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I was in Biloxi about 2 weeks before Katrina late July or early august of 05, I remember it still felt like summer and was hot, I had stayed at one of the older motels across the road from the ocean with my girl, I remember I walked the beach in flip-flops and a tank top and went into the Presidential like that and shot craps, I remember swimming in the motel pool with my girl and some young kids, happened to be afro American kids from the hood just a few blocks behind the strip, funny how the socio economics change so fast there.
The kids came to swim while the parents and extended family sat around the pool talking about their casino evening plans and I was letting them jump off my shoulders and throwing them with their parents acknowledging nod, I remember one young boy told me he didn't like the deep end, he said please don't throw me in the deep end mister.
I said ok, but why, can't you swim, he said NO, I said you need to know how to swim and he asked me why, I said it could be important one day and everyone should know how to swim and I tried to show him how to swim and tread water, he got the treading down but just couldn't swim, he would get scared and give up every time......I had no idea that hurricane was going to be there just weeks later or I would have spent longer trying to teach him, I wonder if he survived, I wonder if he remembers me.....I hope he survived and I will never forget him asking me why, that still haunts me.
I did go back months after the storm and although casino row and New Orleans was destroyed they had bourbon street up and running, you could drive away from the tourist area and everything was blacked out, no streetlights, they had 4 way stop signs hammered in with dead stoplights still overhead, abandoned cars, 100's of them, late model even, were pushed up under the overhead causeway and you could see miles of blacked out houses and apartments along the interstate, I would get off and see the occasional RV and generator in a driveway, the rest was dark and abandoned.
These are Biloxi, I used to make a lot of casino trips, I have other pics that are from film and have to be scanned, it was really something to see, like Armageddon, the 5th ward was really bad, they bulldozed houses down that weren't scrubbed from the earth, some lots were just scrubbed to the slab by the storm.
These were taken in November of 2006 with a cell phone, my 1st with a cam I do believe, I have more pics from earlier trips the year before but they were on film and I have not scanned the pics, the amount of damage was hard to believe without seeing, but where the water stopped smashing stuff life went on as usual, just a lot more local business as people cleaned up.
This was taken from on top of the Beau Rivage parking deck.
This was Treasure Island Casino, looked like a pirate ship, it's flat gone.
The kids came to swim while the parents and extended family sat around the pool talking about their casino evening plans and I was letting them jump off my shoulders and throwing them with their parents acknowledging nod, I remember one young boy told me he didn't like the deep end, he said please don't throw me in the deep end mister.
I said ok, but why, can't you swim, he said NO, I said you need to know how to swim and he asked me why, I said it could be important one day and everyone should know how to swim and I tried to show him how to swim and tread water, he got the treading down but just couldn't swim, he would get scared and give up every time......I had no idea that hurricane was going to be there just weeks later or I would have spent longer trying to teach him, I wonder if he survived, I wonder if he remembers me.....I hope he survived and I will never forget him asking me why, that still haunts me.
I did go back months after the storm and although casino row and New Orleans was destroyed they had bourbon street up and running, you could drive away from the tourist area and everything was blacked out, no streetlights, they had 4 way stop signs hammered in with dead stoplights still overhead, abandoned cars, 100's of them, late model even, were pushed up under the overhead causeway and you could see miles of blacked out houses and apartments along the interstate, I would get off and see the occasional RV and generator in a driveway, the rest was dark and abandoned.
These are Biloxi, I used to make a lot of casino trips, I have other pics that are from film and have to be scanned, it was really something to see, like Armageddon, the 5th ward was really bad, they bulldozed houses down that weren't scrubbed from the earth, some lots were just scrubbed to the slab by the storm.
These were taken in November of 2006 with a cell phone, my 1st with a cam I do believe, I have more pics from earlier trips the year before but they were on film and I have not scanned the pics, the amount of damage was hard to believe without seeing, but where the water stopped smashing stuff life went on as usual, just a lot more local business as people cleaned up.
This was taken from on top of the Beau Rivage parking deck.
This was Treasure Island Casino, looked like a pirate ship, it's flat gone.
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