DukeEngage NOLA 2016

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Reflecting on NOLA - Jared

Hey everyone! I’m Jared, one of the rising juniors who has worked as an intern at the Children’s Hospital. Living in New Orleans the past two months has been incredible; I love the work I have been doing, the Duke students in the program, the exploration of the city, the amazing food, the culture, the music, and so much more. There has been so much to do in and outside of work, and I have felt like the summer has passed by so quickly. I truly could not have asked for a better place to work and live in for the summer.

In particular, my work in the Children’s Hospital has created many new experiences and been such a great place to be immersed and gain exposure in the clinical setting. Some of my responsibilities include supervising/training volunteers, visiting patients bedside, communicating with patient families to ensure patient satisfaction, running the activity rooms for the pediatric patients, doing office work in the Child Life department and other relevant duties. However, because it is a dynamic hospital environment, each day I am often involved in different tasks – some days I work more in the office, and others more with patients. Because of this, I rarely find myself struggling to find work to do, as there always seems to be something that can be done.

But I think what I enjoy most about being here in the Children’s Hospital is really getting to meet new patients each week. Many patients stay from anywhere between 3 days to 2 weeks (sometimes more), so I am constantly seeing new faces and getting to know children from many different parts of Louisiana and surrounding states. While some may be only 2 years old (and can’t really talk), many others are older children/teenagers who I often to talk to about interesting aspects of their life. For me, being able to meet these new people is what makes this job truly exciting.

Outside of work, I have absolutely loved getting to go to new restaurants and visiting new places. Jamabalaya, gumbo, poboys, beignets, fried chicken, snowballs, and oysters have just been a few of the foods we have gotten to try in New Orleans. I don’t think there has been one meal (outside of my own cooking, which has been edible/mediocre at best) that I have not loved. So much of New Orleans culture revolves around food, and so it is no surprise that the food here is anything short of amazing. I am just so glad that other students in this DukeEngage program have been just as excited about exploring the many different food options here as I have been.

As for the experiences/places we have been to, there have certainly been many different memories made. Some of my favorites include: the swamp tour, the plantation tour, going to clubs/bars on Buorbon and Frenchmen Street, eating at Café Du Monde, riding surrey bikes at City Park, going to a jazz concert, walking in a second line parade, feeding a giraffe as Audubon Zoo, going to Running of the Bulls (where girls on skates hit you with plastic bats haha), fireworks at the Riverwalk and the ghost tour. As I look back on each of the things we’ve done, I realize that I have loved each and every one of those amazing experiences. Nearly all those experiences have been for the first time, and I am so happy that I was able to have that here in NOLA with the close friends I’ve made in the program.

With just a week or so more to go, I know that I am going to miss everything about being part of the DukeEngage program here in New Orleans. Whether it was late nights at nearby clubs, watching romantic drama movies with our group, eating beignets for the first time or spending time talking with a patient about her high school experience, I know that these times are going to be sorely missed. However, I am so thankful that I’ve gotten the chance to be a part of this program. I applied to a Duke Engage program 3 times before getting into this one (yes, it’s possible haha; I applied international twice and domestic once) and I couldn’t imagine a better fit. For anyone interested in this program: if you have any reservations about this program… don’t. It is going to be one of the best experiences you can have in a summer - I know that it has for me.

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Numbers

By Tasia Isbell

I have always had an obsession with numbers. When things in life didn’t add up, numbers always could. Two plus three always equals five. Thirty-nine minus two always equals 37; and if you follow the order of operations the sum of three plus four raised to the third power plus 215 always equals 558.

Yet as I grow older, numbers don’t make quite as much sense anymore.

Two plus three equals five—but how does that warrant the actions of two cops taking away the life of a father of five children?

Thirty-nine minus two equals 37—but does it really when the thirty seven years of Alton Sterling’s life were cut short by two cops, six fatal shots, and society’s disheartening track record of police brutality and a disregard for the humanity of black bodies.

When did the third and fourth letters in the alphabet—CDs—warrant taking a life?

Why is Sterling the 558th person to be shot and killed by police this year?

I try and make sense of these numbers as I type them over and over into my calculator.

I type the number five and I see the faces of Sterling’s children. I type 37 and see Sterling’s smile, his humanity. I type 558 and I see Sandra Bland, Tamir Rice, Michael Brown, and Freddie Gray; I see a list with no foreseeable end in sight, I see silence, I see inequality, I see CDs, cigarettes, a minor traffic stop, and just being Black in America as a signature on a death certificate.

