Lafayette - Cajun Culture

This morning I took the megabus to the city of Lafayette, the unofficial heart of the Cajun people. Like the people of New Orleans they are decedents of French settlers. However, their culture, cuisine and language is very different from that of New Orleans. The latter patterns itself on the high culture of French aristocracy. The Cajun however, are descendants of refugees from Arcadia in Canada (Arcadia –> Cajun). They were poor and simple people, cooked with whatever the swamp would give them and spoke an old somewhat medieval kind of French. So although both people have their roots in France they developed two different cultures.

Day 1

Welcome to the swamp

The city of Lafayette is real countryside, there are very few busses (which might go every hour or so). There are no hostels, but a very nice guest house (combined with a Saloon).

A tradition Cajun Dish: “Chicken Gumbo”. It might not look like it, but it tasted very familiar, pretty much like my grandma would prepare some rabbit or pork meat for an everyday meal. The seasoning and everything tasted exactly the same. In fact, rabbit Gumbo is also very common here. Like in New Orleans, what seems exotic for an ordinary American might be very common in my part of Germany. It tasted like a piece of home. Maybe I have just spend too much time abroad and every slightly European dish tastes like home now :D

Before I came to New Orleans and had barely ever heard anything of Lafayette or the Cajun people of Louisiana. It turns out, that this city has a very high reputation. It was named as one of top 5 cities regarding music. That fact was hard to miss, I went to Wednesday songwriter sow in a bar next door. The musicians were better than many professional singers I have seen. Most of it is a mix of folk and rock, amazing voices and deep lyrics. With one artist, I was sure to listen to a live Perl Jam concert. Amazing to have that just every night in some bar nearby.

The saloon in my guesthouse features a Cajun Folk Jam every Wednesday. It seems that I chose exactly the right days to be here. There is currently a revival of Cajun culture, so people sang in old French and played their traditional instruments. I met quite some artists here and spend hours talking about history, music and religion (the American concepts of it). one of them, Cedric was already nominated twice for the Grammy. Thanks the people who regularly hand out in this saloon every Wednesday.

(thanks Moriah for this wonderful introduction into your world and good luck with your movie!)

here record from another Wednesday here at the Saloon (well worth watching!):

Cajun Jam at Blue Moon Saloon

This city is far more interesting than I expected.