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WATCH | Love Letter to New Orleans
essencemagazine
Follow
2/6/2025
Everyone knows that those blessed and highly favored enough to be born Black and raised in the 504 don’t suffer fools gladly when it comes to their beloved city.
Category
🛠️
Lifestyle
Transcript
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00:00
New Orleans, girl, you are the sound, the sample, the reference, the recipe, the accent,
00:21
the source and the soul, your influences in a little bit of everything, but ain't nowhere
00:26
like you in the world. You showed them how to stunt, how to heal, resist, rebuild, how to yag,
00:38
how to take needle and thread and ruin rice and create culture, how to scratch. You are free as
00:44
day. You are yesterday and tomorrow, the example of what could be. You are celebration and sorrow,
00:53
black New Orleans, something else. You are home and you are forever.
01:10
First question is, I want you to describe your love for New Orleans. My love for New Orleans
01:17
runs deep. It's the most unique place in the world. Being from New Orleans is definitely a
01:22
superpower. No matter where you go out in the world, people are always inspired and impressed
01:27
and intrigued by what being from New Orleans means. What does America lose if it loses New
01:40
Orleans? America loses its soul. If America loses New Orleans, it loses a vital organ,
01:49
and not that it wouldn't be able to still be alive, but the quality of life is extremely compromised.
02:11
Boom. This is special. We have inherited something here in this city,
02:22
and sometimes we forget about it because it happened a long, long time ago, and it happened
02:28
just after the slavery. But our way of expressing ourselves came out, and we were free to do it,
02:35
and we did it, and we still are. That's the special thing for me.
03:06
What's special to you about the culture of New Orleans? Oh, my goodness.
03:10
For me, I think there's a certain kind of freedom that we have here in New Orleans,
03:16
and when I say that, I'm talking about what you see when we're dancing,
03:21
you know, and what you see when we're just standing still.
03:27
I think what makes us so unique and special here in New Orleans is that we are the most
03:32
resilient people on this planet. No matter what's going on in our city, in this world, we still.
03:46
It's like we still continue on with our everyday lives. We still continue on with culture,
03:51
our traditions, and that's what keeps us grounded here in the city.
04:04
So much of who I am is directly tied to this city. New Orleans has played such a crucial role,
04:11
you know, historically, spiritually, culturally. It's so important, you know, to emphasize just
04:18
what this city really is and what it can and will be. You know, they say that New Orleans is the
04:24
northernmost Caribbean island or the most African city in America, and I think that is part of what
04:32
makes us unique. We have managed to retain, right, so much of our diasporic connections,
04:43
and not just to Africa, but around the world.
04:49
This place would not lift off the page if the ancestors were not alive and well.
04:53
New Orleans stands on the backs of the ancestors. They have nothing to sell if it wasn't for the
05:01
ancestors. The number one export out this sucker is culture, culture, culture, culture.
06:12
So
06:42
you
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