I type these numbers into my calculator. Click. Clack. Click. Clack. I get no answer.

I hit each key; I hear the clamor of injustice.

I continue typing in the hope that a solution will appear.

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Thoughts from the NO/AIDS Taskforce

By Michelle Li

The first day of work I texted my program director after I had successfully arrived at my office. She texted back, “Welcome to the infamous Tulane and Broad!” Another time Rishi, who also works at the same nonprofit as I do, told his uber driver to take him to Tulane and Broad. The driver did a double take. Tulane and Broad Street is a notorious intersection: the city’s courthouse and prison sits right at that corner, directly across the street from where we work. The proximity is not a coincidence. I work at the NO/AIDS Taskforce which works to prevent and treat HIV/AIDS. The United States incarcerates the most people in the world. Louisiana incarcerates the most people of all 50 states in America. And New Orleans incarcerates the most people in all of Louisiana. Louisiana’s incarceration rate is 5 times that of China, and 13 times that of Iran –countries that aren’t exactly known for being bulwarks of human rights and social justice. Following Katrina, the prison systems have increasingly become privatized (shout out to Bobby Jindal), and the for-profit prison industry is now worth up to $180 million dollars a year, or 180 million incentives to keep prisoners flowing into prisons. In addition Louisiana spends the least amount of money per prisoner per day than any other state in the country, with little of the money going towards rehabilitation, education, psychiatry, medical care, or other programs that would help decrease the staggering recidivism rate. Louisiana also has some of the harshest penalties for crimes. To put their sentences in context, Texas, which has the fourth highest incarceration rate in the country, has a maximum sentence of 1 year for car burglary. In Louisiana, the maximum sentence is 12 years. It’s not a coincidence that Louisiana has the highest incarceration rate in the country and the highest rate of HIV/AIDS infection. Prisoners are 5-7x more likely to contract HIV. And once they are released, they risk spreading the infection to the communities that they return to. Which brings me back to Tulane and Broad. The incarceration rate and rate of HIV infection are closely intertwined. Fitting that the prison in the “prison capital of the world” would be right across the street from the oldest HIV/AIDS service organization in the gulf south. If one were to turn to the government for help in solving the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Louisiana, they would be (shocker!) greatly disappointed. The government helps perpetuate stigma instead of reducing it. HIV criminalization laws still exist—it is illegal for a HIV positive individual to spit at someone else, even though HIV absolutely cannot be transmitted through saliva. In 2013, an HIV positive woman was arrested for scratching her boyfriend in self-defense. The case became not about the domestic abuse she suffered, but instead about how she was trying to infect her boyfriend and the responding police officers, subsequently criminalizing her for being HIV positive. Carrying condoms is considered grounds for suspicion of being an illegal sex worker in New Orleans, making it that much harder for high-risk individuals to protect themselves from infection. Possession of a needle or syringe for a non-medical purpose is illegal, and the individual will be charged with possession regardless of whether they have drugs on their body. This increases the rate of sharing needles. While both the CDC and WHO recommend syringe exchange programs so people can obtain needles, the entire city of New Orleans only has one such program (run by NO/AIDS yay). It’s only open 2 hours a week and despite having a special relationship with New Orleans Police, due to drug paraphernalia laws it still runs (to quote my boss) “borderline illegally.”   I could go on. I haven’t even talked about the lack of sexual health education in schools, institutionalized racism that’s reflected in the race disparity among those infected with HIV, or the way in which Hurricane Katrina (or as my boss calls it “that bitch Katrina”) disrupted care for so many people. Not to mention the way that poverty amplifies and is conducive to the spread of HIV/AIDS in the way that it disrupts access to healthcare—if you’re worried about where you’re going to sleep, if you’re going to eat, if you’re going to get shot, getting tested or making a doctor’s appointment is the furthest thing on your mind. Oh yeah, Louisiana is the second most impoverished state in the country. I came in very aware that I wasn’t going to be able to make a difference. My privilege, my background, the shortness of my stay made it almost certain that I was not going to change anything. And I was okay with that because I felt that even if I helped somebody in the organization a tiny bit, I was contributing to the mission of the nonprofit. And I was confident that NO/AIDS was working to change things. But this organization has existed for over 30 years. Louisiana still has the highest rate of infection. Baton Rouge and New Orleans still rank in the top 5 most infected cities, as they have for years. The new governor who was elected after Bobby Jindal left to pursue a (tbh god-awful and disastrous) presidential run chose to expand Medicaid in January. But progress is slow or seems nonexistent. I don’t want to belittle the efforts of NO/AIDS at all because I have been truly inspired by their work and those who passionately carry it out. But the staggering weight of all the systemic factors that go into the prevalence of this disease still exist. And it made me realize that sometimes change is too lofty of a goal. Instead all you can do is try to mitigate the disaster and the consequences. And I’m still trying to figure out how. On a lighter note some ~random~ things: - Mojo Coffee House has the most BOMB lemonade. They squeeze it fresh and serve it in giant mason jars which made the hidden basic girl in me very happy - We went to a jazz club and saw Charmaine Neville perform. AND THEN SHE INVITED US TO HER HOUSE FOR DINNER. It was amazing. (If you google her you will come across news coverage of her absolutely insane Katrina experience)  Check out her page: http://www.charmainenevilleband.com/index.html - The dorm we live in also has Yale and Columbia students living there. All of us watched the NBA finals together, and I think they were very taken aback/scared(??) of how intensely we got into basketball - Me and Liz have been alienated by the rest of our DukeEngage group because they don’t understand what a great song All in My Head (Flex) by Fifth Harmony is (OK it’s kind of trash but so catchy) - My shoe fell apart when I was walking in downtown New Orleans, and I had to walk 5 blocks barefoot and now I feel like I need a tetanus shot or something - If you want to learn more about some of the things I discussed in my blog post here are two really great articles: o http://www.nola.com/crime/index.ssf/2012/05/louisiana_is_the_worlds_prison.html o https://aeon.co/essays/how-new-orleans-became-america-s-ground-zero-for-hiv

