by Glen Chilton
The streetcar ride along Canal did not take us into the heart of the hurricane and flood devastation, but the neighbourhood we saw was still in pretty rough shape. Many buildings had been reconstructed and their occupants re-established. A lot hadn’t been. They remained boarded up and the properties fenced in, even several years after the hurricane. With so many FOR SALE signs, it seemed to me that a property speculator with a few dollars would find easy pickings in New Orleans. Banks, grocery stores, pharmacies, homes … even the City of New Orleans City Hall Annex sat empty. But as Rob pointed out, a developer might find every building infested with rats, cockroaches, and termites.
At the Fair Grounds Race Course in Mid-City, Jazz Fest was in full swing. The sensory onslaught was enormous. With eleven stages running simultaneously, we did what everyone else seemed to be doing; we walked the fairgrounds in a counter-clockwise circle, spending fifteen minutes at each stage before moving on to the next one. The air was filled with the expectation that wherever you were headed would be more exciting than wherever you were.
Some acts were great, including the Tulane University Jazz Ensemble, and some were simply outstanding, such as Richard Thompson. Others were peculiar, like Jumpin’ Johnny Sansone’s Harmonica Review. At each venue, I couldn’t help but think how odd young people would find it to see their grandparents bouncing and swaying to a combo of keyboard, base, drums, and accordion. We strolled and ate and drank and stopped to listen, and then strolled some more. When we got to the main stage, we found acres of folks reclining in lawn chairs. “Are they waiting for a shuttle launch?” Rob asked. They were listening to a group called Papa Grows Funk, which was good, but not good enough to deserve the idolatry of many thousands of people. And then we twigged. Most of these people were staking out a bit of turf for the Stevie Wonder concert due to begin in three and a half hours.
Shorts, sandals, wide-brimmed hats, and T-shirts were the order of the day. Many of the shirts proved that their owners had been to an earlier Jazz Fest, or to some other music festival, or to a Kmart. Some shirts were more profound than others. A man gave high-fives to strangers while wearing a shirt proclaiming, “I high-five strangers.” “I ♥ dorks” and “I ♥ sailors” were circling the fairgrounds. The shirt of an amply endowed lady told other women, “Don’t be jealous.” Showing a higher level of self-realization than most of the crowd, one fellow sported a shirt explaining, “I’m not an alcoholic; I’m a drunkard. Alcoholics go to meetings!”
And the closer we got to the performance by Stevie Wonder, the highlight of the day, the more it looked like we were in for a thorough soaking. When the skies finally opened, the crowd cried “Ooooh!” This was no spring shower but a cloudburst that would have had Noah frantically scrambling over last-minute details.
Wonder started on time despite the rain, and settled into a string of less than fully inspired pieces. About thirty minutes in, he performed a preachy little number whose refrain was “I can’t believe,” which seemed to indicate that he was not particularly keen on hate, crime, American wars overseas, high gasoline prices, and the Large Hadron Collider particle accelerator. The rains continued, and about half the crowd left.
And then a beautiful thing happened. Wonder and his band launched into “Don’t You Worry ‘Bout a Thing” and “Signed, Sealed, Delivered.” The crowd began to sing and dance, and the rain didn’t make any difference at all. The band came at us with one hit after another, and everyone seemed to know all the words. Those who stayed to the end left the grounds on a high. In terms of termites, the soaking rain was just what we needed.
THANK GOODNESS FOR TERMITES. Without them we would be up to our necks in undecomposed plant matter. Luckily, termites spend their lives munching away on dead vegetation, saving us the bother of cleaning up every tree that falls. They become a nuisance only when they stop eating the things that we want removed and start chomping on things that we would rather keep. Like our homes.
To be fair, there are only eighty-odd species of termite that do significant damage to buildings. On the downside, that damage is significant, particularly in tropical India, Africa, and Central America. It is difficult to determine the annual cost of termites globally, including building inspection, prevention and control of infestation, and repair of damage, but the figure is somewhere in the billions of dollars.
