QUARTER SERVICE WORKERS
MOURN LOSS OF BAYOU CLASSIC

For the past four Novembers, Matthew Kelly,
veteran server at Jester's Daquiris, would mark Bayou Classic weekend on his calendar.

 “It was a weekend unlike any other down
here,” he says. “Like Mardi Gras in some
ways. A lot of the same prep. We’d pull the
sample cups off the bar, limit the drink choices.
But different, too. That’s the word. Different.
A different kind of party.”

This year, the damage done to the Louisiana Superdome has caused the Bayou Classic, an annual gridiron battle between two of the state’s premier historically black colleges, Grambling and Southern, to take place in Houston.

Tonight, service industry workers on and around Bourbon Street mourn the loss.

 Kelly and two co-workers, Cherie Boudreaux, formerly of Arabi, and “Amber”, who declined to offer a real name, preside over what by the standards of past Bayou Classic Saturdays is a sluggish night at Jester's. Customers come and go. Commerce is conducted happily but solemnly.

 Boudreaux, a veteran of seven Bayou Classics, five as a daiquiri worker, reminisces about past years.

 “They’d come in here with they hair all done up nice.  A lot of them had gold teeth, even the girls, and you could tell some of them picked out their outfits special just to show off their tattoos.” 

About the nonstop flow of business, Boudreaux adds, “It was like I was seeing double, one after another after another. Just nonstop.  It was funny, too, you know, cause when you finally waiting on someone, they like can’t make up their mind. It’s like they been waiting in line for so long, why can’t they decide what they want to drink?”

For Kelly, his first experience, like so many first experiences with the traditions of New Orleans, was magical.

“I happen to get down early,” he begins. “I like to have a cigarette by the door before I clock in. Not this time. Hussein, my boss, is waving wild at me when I’m a block and a half away.  I run in--” Kelly pauses to laugh—“and the frozen drink machines are shaking, like they get when they’re empty. There’s like, no stock behind the bar, and Alicia, the daytime girl, is actually weeping. I tried to ask her what was wrong but everyone was shouting for drinks.

“Hussein sends me upstairs to mix more drinks for the machines, but before I get there these black girls, like ten of them, need me to go into the ladies’ room. There’s a dude in the stall. Man, his Girbauds were reeking with piss and he was on his back choking on his vomit. You know how it bubbles up in your mouth?

“I thought of Alicia, and I knew it was my job to keep the party going.”

Kelly goes silent. “It’s hard to explain. I worked 16 hours that night, but it was like an entire mini-lifetime, where you forget you were ever born and you have no idea when you’re going to die. The next night was the same.”

When asked about the recently adopted Bayou Classic tradition of a run-by shooting at the corner of Bourbon and Iberville, Kelly grins nostalgically. 

“See, that’s what I mean,” he says. “There’s that moment, when the crowd surges to the back, and you’re crouched down behind the bar with people you’ve worked with side by side for the past 12 hours,”Kelly says. “There’s a bond you know will never break.”

“Amber”, who has logged one Bayou Classic at Big Daddy’s and two at Bourbon’s Best, comments on how the Bayou Classic influenced her career choice. “I’m not going to lie to you. I used to strip, and the money was good.  I worked my first Classic in 2003. It was a like a lightbulb went off in my head.  It’s much easier to deal with people when you’ve got the bar in front of you.” Amber looks wistfully outside the bar where a couple strolls by on a street that should be teeming with boastful, spirited collegians.  “It’s a shame,” “Amber” nods in the direction of the passers-by. “Those people have no idea what they would have experienced any other year.”      

Down the street at Café Rapheal, manager Casey Booth oversees a brisk night at the restaurant.  “It’s definitely different,” Booth says. “Most Classic weekends we close to let the workers enjoy the festivities, but this year, after Katrina and Rita set us back, we’re open for business. No trouble staffing the place, either.”

Next door, longtime Papa Crabs busboy Rusty Henry always looked forward to the Bayou Classic weekend. “I feel the loss. Water and iced tea refills is my thing here.  Bayou Classic was my time to shine."

“And you better believe I put a fresh lemon in every glass. I learned that real quick.”  

Out on Canal Street, a lone black SUV, tinted windows half-cracked, pumps out tunes as if the driver never got the text that the party had moved to H-town. Sad as it is, there’s no denying the evidence that the city was simply not ready to host a Bayou Classic. There’s no place to buy that last minute one piece jean jumper or shorts set since Rainbow is still boarded up. And forget about getting a clean pair of kicks around here. 

Back at Jester's, Kelly graciously thanks an exiting customer and scoops off the bar top the two-dollar tip they’ve left behind.“It’s funny,” Murphy says. “Here it is only ten o’clock, and already we’ve made more in tips than any other year.”

He drops the bills in a Styrofoam cup behind the bar and sighs.

“But it’s not about the money. Bayou Classic was never about the money.”