NEW ORLEANS — Defiant revelers as the iconic street reopened ahead of the Sugar Bowl on Thursday, just 36 hours after a bloody New Year's terrorist attack killed 14 people and injured dozens more. flocked to Bourbon Street in New Orleans.
“The big reason we came is to piss them off,” Mark Beeden, a Mississippi native, told the Post Thursday as he and his wife drank and strolled down Bourbon Street.
“ISIS is hell,” Shamsud Din Jabbar, 42, said of the terrorist organization to which he pledged allegiance before speeding down a busy Big Easy street in a borrowed Ford F-150 early Wednesday morning. .
Biden had not planned to attend the Sugar Bowl (a college football game in New Orleans that is usually held on New Year's Day but was postponed after the attack), but he bought a ticket and attended on Thursday as an act of defiance. did.
“They can kiss my ass, but what about that?” he said.
“We can't deviate from the plan and they win.”
Biden was just one of many who headed to Bourbon Street with the same idea, where a brass band played upbeat New Orleans tunes and Mardi Gras beads and 14 yellow roses set off a rampage of jabbers. Decorated the road.
“Morale is high because it was a tragic incident, and I think this will lift everyone's spirits,” said Darryl Brownlee, 63, of Michigan, as he watched the musicians perform.
Follow the latest updates on the Bourbon Street terrorist attack in New Orleans.
Bourbon Street was closed throughout New Year's Day as police investigated the scene, but reopened for the festivities Thursday.
“We couldn't keep it closed forever,” Brownlee said.
Stephanie Drake, 44, of New Orleans, said she walked down Bourbon Street waving a bundle of lit sage, “just to get rid of all the really nasty energy that's been happening on this street.”
“A stick of sage is the best way to get rid of all those nasty stains, right?'' says Drake, who sells the crystals. “That's what I can do now. I feel powerless and it makes me feel like I'm doing something.”
Live updates: Everything you need to know about the New Orleans terrorist attack
Some workers along the iconic stretch who witnessed the horrific attack came out saying they would not be daunted by people like Jabbar.
“It was chaos, it was a massacre,” said Jim Hill, manager of Mango Mango Daiquiris on Bourbon Street. He watched as the terrorist sped by, crashed into a crane several blocks away, and was subsequently shot and killed in a gunfight with police.
“I hate what happened, but I'm going to work tonight. I'm not going to let the hatred win and hide it in my house,” he said.
Hill said he plans to show up to every Thursday night football game and open the bar's doors. And he said that the terrorists just reminded people of the most important thing.
“I'm not going to live in fear. I'm going to live a better life.”
