Mardi Gras in Cajun Country
Mardi Gras is such an iconic New Orleans festival that it’s easy to forget the holiday is a celebration throughout Louisiana. In the heart of Acadiana, an eight-parish region in southwest Louisiana, Mardi Gras is not about extravagant parades, colorful beads and flamboyant costumes. Cajuns have their own traditions that are less familiar but just as entertaining as New Orleans’ festivities, so this year venture into rural French Louisiana and discover the thrill of Mardi Gras done Cajun style.
Eunice, in St. Landry Parish, is typical of many Cajun communities that hold Mardi Gras “runs,†known as Courir de Mardi Gras. Revelers don homemade costumes and painted wire-screen masks, and they ride through the countryside on horseback or flatbed trucks, “begging†from their neighbors.
It’s a little like trick-or-treating, but instead of getting candy, merrymakers receive ingredients for a delicious gumbo that will be prepared when they return to town. The ultimate prize is a live chicken. Grown men chasing a chicken through a farmer’s yard as the streamers of their capuchons (cone-shaped hats) fly through the air is a comical spectacle that gives out-of-towners plenty of stories to tell their friends back home.
To entice a family to be more generous with their gumbo offerings, Mardi Gras (the name of the revelers as well as the celebration) sing for their supper. The more skillful equestrians in the group may serenade a household while standing on their horses.
Others prefer dancing to singing, and the lady of the house may find herself whisked away into a waltz by a masked reveler.
Sixty-eight-year-old Georgie Manuel, a Eunice native, is an unofficial authority on Cajun Country Mardi Gras. Growing up, she heard many family stories about good-natured Mardi Gras mischief, and she has always been fascinated by the masks and costumes used to conceal the identity of the pranksters — so fascinated that she is now a respected costume and mask maker, a craft she learned from her grandmother.
Manuel is quick to point out that during her grandmother’s day, people in rural communities had to use what they had for costumes, and what they had was scraps of fabric and feed sacks.
“I can remember going to the feed store with my grandparents,†Manuel said. “Grandmother bought produce and provisions for her kitchen based on the feed sack designs.â€
She says purple, green and gold, New Orleans Mardi Gras colors, are not part of Cajun Country Mardi Gras. Past generations didn’t have access to such glamorous, colorful fabrics and may not have been able to afford them if they did.
For Manuel, Courir de Mardi Gras is more than just a frivolous party. It’s a part of her community’s heritage, and she doesn’t want it to ever be lost.
“There is only one way anybody’s tradition will survive, and that’s by passing it on to the children,†Manuel said. “I teach everything I have been taught, including how different our traditions are from the rest of the state and the rest of the world.â€
Participants in the Eunice Courir de Mardi Gras on Feb. 24 must be at least 18 years old, wear a costume and pay a registration fee of $30.
But even if visitors don’t join in the run, there are plenty of related activities, including:
• LeJeune Mardi Gras. A run for teenagers ages 13-17 on Feb. 21. Registration begins at 8 a.m. in front of the National Guard Armory, at Ninth Street and Maple Avenue. Run begins at 9 a.m. Cost is $20 on day of run. Pre-registration is $10. Go to www.eunice-la.com to print registration form online.
• Old Time Boucherie. Enjoy plentiful food and live Cajun music Feb. 22 at an old-time boucherie on South Second Street and Park Avenue. A hog is slaughtered and roasted, which provides an opportunity to sample Cajun delicacies such as boudin (sausage). Boucherie begins at 10 a.m. Music begins at noon. A children’s Mardi Gras parade marches down Second Street at 3 p.m.
• Lundi Gras Street Dance. Held Feb. 23 at South Second Street and Walnut Avenue, 2-5:30 p.m. Take a break for dinner and then dance again from 7:30 to 11:30 p.m. with Junior Melancon & the Comedown Playboys.
• Mardi Gras Festival. Once the Courir de Mardi Gras gets under way on Fat Tuesday, Feb. 24, daylong festivities take place in downtown Eunice beginning at 10 a.m. with a festival featuring Cajun and Zydeco bands, a children’s parade, arts and crafts, and a costume contest.
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2009/02/01/cajun_mardi_gras
January 30th, 2009 by Ragin Cajun /
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