14
It takes the rickshaw a few minutes to negotiate the busy
downtown street to what serves as the Casale Excavation Company. The sinewy
driver, who can’t weigh more than one hundred fifteen pounds, pedals with bare
feet, the soles of which have certainly turned to leather. He shoots and scoots
in between people, cattle, and taxi cabs, creating a plume of dust in his wake.
If we’d taken a car, it might have cost us a half an hour to travel the same
distance.
As predicted, located directly
beside the Casale office is a bar. Judging by the red neon mounted to the
interior of the establishment’s front picture window, the name of the joint is
Rudy’s New Orleans Jazz Revival.
Catchy.
Dismounting the rickshaw, I pay the
man double what he asks for and immediately head to the front
