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NEW ORLEANS - Walking across the dry, mud-caked yard that once sustained his wife Thelma's beloved garden, Ken Rohbock carried tree scraps and damaged equipment from his flooded home in Lakeview, Orleans Parish, on Wednesday morning - the first official day that all of New Orleans, except for the Lower 9th Ward, was open. In the backyard, the day lilies Ken's father first planted on the property are buried under fallen tree limbs and debris.
In New Orleans, Thelma's family dates back five generations. Ken's family bought the property in 1928. He grew up on this land, which now holds the water-logged house he helped build in 1989.
After a lifetime in New Orleans and 52 years of marriage, Thelma and Ken, both in their 70s, plan to leave the city and move to either Georgia, South Carolina or North Carolina.
"After all that, after insurance, we'll be seeing it in the rearview mirror," Ken said.
Before the hurricane, he was finally at the point where he could enjoy golf and relax, Ken said, but now he's having to clean up something he thinks could have been avoided.
Faced with unknown factors surrounding rebuilding, residents in Lakeview and greater New Orleans have raised questions about the long-term neglect and mismanagement of the levee system by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Louisiana state government.
"A lot of people are very hesitant. They don't know which way [rebuilding] will go, if it's feasible," Ken said.
Two doors down on Milne Boulevard, Rebecca Authement tried to salvage electronics from her two-story apartment. Floodwaters reached the carpet on the second story, creating a damp, warm climate that grew mold up the walls of her bathroom and bedroom.
"If [New Orleans Mayor Ray] Nagin had let us in two weeks earlier, when he let other people in, then I wouldn't have mold all upstairs. I would have saved 50 percent more," said Rebecca, a humanities assistant professor at Delgado Community College for the past 27 years.
Authement's cousin Lewis Beagle and his friend Kyle Trahan, both from Lafayette, took off work to help her clean out the duplex she rented. Rebecca's renter insurance doesn't cover floods, she said.
Flood insurance was one thing Thelma and Ken did have for their house. What they hope to get from FEMA, Thelma said, is a trailer in their front yard so they can continue cleaning out the house.
"My mother is so strong," said Thelma's daughter Jan Clements, who stayed in a French Quarter hotel during the hurricane because her teenage son was admitted to Charity Hospital downtown the Saturday morning before Katrina hit. "This is her dream home. I kept thinking, she'll open that door and fall apart."
Thelma didn't fall apart. She went right to work, digging through the dark, blackish muck in her living and dining rooms to find a picture of her grandfather-in-law, her father-in-law's gold watch, her daughter's keyboard and her grandson's baby pictures.
"My case is no more special than anyone else," she said. "You can't sit and cry. You got to take care of things. We're old, but we're strong."
Jan, a pianist who's played at Austin's South by Southwest Music Festival in the past, said she wasn't as strong. It's emotionally draining, she said, just walking up and down stairs with the things she stored in her parents' home. Her boyfriend, Chris Brewer, took a smoking break and sat on a queen-size bed upstairs while Jan sorted through her son's printed T-shirts. After spending days tracking down her 19-year-old son, Matt, Jan said he is taking classes at LSU for the semester and her twin 12-year-olds Austin and Tyler are living with their father in North Carolina.
"Now [we're] having to work out custody," she said. She plans to move to Texas, probably Dallas with Chris, who said he hasn't received money from FEMA or Red Cross.
Less than a mile away, Steve Rohbock, the second of Thelma's three children and a traditional jazz pianist at the Maison Bourbon in New Orleans, and his wife, Miki, saw their flooded duplex for the first time. Miki said they and their 5-year-old son, Shoki, plan to live somewhere in the city within in the next year.
About a mile south of where the 17th Street Canal levee broke, waters rose nearly 11 feet in the duplex, totally devastating the first floor and warping the bottom foot of wood furniture and anything touching the floor in the second story.
"I was hoping to find my original [compositions], all hand-written over the last 30 years," said Steve, as he peeled open plastic music sheet covers and discovered they weren't his compositions.
Having evacuated to Texas, then to Chicago, where his older brother David lives, Steve said the couple only had theft insurance. Malfunctions with the FEMA registration Web site, he said, led to their ineligibility for FEMA assistance. According to Steve, some friends received the maximum benefits, although they lived in Kenner, a neighborhood in Jefferson Parish, which has been fully operational, with drinkable water and working energy, for more than a week.
"We got zip," he said.
Days before the storm hit, Miki purchased a passenger van for her new Japanese tour company Mikazuki Connection. As one of the few licensed Japanese tour companies in the city, Miki said her business depends on the future of New Orleans' food, culture and music. She said her business partner is overseeing three Japanese groups visiting in mid-October.
"I will bring the tourists back," Miki said. "That's my mission now."
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