Saturday, February 28, 2009

Mardi Gras 2009

Hey everyone! So Mardi Gras weekend was last weekend, and I think I've finally recovered from all the madness. Mardi Gras was fun as always.

So let's recap. One of my really good friends from grade school, Yana, came to visit me for the weekend. She flew in on Friday night and stayed until Sunday evening. Basically, on Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday, we went to parades and caught lots of beads. The picture below is of my friends Amanda, Regen, and Meghan (apparently all wind-swept) after a parade on Saturday night. Notice that Meghan caught a feather boa... I was so jealous!

Here is a picture of my friend Ashleigh and me on one of the parade routes:


Here is a picture of one of the floats that we saw on Saturday:

On Sunday, I actually went to the French Quarter during the day to show Yana around, and she absolutely loved the French Market and the performers across from Jackson Square. It was a lot of fun; she's even planning our Mardi Gras costumes for Senior year!

On Tuesday, a few of my friends and I planned to go to the Zulu parade which was at 8 in the morning, but we were so exhausted that instead we just stayed on campus all day and ordered in Chinese food for dinner.

All in all, it was a great Mardi Gras, but I'm glad we're all back to reality now... well, kind of glad because now I have to study for an organic chemistry quiz on Monday and a sociology midterm on Tuesday.

Sunday, February 15, 2009

Community Service Scholars and CACTUS projects

So I don't know if y'all know this, but I am a community service scholar. What exactly does that mean? (In case you don't want to click on the link). Well, I'm here at Tulane with a scholarship for doing community service work in high school (I was really involved with this organization which put on Girl's Economic Power Day that taught high school girls how to deal with all things relating to money).

What being a scholar entails is having to do forty hours of community service a year, going to various development meetings, and getting a mentor who would help me develop my own communtiy service project here at Tulane.

Last year, my mentor was a Senior named Brittany who I still am in contact with is one of my best resources even though she graduated. She was the project coordinator of the Big Brothers/Big Sisters program at Tulane under our big community service organization the Community Action Council of Tulane University Students (CACTUS) and so I got involved with both Big Brothers/Big Sisters and CACTUS.

Now, my mentor is my friend Seth (pictured below) who has deemed himself my "life coach" and tells me that I need chill out because he thinks I do too much.



He is also a project coordinator of a project called Paint Rally which is a great project where we go out and paint schools almost every Saturday (contact him at srushton@tulane.edu or me if you are in town and want to volunteer a Saturday with us at Paint Rally!). Below is a cute picture of my roommate, Arielle, when she came to help paint a school (obviously not a clean task)


Basically, I love doing community service work and am glad I get to go somewhere where community service is really valued and needed. I have met some of my best friends doing community service and had a great time while also getting to make a difference. What else could you ask for?

Saturday, February 7, 2009

Mardi Gras 101

Mardi Gras is coming up in a little over two weeks, and I am very excited! So, I thought would write about my past Mardi Gras experience to give you a little insight into what Mardi Gras has been like for me.

Since I am only a sophomore, I have only had one Mardi Gras last year, and it was so much fun! Everyone has this idea (at least I did) that Mardi Gras was spent on Bourbon St. doing things only seen on Girls Gone Wild to get a string of beads, when in fact, it is much more family friendly and less scandalous than that altogether.

It might be a little hard to believe, but believe it! I only went down to the French Quarter once during Mardi Gras last year and it was during the daytime before any of the parades started just so that a friend of mine from out of town could see what the Quarter looked like. Mostly, we spend Mardi Gras on St. Charles St. where the street is lined with tents and lawn chairs and barbeques and families waiting on the parade route. It's a lot of fun - kind of like a picnic except that everyone in New Orleans is invited! Below is a picture of Arielle and Amanda and me coming home from a parade last year (notice the abundance of beads!)


Here are a few fun facts about Mardi Gras:

- The actual date of Mardi Gras this year is Tuesday, the 24, but parades started running as early as this weekend! (the first being Krewe du Vieux) As a Tulane student we actually get school off on Monday the 23 and the next day!
- The parades that are the centerpieces of Mardi Gras festivities are run by social clubs called "krewes". Examples include the Knights of Sparta, the Krewe of Pegasus, and Krewe of Orpheus. These krewes also hold balls (usually masquerade) throughout the Mardi Gras season. Below is a picture of my friend Gerardo and me at a masquerade ball that Tulane put on last year.


- Gold, green, and purple are the colors of Mardi Gras!
- Despite what people think, all you need to do to get beads during Mardi Gras is stand there and hold out your hand! Seriously! You catch so many beads! In fact, most people bring ladders for the height advantage (the little kids who sit on ladders get the best beads!!)
- They don't just throw beads at people from parade floats! They throw weird trinkets, stuffed animals, cups, frisbees... you name it! At this one parade, Zulu, they throw coconuts to a few lucky few in the crowd! Of course, my friends and I managed to catch four between the four of us! (The one with the eyelashes and braids is mine! It's actually still sitting on my bookshelf!)


So that's a little bit about Mardi Gras! Did I mention I'm excited!