Day 4: Tuscaloosa News

The city of Tuscaloosa is perhaps the second or third largest city in all of Alabama. Birmingham is the largest and Montgomery is comparable in size to it as well. Named after an American Indian chief, the city’s name means black warrior, after the custom of the natives of painting themselves with dark soil. The best thing that the city is known for perhaps today is that it is the home of the Crimson Tide, the fighting name of the University of Alabama.

In the morning, once I had recovered from the long drive of yesterday, I decided to explore some of the area, since it had been too dark to appreciate everything the night before. Dan had to work in the morning, so he took off for the office leaving me with the hyperactive Pike. I managed to sneak out of the house and went for a run around the campus up to the river, which incidentally is known as Black Warrior River.

The campus was fairly empty because it also was Spring Break. But, as I jogged around, I was struck by the beauty of the campus and its similarities to the University of Virginia’s design. There were open spaces, plenty of brick and neo-classical style design. The Southern adornment of curved staircases was used prominently throughout the buildings. The jog continued up to the river, where a new River Walk had been built, complete with nice stone benches and a little pier to view and even fish from. Little did I know that the next morning, someone would drive off from the park and into the river, killing himself. That would draw large crowds onto the otherwise empty park that morning.

Dan came home later, and we proceeded to search for acceptable food. I wanted to have some Southern soul food, but Dan was skeptical. Though there were some places that he knew of, he thought it was anachronistic to eat such foods. “It’s all for show,” he said. He explained that people simply didn’t eat the unhealthy and overpriced foods in the town, and it was subject really to tourists. “Everyone’s moved on here.”

He finally gave in though and we went to a tiny little restaurant that was exactly what I wanted and pictured, from my perspective as a tourist. It was a little bit rundown looking over to some train tracks. The inside featured some kind-looking old black women who helped us with picking out our food. I tried “real” Southern sweetened tea for the first time and had a sugar shock almost instantly. The food was hearty though and I couldn’t finish it all. For some reason, during trips my appetite is decreased substantially.

I asked Dan how he was enjoying life in the South. I wondered how a guy from Northern Virginia, who went to high school with me in a county that has the population of one fifth of Alabama was doing. “I think I would have problems living in a place like this. There’s not the same diversity we have in DC,” I said. “Northern Virginia really unique in the world though,” Dan said. He argued that the number of different peoples from all over the world that lived in close quarters to each other on suburban, nicely manicured lawns was something people simply didn’t think about at all. “Right,” I said. “But, it doesn’t stop me from wanting it.”

I explained that I thought that DC was the best city in the world because of that reason partially. It had in addition, a small enough population that it didn’t have the crushing feeling of New York City or London or any megapolis, but had the amenities of fine arts in the Smithsonian and the Kennedy Center as well as a raging nightlife.

“You have a bias,” Dan said simply. There was an implication he said in what I had just articulated – that somehow the “high art” was better than the local arts. I answered that that was not what I meant to suggest. I believe in cultural relativism and it particularly applicable to folk art versus higher bourgeouise art. But, I again was articulating my own sentiments. I grew up in such a world and that was what I was accustomed to. I wasn’t being snobby, though it seemed like it. In fact, I thought that anyone who thinks that folk art is better than fine arts, is exercising snobbery just as well in a reverse fashion.

Other things we did that day:

Ø Saw a mental asylum’s pauper grave.

Ø Took a look at the ruins of the original state capitol for Alabama

Ø Visited Dan’s workplace

Ø Got a drink at the local watering hole, the Downtown Pub

Ø Saw another cemetery, one of dozens of Confederate Soldiers in Gainesville, AL.

Ø Had a cookout and met Dan’s neighbors.