Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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Trip to New Orleans reveals , progress in Katrinas wake Bourbon Street shows signs of coming back to life as the Big Easy recovers Chelsea Hadautay THE GAMECOCK NEW ORLEANS — I had no idea what to expect when I flew down to this storm-wracked city during Thanksgiving break. The last time I was ^ there was at least five years ago — pre Katrina. I visited to apply for a Spanish visa at the consulates office in New Orleans. I sat near a friendly young woman on the plane who was evacuated to my little hometown in Tennessee. “I was lucky,” the woman said. “Some peoples homes were completely destroyed.” Of all places, Franklin, Tenn. This immediately drew a tangible link between me and New Orleans, showing how connected we all are. The debate everywhere among everyone was the condition and state of New Orleans. How bad is it now? Will ' it survive? Will people come back? The airport when I arrived was a microcosm of what the city of New Orleans was like. Almost all shops and restaurants were closed. The airport was, oddly, not very busy compared to most airports. There were FEMA signs everywhere. What I saw at the airport was repeated as I traveled to places in the city. On the drive to my hotel, I saw some of the more residential areas of New Orleans. There were bright blue tarps covering most all of the roofs, protecting from where Katrina had ripped off shingles and entire parts of roofs. Piles of I - trash were waiting on many corners to be picked up. Downtown New Orleans still had some power outages. Stoplights were out and were replaced with stop signs on every corner. Windows were blown out of buildings. Many major stores and shopping centers were closed mostly because of looting. In the French Quarter, an area for the most part unscathed by Katrina, many restaurants and shops were closed or re opening in December. There were still people walking around. It wasn’t completely desolate — there was life there. My hotel was on Bourbon Street, and there was definitely still activity going on until late in the night, continuing its reputation. Police cars patrolled the narrow streets and officers walked up and down streets. I felt safe for the most part. Cars were parked all along the streets, which appeared to be a good sign. But one of my drivers said most of the cars were from people repairing and restoring the buildings. Some places were open. New Orleans is still functional — not fully functional or even half functional, but it is surviving. I went into an Urban Outfitters store in the French Quarter, and it was as if I was in an Urban Outfitters store in any other city. It was crowded and busy, and when I went into the dressing room, I forgot I was even in such a storm ravaged city. Girls were talking to their friends about clothes, talking on cell BI6 EASY • <J Some of city's college students don't want to return Justin Pope THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Stephanie Swisher is settling in nicely as a freshman at the University of Virginia, enjoying classes, Naval ROTC, club volleyball and football Saturdays. Things are going so well, in fact, that she would rather not return to Tulane University in New Orleans — the school she had expected to attend until Hurricane Katrina struck. • “The argument that everyone’s giving'me is that I’m a freshman so I’ve never known Tulane, I need to give it a chance,”’ she said. “My argument is, why should I have to?” Swisher probably will have to give Tulane a chance. Despite her wishes — and a 600-signature petition she helped organize — Virginia is sticking by the conditions under which visiting students were admitted after the hurricane: they must return when their school reopens. And Tulane is scheduled to — reopen Jan. 17. After Katrina, colleges around the country took in an estimated 18,000 displaced New Orleans students. Now, the New Orleans schools desperately need those students to return next semester and pay tuition. Exacdy how many will return won’t be known until January. STUDEfITS • 4 Chuck Burton / The Associated Press Emile Richardson removes soggy wedding photos from an album he rescued from his flooded home in the Gentilly neighborhood of New Orleans on Sunday. Richardson said his only thought after his home was flooding was retrieving photos of his wife, Vicky, who passed away in 1998. AIDS Day activities include free testing Elizabeth Benfield FOR THE GAMECOCK USC’s recognition of World AIDS Day on Thursday will include information tables to raise awareness of the disease, free student HIV testing on Tuesday and the chance to view the national AIDS memorial quilt. One World AIDS Day official touted the free HIV testing. “There is no blood or needles involved, and it is totally free,” said I Deb Maddox, undergraduate World AIDS Day chairwoman. The tests, an oral-swab method called OraSure, are confidential, and students can call to get results or wait until they come back from winter break to pick up the results. Last year, all tests were