Thank goodness for anteaters. Without them, we would be up to our necks in termites. With over 2,600 species of termite described, there certainly are an awful lot of them, despite the anteaters. At the more modest end, with an average colony population of just 6,400 individuals, groups of Microcerotermes septentrionalis termites are about the same size as the human population of Alajärvi in Finland. The residents of Dilovasi, Turkey, and the residents of a colony of Cubitermes speciosus both number about 42,000. At 1,360,000 inhabitants, an average colony of Nasutitermes macrocephalus exceeds the population of Benin City in Nigeria by 200,000. Topping the charts at over 7 million residents per community are Mastotermes darwiniensis and Hong Kong.
On Saturday, we arrived at Jazz Fest a little later than we had the day before, and the action was well hotted-up. Being the weekend, families were out in full party mode. Even so, this seemed a time and place for adults to have their music fun. In contrast with Friday evening, it was hot and sunny, and while most people had slapped on a hat and slopped on sunscreen, a fair few were going to be tender the following morning.
The Gospel Tent was fairly throbbing, with every seat filled and as many people standing in the aisles as the wranglers would allow. A few folks stood and swayed and spun with their arms raised, broadcasting their faith. Song after song, I’m not sure that I could have held my arms up that long. They were devout and must have had a lot of practice. Rob wondered which lobe of the brain would light up if subjected to a CAT scan during that sort of religious frenzy.
Bottled water was selling for $3, and those in the know were refilling their bottles at slowly dribbling water fountains. While filling my bottle, I fell into conversation with a woman named Audrey. She was New Orleans–born and bred but had moved to South Carolina after Katrina. I asked if she was planning to move back. “The sincere answer is that the longer I stay at Jazz Fest, the more likely I am to take my house here off the market.”
We arrived early for a presentation by pianist Chick Corea and vocalist Bobby McFerrin. The tent was packed. Someone had mistakenly given a microphone to an organizer on a power trip, who then started issuing stupid instructions. “No flags. Period. I mean it! Absolutely no flags!”
Thirty minutes after the set was due to start, the duo came on stage and began an agonizingly slow warm-up. McFerrin slapped his chest and sang, “Dibbly-dibbly-dibbly; do-whap, do-whap.” Corea pecked at the keyboard like someone in his first typing class. It wasn’t a crowd-pleaser. “Spiggety-spiggety; dab-dab-dab.” “When are they going to start?” asked Rob. Then it occurred to us that it wasn’t a warm-up; this was the set. After three pieces, we left in search of some real music.
We arrived at the Gentilly Stage to catch Diana Krall, one of my all-time favourites. As we waited for the show to begin, Rob and I chatted with Melissa, a social worker from Monterey, California. She started the conversation by asking why I was writing notes; perhaps she thought that I was a reporter for Rolling Stone magazine. Melissa explained that she was visiting her crazy aunts and would be volunteering the following day at a furniture-distribution centre for folks rebuilding after Katrina. She wasn’t convinced that Rob and I were being honest when we described our quest for termites.
Krall was as spectacular as I had hoped she would be. She wasn’t afraid to cover tunes by Fats Domino, Nat King Cole, and Irving Berlin, which seemed to be exactly on track for the fans at Jazz Fest. She ended her set with “‘S Wonderful (‘S Marvelous),” which it truly was.
THE FIRST TWO DAYS of Jazz Fest were great, and the whole event is so damned important to the city of New Orleans that the First Grace Methodist United Church was moved to decl
are, “Blessed Are Those Who Fest.” But we still hadn’t seen a Formosan termite. We (mainly Rob) had been talking to almost anyone who would talk back, asking them about termites. Some claimed that they ought to be swarming as soon as the sun went down. Others said that we had arrived a month too early. Some said that the French Quarter would be alive with termites, while others directed us to the rather more rundown wooden buildings beyond that. A Voodoo priestess explained that her landlord fumigated her shop once a year and that the state had made a big sweep through the French Quarter, but she confidently predicted that we would still be in good shape. We had seen heavy rains, and the day was now warm and sunny. In May, this is the recipe for swarms of termites.
