Tee Mamou Iota Mardi Gras
Tuesday, February 9, 2016
Iota, LA
Drop the area of Iota’s downtown into your standard USA shopping mall and it will rattle around like a BB in a barrel. Throw in its 1483 inhabitants and that mall would swallow them up as easily as the whale gulped Jonah. On Mardi Gras day, however, the steam of three hundred years of Acadian/French culture makes the place explode like a kernel of corn.
This is Louisiana, of course there is music and food involved. A big time Cajun or zydeco band plays on a raised dance stage set up smack in the middle of Duson Avenue, the main street that divides Iota in two. Dancers from near and far have highlighted this on their calendars and arrive at 10 AM (yes) to start their day. They’re more than happy to drive an hour from Lafayette to party (free) on the sturdy stage with the plywood floor that undulates gently under the rhythmic pounding of feet.
The Tee Mamou Iota Mardi Gras is about much more than music and dancing. It’s the annual re-baptism of the little town into its history and culture. The rowdy courir de Mardi Gras (Fat Tuesday) is a day of revelry that precedes Ash Wednesday and the next 40 days of restraints associated with Lent in the Roman Catholic calendar.
Centuries ago, French peasants would dress in colorful costumes, wear masks and conical hats (capuchons) to disguise themselves on this day, and roam (“courir”) to homes of landowners to beg for food, often entertaining them and playing pranks. A prize catch (literally) would be a chicken that would be used to make a communal gumbo for a feast at the end of the day.
Today, men have been at it since 7 AM. Instead of riding by horse, they scour the nearby countryside on trucks on a route planned in advance. Homeowners and farmers are ready for their visitors who might be offered a beer but have to work hard to corral a floppy flying chicken. By the time they return, men hoist chickens as prizes. Tomorrow they may hoist aspirin for a hangover.
Most people think the day is done when at 3 PM the trucks loaded with whooping and hollering costumed revelers roll into town on the special flatbeds made for just this purpose. Escorted by police cars with sirens blaring, this is a spectacle to behold. VIDEO1 VIDEO2 VIDEO3
Little boys and girls riding in pickup trucks throw candy into the crowd along a 300-yard stretch of the street. After off loading from the trucks, first the children then the adults take to the stage to sing the Mardi Gras song (in Cajun French), a perennial ritual that winds down Mardi Gras. No marching bands, no floats with beads being thrown to spectators, just history, straight up.
This is when the heartbeat of Iota takes over. Spectacle coalesces into community as the men and women leave the stage. The courir participants are greeted with hugs, appreciation, and admiration. They’ve participated in a ritual that binds them to their town, their families, their friends, their culture…and are proud of it.
As I wander through the crowd, it seems like everyone in Iota is connected to someone who’s done a courir. A couple of “May I take your photo?” requests bring me face to face with Iota’s past, present, and future.
That’s when I met Katy Comeaux and Shea Lantz and his mom and dad, all from Iota.
“I’ve done the courir since I was 15, now I’m 23. ” Katy says. “There is a woman’s courir on the Saturday before Mardi Gras every year. This year 88 of us went from house to house begging for food and chasing chickens for the community gumbo like the men did today. My family is really involved, some of the men are captains in the courir.”
“My mother made my hat and mask and clothes for this,” she says, “hand made costumes are a requirement.”
At least three generations take part in the ritual. “There’s a children’s courir every Sunday before Mardi Gras. They stay close to town, beg for food and chase chickens, just like the men and women.”
Shea Lantz, now 26, has been in the courir since he was 15 years old. “My dad has been running the courir for 40 years, more consecutive years than any one else. He and I are the only two allowed to sit on the roof of the wagon in the parade.” (photo under paragraph 5) Troy Lantz is a town councilman and Iota's police commissioner. Shea, a former EMT, just finished his internship and has his mortician's license.
Shea and Troy point out how they constructed their capuchins (conical hats) with crawfish trap mesh. “It doesn’t collapse like cardboard when it gets wet,” Shea’s dad Troy says. I marvel at the hand stitching of the inner headband. The mask's mouthpieces and eye openings are made from shaker screen, an extremely durable oil field mesh screen used to separate mud and small particles from fluids in the drilling process. The use of these screens is creativity with a distinct Louisiana twist.
Troy's mask fuses family history with Cajun customs. It was sewn by his late cousin 35 years ago. “Hand-sewing the hats and masks is 100% tradition,” Shea says with pride. Shea later tells me that until three years ago he and his dad wore Mardi Gras suits made by the same cousin 35 years ago. "The material became so brittle that we didn't want to ruin them."
“We welcome people who come here to watch us carry on our tradition,” Shea says. "It helps our little festival keep going."
"Where are you from?" they ask. And wonder why I come to this small place for this big holiday.
“Everything in this custom feels so authentic. I can see and feel the pride you have in re-enacting the courir and the way you’re passing it on to the next generations. It’s really unusual to see an entire town connect like this, it just doesn’t happen everywhere,” I say. "And the people, like you and your dad, are friendly."
The earliest arriving Cajuns endured great hardships. They survived by staying connected with their language and customs. They have a fierce determination to carry them on. Find out for yourself. Head for Iota next year on Mardi Gras day.
For most Americans, their heritage is a gauzy memory set in scrapbooks and family mementos. In Iota it’s a tradition that grows as vigorously as the rice fields in the nearby prairies.
Photos by Paul A. Tamburello, Jr.
Great stuff....just posted it on Facebook
Posted by: Bernard Ussher | February 18, 2016 at 05:43 PM