In New Orleans, a little sunshine after the rain

NEW ORLEANS - Holly Kalman never thought she'd be donning a mask, goggles and gloves to help gut houses, but the Tulane junior says that type of community service is now commonplace.

Thomas Krouse only shrugs when talking about having to change his academic focus because his cash-strapped school axed a wide slice of its programs.

And Jimmy Michaels' reaction to two of his best friends being forced to transfer when Tulane dropped its engineering school?

"A huge bummer," says the Los Angeles native. But hey, Katrina happens.

Like their peers, these three Tulane

students - who all attended Penn last fall when their school was shut down - are determined to tell you that daily life at their school is normal, pretty much the way it was before the hurricane. The Tulane bubble, they say, emerged from the storm undented, and everyone is thrilled to be back.

The only problem is that to anyone not swept up in the big Green Wave of good feeling, things seem far from normal.

Obviously, slashing an engineering school, dumping all but six varsity sports programs and waving goodbye to over 200 faculty members is far from business as usual. But really, how can things be completely normal when the Subway across the street from campus closes at 8 p.m., well before students start getting their late-night cravings?

Take housemates and fraternity brothers Andy Herman and Stuart Shapiro. Like Kalman, Krouse and Miller, the two Lower Merion natives spent last fall attending classes at Penn while Tulane was shut down.

Eased into a couch and comfy chair in their apartment overlooking Broadway, Tulane's main drag and frat row, they lamented that one of their favorite spots on campus, the Camellia Grill, was closed. Not 20 minutes later, Shapiro jumped in when Herman said that closed restaurants are "the one thing" that's affected their normal college lives.

"Think of one restaurant in this area," challenged Shapiro.

"I mean Camellia Grill is the prime example," said Herman.

"Ok, without Camellia and without Delmonico's," Shapiro said, now laughing out loud. "Just because we can't find anywhere to eat doesn't mean it was because of the hurricane."

Considering the conditions around the city when the pair first returned to school here in January, it's hard to blame Shapiro for his enthusiasm. The campus only took minimal physical damage, but it was only nine months ago that Shapiro and Herman could daily see the National Guard roll down Broadway from their balcony and almost nothing outside the campus was open. The street and traffic lights didn't even work.

"When we came back in January, I will never forget this one night," Shapiro said. "All we were trying to do is get dinner, and it took us four hours. Literally, four hours driving around the city going to restaurants.

"There was either a two-hour wait, or it wasn't open, or they didn't have plates - it was unbelievable."

"It wasn't Tulane," Herman says.

Eating options weren't the only thing that changed at Tulane. While the campus might have escaped the worst of the hurricane, the school was drowning financially. In response to an expected $200 million in recovery costs - the school has actually rung up $410 million in Katrina bills so far - and an anticipated huge budget shortfall for this year, last December Tulane President Scott Cowen announced his Renewal Plan.

In addition to eliminating 180 faculty positions from the medical school and 50 from rest of the university and compressing the athletic department, Tulane dropped its engineering, computer science and sports science programs.

Krouse, a sophomore at Tulane, was planning to study in the school's industrial-development psychology program, which was cut.

"I was disappointed," he said, adding that one of his favorite professors was forced to leave the school.

Krouse attempted to transfer to Penn, but was denied and ultimately decided to stay at Tulane, where he has a full scholarship.

"I'm just going to save my money for graduate school," he said.

Still, Krause said day-to-day life is more or less normal.

Kalman agreed, saying that Tulane feels the same to her even though the type of community service her sorority does regularly has shifted dramatically.

So how can so much change but still be the same?

Michaels said it could just be that everyone's used to it. Also, he said students were so excited to get back to campus last January that they have been willing to look past inconveniences.

"We've all been through a lot," Shapiro said. "We're still all kind of recuperating, so we all know and give each other the benefit of the doubt."

So while the school may seem far from normal to outsiders, Tulane students seem to be on the same page - things are normal, or close enough to it anyway.

Plus, the Burger King down the street just re-opened. Who needs Subway, anyway?

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