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Intent vs. Impact

By Samayra Siddiqui

“Hey, how are you?” Make a quick smile and answer “Good.” “Good morning!” “Morning.” He seemed harmless. “Hey baby, that’s a real pretty dress.” Avoid eye contact. Don’t react. “Alright then, guess you don’t want to talk. Have a good day.” Wait, what?

I was told that people are affable here, that strangers will talk to you on the street, but I’ll be able to tell when it isn’t just a friendly gesture. Unfortunately, it hasn’t been that black and white. I don’t know if a grown man asking where I’m headed is simply out of curiosity, or one of the numerous schemes that pop into my head. Am I sadistic for assuming the worst? Do I have to de-condition myself in this lively, community-centric city? What happens if I let my guard down? I feel painfully foreign, facing culture shock within our borders.

Just as I start to trust New Orleans, I’m shoved back into reality, a harsher truth than I’ve ever experienced. Dehumanizing remarks, blatant objectification, exoticization, threats and swears, accompanied with misleading smiles, are hurled at my best friend and me, in the span of 2 hours, as we scramble to get home.

A couple weeks go by, and I’m still hesitant to reciprocate a smile to the lady walking her dog. Why does the posh-dressed woman with the Chicago accent think she’s so special, she can’t even say good morning? I’m still learning, protecting myself while respecting a deceivingly familiar home. New Orleans is a difficult place to read. Everyone’s friendly, even when they’re threatening.

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Week 5 in New Orleans

by Courtney Scoufis

The past five weeks in New Orleans have really gone by so quickly. I think that the craziest part about this has experience has been slowly beginning to feel like I too am a part of the New Orleans community. While I have spent much time exploring the beautiful French Quarter, Uptown, the Garden District, Metairie, and Tulane, I also have been exposed to aspects of the city that desperately need improvement.

I think my community partner, is largely responsible for my feeling of belonging in the city. My community partner is a wonderful organization that helps homeless youth become independent members of society. My time at has been split between working with finance and policy.

My organization has a strong interest in human trafficking, as many of the youth who end up at their organization have been victims of trafficking. As a result, it has been active in pursuing policies that decrease human trafficking in New Orleans. Interestingly, New Orleans is a hub for human trafficking. A contributor to this is the nightlife that New Orleans is so famous for, namely Bourbon Street. My organization was active in pursuing a city law that mandated that strip club dancers be at least 21. Now, it is pushing to increase regulation enforcement and limit the number of strip clubs citing studies linking strip clubs to increased crime and human trafficking.

