work in progress...

OK, it took some time to write the post. But here it is.

I spent my first couple of nights in an hostel that is called St. Vincent's Guesthouse. It's an old orphanage and rooms are pretty cold. That wouldn't be a problem but it has to be said, that also the beds are ones of the worst I've ever slept in. The 24-bed dorm I had booked turned out to be an 8-bed dorm. The first night I had to share it with some Tunesian guys but they didn't seem to be very happy with St. Vincent's and so they left after the first night. Great for me - Now had a big room, 8 beds t choose from and a shower for my own. I've taken some photos you can find at http://picasaweb.google.com/stephan.schiffleithner/FirstImpressionsOfNewOrleans?feat=directlink.
Right on a new year's day I went to Walmart, got something to eat and that great 'huffy-bike' you can see on some of the photos. Later I got in contact with some Australian students and spent new years evening together with them in that French Quarter which is by the way the touristic heart of New Orleans. We had some fried calmars and a great cigory spiced coffee at Café du Monde. We went into some of that great Jazz-bars, listened to some of those brass-bands on the streets and finally watched the great fireworks again from somewhere around Café du Monde. Unfortunately the Australian guys left one day later in the early morning but it still was a great night here in New Orleans.
What's next? Housing. People at Tulane University had already told me that they could help me with that but as the office was closed until Jan 4 I began to search on my own pretty soon. If you're willing to pay around $700 a month plus utilities you can find housing pretty easy here in New Orleans. As I had some budget-restriction it was a little more complicated for me. After having talked to some people renting rooms for around $600 a month I decided that it would be the best to get housing together with other Tulane-student to live in a shared apartment. So I spent the next couple of days riding around with that great bike, calling landlords and taking photos of possible apartments. All in all I wasn't much in St. Vincent's but as there is a small WiFi-internet enabled restaurant called 'Gardens's Edge' right in there I was there for some hours a day browsing craigslist and some other stuff. Other than the guy running the guesthouse the people running the restaurant are pretty nice people and helped me with some stuff. I also met Dennis there. He's a (I think) 34 year old guy from Chicago who is writing on a novel at the moment. He had decided to move to New Orleans for a year or so. Later I found out he also had been a Tulane student for some semesters. By the way telling people you're a Tulane student opens doors here. Maybe there's some relation to the financial situation of people being able to pay that some-thousand-dollar-a-semester fee but at least it's good to know that.
Garden's Edge is closing at 10 PM and so I went out to a local bar with Dennis one night and as he was also searching for housing we had some knowledge-exchange there. He was doing it the old-school way looking at the ads in 'New Orleans Picayune',  the local newspaper and had already found an maybe great opportunity: A small 1-2 person apartment for $700 (utilities included) given for rent by an old and probably trustworthy man. We went there to have a look at it the next morning and it was looking pretty good. I think Dennis would have taken it immediatly but I had to think about it and went to University. Meanwhile he got his bike fixed by the local bike guy at Magazine Street.
At University...