Back at our hotel, I spied a film crew setting up for a poolside interview with a gospel singer. I spotted some largish insects swarming around the camera lights. Wings … a centimetre long … brownish … They looked like termites to me.
“Rob! Quick! I found termites.” Rob grabbed his forceps and a glass vial, and we were off. These termites were the dispersing reproductive form. The camera crew didn’t seem to mind us working around them as Rob picked ten termites off their white backdrop screen. It wasn’t a lot, but it was a start. The fellow in charge of the microphone derisively referred to them as “Formosans” instead of “termites,” in the same sort of way that he might have said “Belgians.” The collected termites bashed against each other in the vial, and we feared that they might knock their wings off, so we slowed them down by putting the vial in a coffee cup filled with ice. Later we picked up a small bottle of gin to pickle them.
And a big, happy wave of contentment washed over me. The Jazz Fest had been fun, and we had found Formosan termites; the rest of the trip was a bonus. So we headed down Bourbon Street and into the French Quarter in search of adventure on a Saturday night. It was just after 9 p.m., and the French Quarter was unfolding. Taxis, fire trucks, and cars from the Sheriff’s Office competed with revelers for space on the road. Although the night was young, the trendiest clubs were already turning away the unpretty.
Bourbon Street, old and vulgar by day, is the Promised Land of fantasy and excess by night. Jazz spilled out of one club after another and slithered across the pavement. Three groups of people set the backdrop: those who were lapping up the night, those who were terrified of the night, and those who were throwing up into the night. Neon lights filled my eyes. Members of the David Cobb Evangelistic Association of Gatlinburg, Tennessee, promised to save my soul, and Larry Flynt’s Hustler Club offered to do the opposite. Every bar in the neighbourhood was happy to put a beer in a “go-cup” so that I could—legally—walk the streets and drink at the same time.
From parties on second-storey balconies, revelers hung over the ironwork offering to throw strings of beads to those who asked. I asked, and soon had four strings around my neck. Then eight. Three ladies at a balcony party tried to get the attention of anyone who would look at them. I looked. They were pointing at the ground, having obviously dropped something. “Where is it?” I asked. “Go forward,” they screamed. “Go to the right. Just at your feet!” I found a packaged condom and picked it up. “This?” “Yes. Throw it up!” I am not sure how much fun three women can have with one condom, but they shouted their thanks and blew me kisses.
On our way out of the district, we came across two uniformed police officers. Rob asked them if the street party was largely self-policing. “Noooo, no, no,” they explained. “We’ll be taking people away all night.” Rob asked how early it had all started. “We’ve been hauling away drunks since five this afternoon.”
I liked myself twenty years ago, and hope that I am fundamentally the same fellow today. I liked Rob twenty years ago, and was delighted to find that he was the same fine fellow all these years later. Rob is committed to social justice, but he is just as committed to finding joy in life. He is that rare sort of person who can use the expression “Nice rack” without insulting anyone.
PERHAPS YOU ARE AMONG those smarty-pants orators who make themselves unpopular at parties by spouting minutiae that are of no benefit to anyone. You may, for instance offer such gems as “Termites eat wood but are unable to digest it without the help of single-celled organisms known as flagellates that live in the insects’ intestines.” If so, then shame on you. First, everyone knows about the microorganisms. Second, no one cares. Third, it isn’t true. Facts are true. Factoids sound as though they should be true, but aren’t. The reliance of termites on the flagellates in their guts to digest the cellulose in wood is a factoid, according to Professor David Bignell of Queen Mary University of London. And who are you going to believe, the Internet or Professor David Bignell? The flagellates may help, but all termites have the ability to break down cellulose on their own without the help of microbes. If you want to share wisdom at a party, tell people that termites are more closely related to cockroaches than to ants. At least you won’t be spouting a factoid.