On Tuesday, I had the opportunity to attend the city hall meeting where citizens had the opportunity to discuss their opinions on the recommendations of the city council staff. I can honestly say that I had no idea what I was walking into. I had heard that city council meetings were generally dry and monotonous.  I walked into this meeting to see the room packed. There must have been 300 people at the meeting. Every seat was taken and many people were standing along the walls. Young girls walked by wearing “Let Us Dance” stickers and holding “I Love Strippers” signs.

Strip Club Dancers cheer for a speaker - The Times- Picayune

For three hours I heard many young girls, many who were my age, discuss how dancing at strip clubs was a job for them and a source of income. They expressed their worries regarding the type of work they would have to enter if their strip club was closed or if more regulations were put in place or enforced.  I also heard the director of my community partner speak about how it was necessary to protect those who were vulnerable.

Throughout this meeting, I kept thinking back to my public policy ethics class where we studied sex work. We studied a variety of views from those who believed that no one can honestly choose sex work for a living as it by nature dwells on the vulnerabilities of women to beliefs that women should be able to engage in sex work like any other business.

I am so thankful for the efforts of my community partner to stop human trafficking. Sitting in that meeting made me realize how greatly complex the issue is. Taking steps to end human trafficking, a problem everyone sees as a moral wrong can affect the lives of others who are working in an industry that they see as a means to a job. Even then, however, there are conflicting views on whether allowing an industry to exist that capitalizes on women’s sexuality is morally acceptable. This was the most striking experience that I have had on this trip so far where I considered my coursework at Duke, my internship, and greater issues that exist in my host community.

An example of the “Let Us Dance” signs. I made the photo as well! - The Times- Picayune

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NOLA Blog Weeks 1-5, Tara Davis

Week 1: It’s been a week. It’s felt like a long time – not in a bad way. New Orleans is completely different from any other city in the country, yet you adapt to it so easily. The other day, I was on the trolley going to the French quarter and saw the American flag strung up on a house along St. Charles. For a second, I was confused as to why it was hanging because I forgot that it was still in the states. It has more character than anywhere else: street cars, jazz, good unique food, and much more.

Week 2: I’ve been working at the Southern Food and Beverage Museum as a Culinary Kids Camp counselor. For the first two weeks, my role is administrator so I take photos, blog, float and budget. It was sad to say goodbye to the kids from the first week. They were all so fun, decent and respectful. I don’t know how these next few weeks of kids are going to be after being with such an amazing group.

Week 3: We’ve been to Bourbon twice now. Famous, famous Bourbon. It’s pretty yucky. The streets are dirty and there’s a strong stench of trash and whatever else. It was fun, at least to go to the gay bar Oz, but twice is really the cap. Maddy and I just went out this fine (very hot) Sunday afternoon because we wanted to get more things checked off our NOLA bucket list. We went to Magazine Street and had a chicory café au lait at a crepe place. Then we aimed to go to the St. Louis Cathedral – it closes at 4pm, so we didn’t see it. Then we went to the French Market, walked around, spent nothing; we are broke.

This last week and next, I’m in charge of cooking at the camp. The first day was stuffed bell peppers, and they all loved it. It went downhill from there. On the last day, a kid came up to me and said, “Tara, you’re much better at cooking stuffed bell peppers than.” I asked her back, “than what?” to get her to finish her sentence. “Than anything else” she said. It was hilarious. I know the food didn’t turn out as expected these last few days. I’ve been a bit too over ambitious. I know I’ll learn the hang of it eventually though.

Week 4: Just this weekend we went to two plantations and a museum. Then today, we went to Waffle on Maple (Maple street is probably one of my favourite parts of New Orleans) for delicious waffles and omelets. Then Maddy and I went on the Garden District/Lafayette Cemetary tour by Free Tours by Foot (which I highly recommend). Our tour guide new everything about New Orleans, every question was answered with a full explanation drawing from various aspects of New Orleans’s rich history. We’ll definitely be signing up for another Free Tour by Foot. We walked over to Krew du Brewe for their $5 breakfast sandwiches and coffee. We’ve been meaning to go there for a while since we’ve driven by the place many times (it’s right on St. Charles).

