floor, then the attic.  Like so many others, he searched the house for anything that he might use to break through the roof.  He somehow managed to remove a roof vent.  He showed us the cuts on his enormous hands.  With his bare hands, he punched, and clawed, and broke, and tore a hole big enough to lift his neighbor through.  They waited for two days to be rescued.

Another man was attracted by our television lights.  He had been luckier.  His home had not been flooded, an island in an ocean of human misery.  He watched out of his kitchen window as looters beat his neighbor to death.

Around 11 that morning, Arch-bishop Alfred Hughes from New Orleans and Bishop Robert Meunch from Baton Rouge came to pray for the souls of those who didn't make it through the storm and ask for God's grace on those who did.  It was the first time in a 17-year career shooting news that I ever turned my camera off in the middle of a story.  I couldn't shoot.  My reporter couldn't write.  We could only cry with them.

I turned my camera off many more times in the week I spent at the shelter.  As much as the people parading in front of my lens needed to tell their stories, they needed someone to listen even more.  They needed a hug.  They needed a human response, not the bureaucratic answers from emergency workers.

Just outside the range of our microphone, a tall, slender grandfather was preparing a baby's bottle.  The grandfather's afro was mashed in on the right side of his head.  It spread out wide on the left like it was reaching for something.  His pants were baggy, and he needed a shave.  He never ventured to tell us his story, but my reporter and I watched him feed, change and care for his grandchild.  He wouldn't offer any details as to how they ended up here.  He didn't know where the child's parents were.  They were separated during the evacuation.  There was nothing he wanted, nothing he needed -- Maybe a phone call.  We both offered our cell phones, but it was pretty useless.  Communications were down through most of south Louisiana.  The lines that worked were jammed.  By the end of the week, we had adopted them. 

We were constantly asked for news.  The truth was we didn't know much more than what was unfolding in front of our lens.  We witnessed a few reunions, but many more tears. Of all the images from that week, the roof-top rescues, third world conditions at the Superdome and Convention Center, the citizens flotilla, nothing haunts me more than the glazed-over eyes, tear streaked cheeks and expressionless faces I go to know inside the Baton Rouge River Center.

Rick Portier is a television news photographer in Baton Rouge.  For more of his stories and rants see his personal blog at  http://turdpolisher.blogspot.com/

A Reader's Rants

Publisher's note: The following post was submitted by friend and Rennaissance woman, Michele Fry. Michele also generously shared her photo-journal of Katrina's damage to Slidell/Mandeville, Louisiana and Waveland, Mississippi at this post.

The other day there was a special CNN report on the new Girl's Leadership School that Oprah has opened in Kenya.  It was an hour long report of how she designed the school, worked with the architects to realize her vision, interviewed all the girls, and selected the teachers. 

The program ws 100% positive information for a full hour about what she's been doing with her time and money to solve the social problems she sees. It was all about vision and generosity and independence.  It made me feel absolutely wonderful.  It also made me realize how we are so inundated with bad news 24-7 despite all the good news and heroic, heartwarming things that happen every single day -- it has to make a difference in our depression level and mistrust of one another. 

I yearn to hear about the manufacturers who keep on making those FEMA trailers, and building all that heavy equipment.  The driver training schools where folks learn to operate the heavy equipment.  How the Corps of Engineers is on the job every day figuring out new solutions.  How the government is finally reviewing it's ability to respond quickly, and getting rid of red tape. How did we get all the red tape in the first place?  Wasn't it to appease a public  screaming for "accountability"?  How do we weigh the cry for accountability against the need to be nimble? 

These questions keep percolating through my mind. Are private institutions and individuals doing anything to help themselves?  Would things be better if we depended less on government?  What if private groups and organizations decided to take matters into their own hands, like Oprah did?  Is anyone doing it?  This is supposed to be the great American experiment, where free enterprise comes up with solutions faster and better than any other system.  Who is singing about that?  Who says federal government has to resolve all our problems?

I mentioned to a friend of mine the other day that a  light bulb needed changing at public facility. She said,  "they'll have to put in a work order, which will take 2 weeks to process, so   I'll just bring a few light bulbs and we can change it ourselves!!!"

One of the most damaging effects of Katrina, to me, is the notion that people are helpless  and the federal government is responsible for saving everyone from every disaster.  This  mentality has been successfully projected onto the whole country now, discussed and accepted as a given, undisputed by any voice I've heard. We are all reduced to helpless children.  We are supposed to just stand in line and sign papers and wait to be assisted. We have psychologically given up our power, and given it all to government. Bye, Bye America.  The experiment of freedom is over.

We fear.  We doubt.  We are oppressed by all the bad news. How to turn that around? For me, focusing on<as much good news as possible, and as often as possible, without being an ostrich, sounds like a wonderful, uplifting plan.

17th Street Canal Bell Memorial

The photograph was submitted by NOLA blogger, Mark Folse. The caption reads "A purple and gold, fluer-de-lis votive candle on the railing of the bridge over the 17th Street Canal at the levee breech, with the cofferdamn temporary repair seen in the backround. I found this on the morning of 8-29-2006 as I arrived to attend the memorial service on the anniversary of the Federal Flood". Mark has some great video footage of the bell service and other NOLA anniversary happenings on his blog. You really should check it out here.