Tag Archives: home

New Experience, Outlook

A True Jewel Offers Taste of Home

By Madeline Landry

When I first came to USC, I will admit I was a tad nervous. Okay, maybe a bit more than a tad. I was obviously extremely excited, as USC and “the college experience” had been a dream of mine for some time, but as I made the long flight here I couldn’t help but think about how California seemed so… far.

I grew up in New Orleans, Louisiana, a city located at the end of the Mississippi River, right as it floods out into the Gulf of Mexico. New Orleans is quite different than the rest of Louisiana, and sometimes the United States as a whole. New Orleans is often considered the birthplace of jazz, and is home to many famous events such as the Jazz and Heritage Festival, a large music festival featuring artists such as Elton John and Maroon 5, to Mardi Gras, a nearly two week-long, city-wide celebration. And while New Orleans is celebrated for all of these reasons and more, perhaps what New Orleans is most famous for is something I often overlooked – its food.

New Orleans food is often rich and flavorful, with dishes covered in seasoning and the occasional dose of hot sauce. Famed dishes such as jambalaya, gumbo, po’ boys, red beans and rice, dirty rice, beignets, crawfish etouffee, and bananas foster (and many more) are favorites to locals and tourists alike. Starbucks and Dunkin Donuts are rare, as local coffee chains such as PJ’s and CC’s dominate the market. Finally, as New Orleans is right next to so much water, boiled seafood dishes, particularly crawfish and oysters, are always fresh and delicious, and are so much considered a part of life that “crawfish boils” are probably more common than “dinner parties.” In New Orleans, food is embedded in the culture and spirit of the city, but somehow I didn’t really consider how much it was intertwined in my personal feelings of home until I left.

When I decided to go USC, I knew I would miss New Orleans, but I was still excited to try something new. Every city is different, and just like there were so many things I loved about New Orleans, I knew there would be so many things I would love about Los Angeles. And within my first months at USC, this proved true! I loved the countless events, the proximity to the beach, the amazing weather, and, of course, USC. I would explore the city with friends and try all the strange trendy places we saw on Facebook and all the free movie screenings we heard about through class. Still, every now and then, I would get a little homesick. California was always exciting and new, but there were times when I started to miss the comfortable familiarity of home. I would try to involve New Orleans into my California world, trying a “Mardi Gras Theme Night” at a dining hall, collecting songs by famous Jazz artists, and, even on one occasion, asking my much too nice parents to ship me New Orleans style coffee, but I still felt as if the closest I was to home was my Louisiana flag I had hung up on my dorm room wall.

It was around that time that I began to hear about a restaurant in Chinatown that supposedly served New Orleans style food. Multiple people seemed to have heard of it and spoke of it highly, but no one seemed to know the name until, at last, I found it: a small place in downtown called “The Little Jewel of New Orleans.” Upon finding this out, I immediately told my friends that we needed to go. Thankfully, they were almost as excited as I was to try the food I had been praising almost every day they had known me, albeit perhaps a little nervous about having to sit through my intense criticism should the food prove not “authentic” enough. Still, we made plans to go that weekend, and I could hardly wait.

Photo by L.A. Foodie on Flickr

The Little Jewel of New Orleans was an unassuming place from the outside, with a striped green overhang and a small neon sign over the door. But as I walked in, the atmosphere changed, with a brightly painted chalkboard menu and a lit up line of fridges. Looking at the menus, I saw a long list of po’boys. Better yet, looking around I saw several rows of signature New Orleans products, from beignet mix to Mardi Gras throws to even the coffee my parents had sent me a month before! Still a bit in awe I jumped to point out everything to my friends, telling them where you could buy this, and what was the right season to cook that. Still the moment of truth came when we actually ate our food, and for the first time since coming to Los Angeles, I found I had absolutely no complaints as to the “authenticity” of the New Orleans style food I was eating. The food, the products, even the décor sung of New Orleans, and all I could do was smile at how familiar it all seemed. With just a bit of French bread and some cold brew coffee, home didn’t seem quite so far. Perhaps best of all, my friends loved it as well, and by the time we headed home we had all agreed to come back again soon.

