Honestly, how is it to live in New Orleans? Good and bad.

I've visited New Orleans many times. I love the city. It's my 2nd favorite city in the country, after my hometown in Houston. But I've never been there longer than 4-5 days at a time. So I only have a tourist viewpoint of the city. How would you say it is to live in New Orleans? Good and bad.

In relevance to the Pelicans, would you say it is a city that a professional athlete making millions of dollars would enjoy living for an extended period of time (or an entire career). Why? Or why not?

There always seems to be a tonne of hot chicks on Dance Cam

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Originally Posted by AusPel

There always seems to be a tonne of hot chicks on Dance Cam

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Our dance team took the year off.

It's cool for tourists but living there low-key sucks. Crappy roads, corrupt law makers and cops, crime, expensive housing, bad land scaping, education system and mainly old school conservative views.

But being from new Orleans, the good has alot of perks based on the family warming culture, empathetic drivers and neighbors, traditional events, food, and it's sports.

It all depends on what you want in life, I was raised in the south but knew by the time I was 8 I wasn't a southern person, however I have a deep love for my city where I look past the bad (sometimes). Could never live and raise a family there, but 95 percent of my family and friends are still there so it can be based on personality. Are you a introvert? Are you a old school, religious family oriented person? City person? Country guy/girl? It all depends on what your personality is.

It's great living here! And no SilverFoxx, New Orleans is not a conservative place. Quite the opposite actually.

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Originally Posted by luigi modelo

It's great living here! And no SilverFoxx, New Orleans is not a conservative place. Quite the opposite actually.

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I guess my circle is pretty old school then haha.

Many Saints players (some Buccaneer and Jazz Players too) have come to New Orleans from elsewhere to play, been traded elsewhere, only to return to New Orleans at retirement.

You might ask Steve Gleason, who is tormented with a myriad of physical hurdles and obstacles to overcome, if New Orleans has been a great place for him to live.

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Originally Posted by Silverfoxx

I guess my circle is pretty old school then haha.

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That may be. Hell, Comus still exists, so we aren't immune to conservative think

I was born and raised here and have lived in many places and different countries and I have a love /hate relationship with my hometown , when i'm here I hate it and can't wait to leave , when i'm away I want to come back . This time if I ever move away I'll never move back for good. I'd come back to visit but never to live

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Originally Posted by luigi modelo

That may be. Hell, Comus still exists, so we aren't immune to conservative think

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Conservatism isn't a disease; it's only a point of view. There is no denying that the city is clearly in liberal hands.

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Originally Posted by djrnno

I was born and raised here and have lived in many places and different countries and I have a love /hate relationship with my hometown , when i'm here I hate it and can't wait to leave , when i'm away I want to come back . This time if I ever move away I'll never move back for good. I'd come back to visit but never to live

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Not from New Orleans myself (or even the US) but I feel like this is a pretty common mindset for most people.

When I was living away from my hometown I loved it but I missed everything I had grown up with a lot. Moved back after a few years, now I can't wait to leave again :hihi:

Thomas Wolfe said, "You Can't Go Home Again".

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Originally Posted by djrnno

I was born and raised here and have lived in many places and different countries and I have a love /hate relationship with my hometown , when i'm here I hate it and can't wait to leave , when i'm away I want to come back . This time if I ever move away I'll never move back for good. I'd come back to visit but never to live

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Pretty much me lol

Some things don't change. In 1879 Lafcadio Hearn in a letter to a friend in Cincinnati in reference to New Orleans:

"Times are not good here. The city is crumbling into ashes. It has been buried under a lava flood of taxes and frauds and maladministrations so that it has become only a study for archaeologists. Its condition is so bad that when I write about it, as I intend to do soon, nobody will believe I am telling the truth. But it is better to live here in sackcloth and ashes than to own the whole state of Ohio."

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Originally Posted by As I See It

Many Saints players (some Buccaneer and Jazz Players too) have come to New Orleans from elsewhere to play, been traded elsewhere, only to return to New Orleans at retirement.

You might ask Steve Gleason, who is tormented with a myriad of physical hurdles and obstacles to overcome, if New Orleans has been a great place for him to live.

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There definitely seems to be polar opposite attitudes towards New Orleans between pro football and pro basketball.

New Orleans proper is liberal. Get caught with marijuana within new orleans, and it's a $100 fine, if anything at all.

