As we came along this road

The Home Depot is difficult to walk to, even though it's just 4 blocks down the street. The street it is down is paved with homeless people before it joins the freeway for a block, passes the Superdome, and then comes down to the rather sketchy neighborhood that the Home Depot is in. I needed a copy of my key for my summer sub- letter and figured I could walk around the long way to the hardware store.

Twenty minutes later I was wandering around deserted streets behind the stadium ready to give up, except that I didn't want to walk back the way I had come, when I happened upon a friendly girl. "Where is the new Home Depot?" "Just down that street," she pointed further into the sketchy neighborhood. "Um, is it safe for me to walk down that way?" She smiled. "Do you want me to walk with you?" "I can do it if it's alright."

She walked with me anyways. I had already headed down the road and she was a few steps behind. She made pretenses that she was on the phone, and then gave it up. We continued past deserted lots, garages and some local toughs. I thought admitting defeat and about turning around, but the nice girl was still there, so I engaged" "What's your name?" She replied in syllables I couldn't understand. "Excuse me, could you repeat it?" Laughing she said her name and I tried unsuccessfully to articulate it back. "Shoneke? Showneeeka? Sho-na-whaat?"

"It's hard, huh?" she was amused. "Where are you from? What are you doing here? You're in New Orleans to go to Home Depot? Oh me? I'm live just down the street from the Home Depot. I'm 17. I'll spend the summer working. At a day care." Having delivered me safely at the front gate of the Home Depot she walked off down the road, my first truly cross-cultural experience in New Orleans.