negative. The testing will take place from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the Russell House Ballroom. Columbia has one of the highest numbers of AIDS cases per capita in the country, says one USC health official. Columbia and South Carolina rank ninth in the nation for AIDS cases per capita, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “The South is disproportionately affected by HIV and AIDS,” said Adele Markowitz, program director for Sexual Health Services in the Office for Sexual Health and Violence Prevention. The most common sexually transmitted infections at USC are the same as the most common national STIs: chlamydia, herpes and genital warts. “When you have one STI, you are more likely to get another one,” Markowitz said. One reason for the continuing spread of STIs is lack of communication and awareness among students, she said. “Young people aren’t talking about sex in meaningful ways,” she said. RIDS • 2 INSIDE Viewpoints Tim McManUS points out all the fun you can have on Facebook; Jacob Davis laments the chaos of finals week and says cramming won’t help in the long run. 5 The Mix Dis-N-Gage Nokia’s gaming / cell phone combination, N-Gage, will be discontinued after users complained of design flaws. 6 Sports Basketball stopped cold in Alaska USC’s men’s hoops team advanced to the finals of the Great Alaskan Shootout before falling by 3 to Marquette. ' * 9 War hasn’t affected number of Carolina’s ROTC cadets Jason fllyers FOR THE GAMF-COCK The war in Iraq hasn’t affected enrollment in USC’s Army ROTC, which has stayed steady at 70 to 80 cadets a year. “South Carolina is a pretty pro military state,” Maj. Shane Ousey, recruiting operations officer, said. “We have Fort Jackson nearby and a lot of retired military families in the area. We have a good demographic to keep our numbers significant. Ideally we would like to have our program at 100 to 125 cadets.” Although no further commitment is required of a cadet after graduation, the majority of cadets remain in the Army, Ousey said. ’“I don’t know the long-term numbers on whether once they get their commission they go on to a career, but most of the officers are coming out of the ROTC program,” Ousey said. “So if you do the math, then most of the career officers would have started off in ROTC somewhere. It would be safe to say that most ROTC cadets stay in the military.” Army ROTC is the largest source of scholarship money in the United States, offering tuition and fees up to $68,000, annual living expenses up to $4,000, plus an annual allowance for books to thousands of needy students, according to ROTC.com. While this used to be a major factor in determining whether someone ROTC • 3 Ex-Iraqi official cites human rights abuses Former prime minister says secular death squads rival Saddams secret police Robert H. Reid THE ASSOCIATED PRESS BAGHDAD, Iraq — Iraq’s former interim prime minister complained Sunday that human rights abuses by some in the new government are as bad now as they were under Saddam Hussein. Ayad Allawi, a secular Shiite Muslim, told the London newspaper The Observer that fellow Shiites are responsible for death squads and secret torture centers and said brutality by elements of Iraqi security forces rivals that of Saddam’s secret police. “People are remembering the days of Saddam. These were the precise reasons that we fought Saddam and now we are seeing the same thing,” the newspaper quoted Allawi as saying. Allawi’s allegation of widespread human rights abuses follows the discovery this month of up to 173 detainees, some malnourished and showing signs of torture, in a Shiite-led Interior Ministry building in Baghdad. “People are doing the same as Saddam’s time and worse,” he said. “It is an appropriate comparison.” His remarks appeared aimed at winning favor among the Sunni Arab minority as well as secular Shiites ahead of the Dec. 13 parliamentary elections. Allawi is running on a secular ticket that includes several prominent Sunnis. During his tenure as prime minister, ■K.1 Hadi Mizban / The Associated Press An Iraqi child holds a poster reading: Where is my father?, as his mother holds a picture of her husband, during a protest in front of Iraq’s Human Rights Ministry, in Baghdad, Iraq. Allawi lost the support of many Shiites because he brought back former members of Saddams Sunni-dominated regime back into the security services to bolster the fight against insurgents. There was no comment from Shiite politicians on Allawi’s interview. However, the leader of Iraq’s biggest Shiite party said allegations of torture were distortions and might be designed to draw attention away from the Saddam’s trial, which resumes Monday iafter a five-week break. “At the time of the Saddam trial, the issue of the torture in Iraqi detention centers is being exaggerated,” said Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim', head of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq. “When it comes to the crimes committed by Saddam for decades in which millions of Iraqis were «*affected, there is complete silence.” '