Go 15 minutes into the suburbs. where it's not so liberal, same amount of marijuana might get you jail time.

Not going to get into all the explanations behind that, but that right there is part of the reason this area has stagnated. Old attitudes, "ways of life", and habits die hard.

It really depends on the person. I'm a native but have lived away for long stretches of time. That helped my perspective on the city, both good and bad. When I lived in NYC, I was always struck by how green, warm and dreamy New Orleans seemed when I came back home. It's an authentic culture, but one quite removed from world of clubs, bottle service, video games and pop culture that your average 25-year-old athlete might like. The writer A.J. Liebling placed the city in the same latitudinal orbit as Marseille, Genoa and other "hellenistic" port cities of the Mediterranean. A buddy who is an architect whose family came from Cuba always says it's the northernmost city of the Caribbean and jokes that if you don't like the crime and corruption in New Orleans just pay a visit to Havana or Port-au-Prince and you'll feel much better about things.

Bottomline, it's an outlier in the NBA for sure. It's small, relatively poor and isn't really about the things most people like in Los Angles, New York or Atlanta. On the other hand if you're down with an alternative vibe like in Austin or San Francisco, it may be your kind of town because it has all of its own kinds of ideas about music, food, culture and how to live.

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Originally Posted by Silverfoxx

I guess my circle is pretty old school then haha.

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If it wasn?t for New Orleans there would never be another Democrat in the governors seat.


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I absolutely love the authentic feel of New Orleans. But I am not a $20 mil a year 20ish athlete. New Orleans(or Dallas, Houston, Atlanta, even Chicago)
cannot compete with the coasts when it comes to free agency. That is why I hate the tanking attitude and want the Pelicans to be an exemplary organization that wins consistently. It’s the only way.

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Originally Posted by Chavan30

I absolutely love the authentic feel of New Orleans. But I am not a $20 mil a year 20ish athlete. New Orleans(or Dallas, Houston, Atlanta, even Chicago)
cannot compete with the coasts when it comes to free agency. That is why I hate the tanking attitude and want the Pelicans to be an exemplary organization that wins consistently. It’s the only way.

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The question then becomes this: if the Pelicans ''cannot compete with the coasts'' in Free Agency, which you say is the case (and I agree), how does the team become a consistent winner?

Trades or Drafting. That's why people are interested in tanking. You can't become an exemplary organisation that wins consistently without good players, and without the ability to compete in free agency your options are limited.

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Originally Posted by Pelicanidae

The question then becomes this: if the Pelicans ''cannot compete with the coasts'' in Free Agency, which you say is the case (and I agree), how does the team become a consistent winner?

Trades or Drafting. That's why people are interested in tanking. You can't become an exemplary organisation that wins consistently without good players, and without the ability to compete in free agency your options are limited.

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Trades, trades, trades. I lived in Dallas during the formation of Dirk’s championship run. Tanking for draft picks was never the answer. Surrounding an elite level talent with high level NBA second tier players via trades. I will always believe building a winning culture is better than tanking and hoping you get ping pong balls.
I also believe there are tiers of organizations. Dallas is not a preferred destination for FA, but all is not lost if you get traded there. Then there are the Minnesota’s of the world where you don’t want to be there no matter what. I would like the Pels to be a Spurs like organization where if you end up there you know you have a chance to win and not looking for the exit.

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Originally Posted by Chavan30

Trades, trades, trades. I lived in Dallas during the formation of Dirk’s championship run. Tanking for draft picks was never the answer. Surrounding an elite level talent with high level NBA second tier players via trades. I will always believe building a winning culture is better than tanking and hoping you get ping pong balls.
I also believe there are tiers of organizations. Dallas is not a preferred destination for FA, but all is not lost if you get traded there. Then there are the Minnesota’s of the world where you don’t want to be there no matter what. I would like the Pels to be a Spurs like organization where if you end up there you know you have a chance to win and not looking for the exit.

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The problem is that that requires a lot that is beyond your control as an organisation. Whereas drafting players who are high ticket players likely to be at least good gives you control over them for a long period of time and gives you the ability to work with known quantities.

Trades require, beyond all else, opportunity, timing, and luck. The draft only requires one of those.

Born and raised here for 62+ years. Love the ambiance, culture, sports and cuisine, but despise the crime and political shenanigans.

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Originally Posted by PelDave

Born and raised here for 62+ years. Love the ambiance, culture, sports and cuisine, but despise the crime and political shenanigans.