We did end up doing exactly this a few weeks ago. We bought some more good food and coffee, of course, and were about to leave when I thought I recognized the girl working at the counter. A bit nervous, I went up to her and asked her name. A few minutes later and we discovered that we had gone to the same high school, a year apart. The restaurant, as it turned out, belonged to her father, who had lived in New Orleans before coming to Los Angeles some years ago. As I looked back and realized my friends were still waiting at the door, I made to say goodbye, but something struck me, and I quickly added, “And tell your Dad I love the restaurant! And… thanks. It’s given me a chance to feel like, just for a little bit, I’m back home.”

Featured image by Aya Salman on Unsplash

Madeline graduated USC with a degree in Animation and Digital Arts. Coming from New Orleans, Louisiana, she always missed home, but loved exploring California. Her family full of avid readers, writers, and lawyers, she had constantly been pushed to continue exploring the English language. She loved visiting Ireland and France while at France and even studied abroad! While as a student, Madeline loved drawing, reading, watching movies with friends, and listening to lots of different music. At USC, she was a part of the satirical newspaper Sack of Troy’s writing staff, and was an aspiring DJ at the student radio.

Outlook, Travel

Summer at Home

By Harrison Poe

Hot, dry, and sunny – the seasons in Los Angeles have little difference, but the summer in my hometown of Houston, Texas is its own unique spectacle. Summer storms create steamy days with both the temperature and humidity cranked up to one hundred percent. The climate serves as a perfect breeding ground for the mosquitoes who come out to feed during the cool evenings. However, despite the oppressive climate and having to bring two shirts with me everywhere I go, the heat allowed me to forge great memories during my summers in Houston.

I can remember when I was little, walking to my neighbors’ house to pick the figs off of their backyard tree in early June. Years of growth and care had caused the tree to expand across the back corner of our neighbor’s backyard, and this yearly ritual provided my sister and I with enough fruit to last us until the next summer. We were always greeted with a warm smile and a hug as we scurried, buckets in hand, towards our fruity symbol of summer. Throughout the rest of the summer the figs would make their way into salads, preservatives, desserts, and ultimately, our stomachs, and over time summer simply wasn’t summer without the ripe fruit on the dinner table.

As I grew older, the summer brought with it music festivals, exciting vacations, and road trips with friends but, with age, came hard work. The summer after my junior year of high school my dad insisted I spend some time working at the family business. Since my great-grandfather opened Carl Poe Company, my family has been repairing gas meters and selling their parts for over fifty-five years. So, instead of having a nice office job or internship like some of my friends, I labored in the oven-like workshop disassembling gas meters for repair. It wasn’t lazy days spent by the pool or the thrilling vacation I’d desired, but it was a much needed lesson, even if I didn’t realize it at the time. Those sweaty hours of swinging a hammer and dismantling meters with my pneumatic screwdriver taught me the importance of preparing for the future. Though I arrived begrudgingly everyday at eight o’clock at the forceful request of my father, the job provided me with experience I’d need when applying to future jobs, not to mention a little extra cash.

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Travel

Being Oregonian – My Classic Family Road Trip

By Diya Dwarankanath

Even the global citizen has a special place they associate with home. If you disagree, I recommend reading the short story, A Cosmopolitan in a Café, by the American author, O’Henry.  In this piece of literature, a man, endearingly named by the narrator as a “cosmopolitan”, claims to have no piddling feelings for any one place; he says “It’ll be a better world when we quit being fools about some mildewed town or ten acres of swampland just because we happened to be born there.” But just when you, the reader, perhaps start to feel guilty for being sentimental for your own hometown, the cosmopolitan gets in a brawl over a negative remark said about his own birthplace in Maine. O’Henry’s fictional account inspired me to write about a recent family road trip.

Your hometown, home state, or home country means something to you. Often the meaning is small, but distinct – like the fresh smell of the soil when it rains, unique to my home state, Oregon. Actually, I’ve lived in two countries, India and the United States, and three states in America—Oregon, California, and Massachusetts. Whenever I move, people always ask me, “Where do you come from?” and “What’s it like back home?” Answering these questions make me more aware of my roots.

And more aware of what I am missing.

When my family moved to Oregon, one of the first things I remember learning about American life is that families went on road trips. Oregonian families specifically went on road trips to Crater Lake, one of the most famous attractions in Oregon. My friends told me about the road trips they took there, but that it was a multi-day commitment. As a child, I insisted that my family should go, but the timing never worked out.

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