Saturday’s heat hadn’t done much to dry the fairgrounds, and tens of thousands of feet had turned large tracts into the sort of ooze that might spawn life anew. For many at Jazz Fest, the highlight of the weekend would be the performance by Carlos Santana. We arrived at the stage, or rather at the lip of a ditch 200 metres back from the stage, twenty minutes before the scheduled start but found the band already in full flight. We seemed to have achieved the perfect sound balance, and I cannot imagine what remained of the eardrums of people 195 metres closer. Rob and I tried to estimate the size of the crowd and came up with something like 30,000. It was as though the entire population of Braintree, Massachusetts, had stopped by to see the performance.
Given that “Black Magic Woman” had been released thirty-eight years earlier, I probably shouldn’t have been surprised that the average age of the folks around us was sixty and that this number was held down by numerous grandchildren. The grey crowd was slurping back cheap, low-alcohol beer and consuming huge quantities of dope. Never has so much marijuana been consumed by so many who were so old. A lot of the music seemed to sail right over the heads of the shit-faced seniors around us, and I was left wondering if they grew their weed themselves or scored it from some geriatric dealer.
While waiting for a pizza in a restaurant in the French Quarter, Rob and I spotted a couple of termites fluttering wildly through the air above our heads. And then a few more. And then a lot more. The New Orleans swarming of Formosan termites had begun in full. To us, they were as delightful as dancing sprites under a full moon, but to the restaurant manager they were pure evil. He dashed around closing windows before any more could enter and attempt to set up shop.
Now closed, the outer surfaces of the windows were covered with termites, presumably drawn in by the restaurant’s neon lights. Back on the streets, we found that the termites had a curiously clumped distribution. A termite trap at one corner was well attended, but another just a half-block away had no visitors at all. Termites are not very good fliers, and Rob suggested that a big swarm might indicate a large nearby colony sending out its next generation.
HAVING SEEN TERMITES SWARMING in the French Quarter, the only thing left was to speak with a termite expert. Regrettably, our local contact had been called out of town on family business, and we needed an alternative. Digging through my files, I found a newspaper clipping that made reference to the City of New Orleans Mosquito and Termite Control Board. The telephone directory had an entry for the board, and after a few misdirections I was put through to Ken Brown, a research entomologist. Ken immediately invited Rob and me to join him and his colleague Ed Freytag at the termite laboratory in the USDA building at the north end of City Park.
We were lucky enough to arrive on a day when the laboratory’s technician was knocking termites out of infested wood collected from a military base. As he banged bits of wood together, huge numbers of termites dropped out. I gathered that the creatures were going to be used in an exhibition at New Orleans’ soon-to-be-opened insectarium.
We were told that the
winged reproductives, more formally called “alates,” that we had seen the night before included both males and females, not very different in size. However, the specimens in front of us were mainly wingless workers, joined by a number of big-jawed soldiers. In a colony, workers do all the grunt work. Soldiers are about the size of workers but are aggressive. They have teardrop-shaped heads with nasty mandibles and a gland that exudes glue. They use these attributes to defend the colony when threatened. Neither workers nor soldiers stray far from their nests or the shelter tubes they construct of mud, wood, spit, and poop to protect them while searching for food.
Ed said that we couldn’t leave the lab without being bitten by a Formosan termite soldier, and so he dropped one each into our hands. As long as we kept the skin of our palms stretched tight, the soldiers had nothing to clamp on to. But as soon as we creased our skin, they grabbed us. This is probably something that you don’t want to happen if you are, for instance, a bug, but it didn’t hurt us any more than having a hair pulled out.
Ken and Ed were incredibly cooperative, and gave us 25-cent answers to nickel questions. For instance, they explained that, until recently, fundamental aspects of the termites’ biology were not well understood, even whether they had a preference for one type of tree over another. We heard that it takes about five years for a termite colony to mature to the point where it is producing dispersing alates. By that point, the house probably has sagging floorboards; when you first notice you have termites, you already have a huge problem. Formosan termites survived two weeks of flooding following Katrina. Those survivors had probably invaded abandoned buildings, and the city was likely to see an enormous increase in the scope of its termite problem.