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...and educational system.

It’s a great place to visit. But as with many cities these days, the cost of living and expenses skyrocketed and poverty/crime has increased exponentially. And as others have said, the political shenanigans never help. It’s not just New Orleans to be fair. There is a reason so many people are evacuating big cities in droves for Texas.

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Originally Posted by JJackisangry

It’s a great place to visit. But as with many cities these days, the cost of living and expenses skyrocketed and poverty/crime has increased exponentially. And as others have said, the political shenanigans never help. It’s not just New Orleans to be fair. There is a reason so many people are evacuating big cities in droves for Texas.

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Better infrastructure. More job opportunity. Superior education systems. More Diverse Recreation. No State Tax!!

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Originally Posted by As I See It

Thomas Wolfe said, "You Can't Go Home Again".

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"You can't go back home to your family, back home to your childhood ... back home to a young man's dreams of glory and of fame ... back home to places in the country, back home to the old forms and systems of things which once seemed everlasting but which are changing all the time...back home to the escapes of Time and Memory."

Just speaking to the nightlife I would say growing up in NOLA as a teen and 20 something it's great for your average to below average earner because you can do so much for free. But there's no super up scale life style so if you have big money and want to feel like it every time you're out NOLA didn't really provide that comfort at least not when I was there. The clubs (especially the ones of the strip varieties) weren't super walled off with velvet ropes.

I think the better question is "Compared to where?"

I was born and raised in Louisiana, but there's no way in hell I would ever move back. I've seen too much of the rest of the world.

1) New Orleans is not Louisiana.
2) Having grown up in New Orleans until 3 years ago, I never thought I could miss a place as much as one would a family member, but here I am.
3) New Orleans will give you what you give it.

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Originally Posted by UNO Gracias

1) New Orleans is not Louisiana.

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Oh, I see. We are gatekeeping now.

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Originally Posted by ragincaucasian

Oh, I see. We are gatekeeping now.

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Are they gatekeeping or just referencing that the largest cities in a given area, particularly ones which are high tourism, are not usually very representative of the rest of the place?

Like, London is cool but most of England is nothing like that. Paris is nothing like most of France.

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Originally Posted by Pelicanidae

Are they gatekeeping or just referencing that the largest cities in a given area, particularly ones which are high tourism, are not usually very representative of the rest of the place?

Like, London is cool but most of England is nothing like that. Paris is nothing like most of France.

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I was half kidding. I never lived in New Orleans proper, so my opinion is not valid anyway.

My original followup question was never answered. I asked "As opposed to where?"

Not many people are going to pick New Orleans to live in if they have other options. It's just the honest truth.

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Originally Posted by Pelicanidae

Are they gatekeeping or just referencing that the largest cities in a given area, particularly ones which are high tourism, are not usually very representative of the rest of the place?

Like, London is cool but most of England is nothing like that. Paris is nothing like most of France.

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True, but London and Paris are two of the biggest cities in Europe

New Orleans isn’t Louisiana in that it isn’t. From how people in New Orleans behave, to our politics, to music, it’s a 180 from the rest of the state, hell it’s about a 75 degree difference from the canal that separates New Orleans from Metairie (only 20 ft apart). Hell, you could say the Lower 9th is different from New Orleans, and the Lower 9th is New Orleans. What I’m saying is that as much hell as folks around the state want to give the city of New Orleans, with all the taking from the city to fund the rest of the state’s poor projects, to giving the cities representatives but a sip from the bird bath in BR, etc. y’all can have it. New Orleans will be fine without the your mayonnaise heavy potato salad. We have our own flavor down, here and we are fine by ourselves.

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Originally Posted by ragincaucasian

I think the better question is "Compared to where?"

I was born and raised in Louisiana, but there's no way in hell I would ever move back. I've seen too much of the rest of the world.

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This.

I find folks who were not born and raised in New Orleans love it more than folks who were born and raised.

And I can't speak for anyone else, but whenever I go down home, it feels like family and friends are still living in 2009 for some reason. Like I just don't feel growth and not in some lame "I'm a adult" way, but from a way viewing progressive thoughts vs old school traditional ones. Examples like views on gender roles, LGBT, science, education, etc.

I find the more progressive folks are more so from people who moved to new Orleans rather than growing up there.

But like someone mentioned it may just be my circle haha.