We read that the Louisiana State Museum has an exhibit about the history of Mardi Gras, and about Hurricane Katrina.

The Museum is housed in several buildings, but we headed to the one in the Presbytere, which is in the French Quarter along Jackson Square, beside St . Louis Cathedral. It gets its name from being built on the site of the residence, or presbytere, of the Capuchin monks (although it was never used as a religious residence). It became part of the Louisiana State Museum in 1911.

We spent most of our time there looking at the Katrina exhibit. Some pretty sobering stuff. What got me were the audio recordings of stories told by people who were trapped when the storm hit, or who were part of the rescue effort. We've heard before since we're here that it wasn't the storm that caused the devastation - it was the poor planning and failure of the measures that had been put in place to handle the water when it rose. This was emphasized in the exhibit too.

The main problems were that all three of the levees that were supposed to handle the water failed, and once the city was flooded (up to 13 ft in Ward 9, the area worst hit), the emergency measures were a disaster themselves . There was no organization. The Superdome was supposed to handle a couple hundred or a thousand emergency evacuees, but thousands and thousands (20,000) of people arrirved because they had nowhere else to go. The power and water quit, so everyone had to urinate and defacate in the open. People were trying to sleep and live in there for days. The stench was apparently horrible, and they didn't have a way to evacuate people other than the critically ill. People who stayed in their houses had to escape the water thru the attics to their rooftops, where they waited for days to be rescued.

After being emotionally overwhelmed by the Katrina exhibit, we went to the Mardi Gras exhibit, but we weren't really in much of a mood to look at party stuff at that point. It had explanations of the history, photos and examples of the costumes, floats, etc. Tomorrow there are several Mardi Gras parades in and around New Orleans, so we are planning to try to take another one in. Hopefully we'll get to see it this time!