It’s Asian week at camp and darn, it’s been so good! The very last day was Singapore themed (I’m from Singapore) and I felt so much nostalgia cooking Wonton Mee with them. We made chicken with a Char Siu glaze, vegetarian wontons and even the dry sauce for the noodles that I would order from the food courts when I was a kid. The dry sauce wasn’t a favorite but the rest was delicious. Oh, the memories.

Week 5: This last week, we’ve done so much, I feel like it’s been several weekends all mushed into one. I walked the downtown area a bit more, walked almost all of Magazine, went to the Zoo, the pretty restaurant along St. Charles, went to a Ghost Tour, took the Ferry to the West Bank, went back to Magazine for Vietnamese, ate at Surrey’s Café, had some Creole Creamery ice cream. We did that all in a span of 36 hours. I realized that’s one cool thing about New Orleans, there’s so many distinct sites we have to go that we will never be able to find anywhere else.

The same thing from week 1 happened to me again! I was sitting next to a guy who was wearing an American flag shirt and I was wondering why he was wearing that. I again thought we weren’t in the States. This place is disorienting.

Cooking has been fun and smooth. This week was fantasy week so we’ve had an excellent soundtrack playing throughout camp. It also let me be creative on what foods to cook. The first day was Lord of the Rings, and we made honey-glazed vegetable rings (not fried) and two spreads for bagels. Chandler and I have been watching lots of kid movies because of the themed days, like Harry Potter (which is really for all ages), Tangled, and others. Maddy hasn’t liked that: she’s a movie snob. Silly Maddy.

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Well, we have to admit, it’s been a busy four weeks of summer so far. It has flown right by and we’re all kind of scared to realize that we are halfway through our program. But, in terms of blog posts, better late than never, right? We are going to get this blog rolling and share what we’ve been doing with our time here in NOLA, from our workplaces to our free time. It’s been an exciting four weeks so far and we are thrilled to share it with you!

As a bit of an introduction (and in case you didn’t see the “About Us” section), my name is Maddy and I’m working at the CARE Center at the Children’s Hospital. I’m a rising senior double majoring in Public Policy and Global Health and I’ve been spending much of my free time wondering what exactly I want to do with the rest of my life once I graduate from Duke. If you have any ideas, let me know!

Working at the CARE Center has been a pretty incredible experience. Last week, we helped to put on a national conference for the American Professional Society on the Abuse of Children, where more than 600 professionals, advocates, law enforcement officers, and medical doctors came together to discuss how to improve their work in the field of child abuse. The weeks leading up to the conference were quite frantic, but it was great to see it all pay off. I got to attend multiple seminars, helped to successfully put on a silent auction, participated in a second line (traditional New Orleans parade through the streets), and even got to watch my boss present some slides I helped make for her presentation on No Hit Zones, a policy that we are trying to implement at Children’s Hospital.

I’ve also been doing some work for the Dear Parents campaign that the center started. Check out our messages on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/NOCACDearParents/?fref=ts or Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nocac_dearparents/.

Getting to work is a walk in the park, literally. Sam, my fellow Duke intern at the center, and I take our daily stroll through beautiful Audubon Park every morning and afternoon. I think one of the aspects of New Orleans that has been most striking to me is its sheer beauty in the most mundane of places. Even when I have to hop on the streetcar (whose service is both slow and sporadic), I find myself to slow down to match the pace of the city, which moves a little slower than most other cities I’ve been to, to enjoy the beautiful shotgun houses with patios for every floor that line St. Charles Avenue. I have become notorious in my group for suggesting we walk distances that are far too long to walk because I really believe I need the time to soak in the architecture of a city that feels like we got off the plane in Europe. The city is full of stunning houses, good coffee, sweet desserts, delicious food, and live music, and we can’t get enough of it.

Our group has done our best to take full advantage of the opportunities we have here. You will hear plenty about that in the upcoming blog posts, but perhaps some of my favorite time we’ve spent together has come in the small moments like watching the NBA Finals together (LeBron is unreal), getting way too competitive while playing board games in the dorms, and trying out different restaurants and bonding over our love of food.

Look out for more posts coming soon, detailing our favorite adventures, food, memories, and work moments. New Orleans is a special city and we’re just getting started telling you about it. 

Been drinking a latte of coffee recently

The French Quarter. ...almost reminds you of somewhere... France, maybe?

In front of the St. Louis Cathedral

Our group is so supportive - they showed up to walk in the conference’s second line!

Nothing like strolling through the streets behind a brass band!

View of one of the plantations we visited this past weekend