The first time I was ever on Bourbon Street, on New Year’s Eve 2001, I remember standing in a crowd of people hurling strings of beads up toward a girl standing on a balcony above us. But she wasn’t revealing any body parts. I was perplexed, until a homeless man of immense sagacity stumbled up to me.

“Inflation,” he said. “These days, a girl on a balcony might require five to ten sets of beads before she’ll flash you her taddies. But she will, eventually. That’s what she’s up there for.”

And of course, she did.

The whole incident, I think, really defines modern New Orleans: Changing with the times, but still able to deliver what you expect.

It seems you can’t have a conversation about New Orleans without somebody mentioning Katrina, but I’ve been to the city twice now, once before the storm in 2001 and again in 2008, and I have proudly say that the Big Easy has not lost its debaucherous edge.

Not to undermine the tragedy of nearly 1,900 lives lost and billions of dollars of property damage, but New Orleans has recovered well, and at last count was back to around 350,000 of its 450,000 pre-Katrina inhabitants. That’s still a big change, but somehow we on the West Coast had gotten the impression that the town had simply been washed out to sea by a giant 2012-style tsunami, that “There was no more New Orleans.” But there’s a difference between “flooded” and “destroyed”, the folks of Louisiana are a resourceful bunch, and honestly when I there just three years after the disaster, 95% of what I saw looked exactly the same. If you visit the French Quarter, you might never know that there was a hurricane at all, except for the cringingly comical gift-shop souvenirs that say things like “I survived Katrina and all I got was this lousy T-shirt”.

New Orleans will always be New Orleans. Bourbon Street will always feature an endless string of cheap, college-style drinking holes; some of the best jazz and blues in the world; drunk, friendly people; and a faint trash/booze smell that never really leaves. N’awlins will always be home to many, and a party to many more.

RECOMMENDED

Partying (on Bourbon Street)
Don’t go to the beach if you don’t like the ocean. Likewise, although the town has a lot of sober history to it, what New Orleans does best is drinking its face off. And gimmicky though it is, there really is no better place to do this than the street most famous for it… you know, the one named after booze. It’s going to be crowded. It’s going to be dirty. It’s going to be generally low-class. But if you’re a college student or anyone after a good time, isn’t this exactly what you’re looking for? When I was there for New Year’s, a crowd cheering a woman doing a strip tease on top of a mailbox was interrupted by a two police cars and a fire truck pushing through… only to have the firemen pull the woman up onto the back of their truck and the cops shine their spotlights on her so everyone could see her better. True story. It’s that kind of place.

Pubclub has a list of bars, but honestly you should just wander down the street and go wherever looks the most ridiculous. Go to Huge Ass Beers stand. Pee against the side of a building. And yes, throw beads at people (both genders) to get them to show you things, if that’s your bag. It doesn’t have to be Mardi Gras. Trust me.

NOT RECOMMENDED

Fancy (read: Expensive) tourist drinks
One thing to remember about Bourbon Street, however – you’ve heard of it because so has everyone else. Out-of-towners flock there in drunken droves, and the local establishments take advantage of said out-of-towners by concocting fruity drinks called things like “Hurricanes” and “Hand Grenades” that cost $10 and are sometimes just frozen juice and a splash of rum. So as with any touristy spot, watch out for paying lots for stuff that’s crap. Oh, and also watch out for beer bottles thrown at your head.

RECOMMENDED

Partying (not on Bourbon Street)
If that previous scene sounds less like your wildest frat party dream and more like your worst frat party nightmare, there are other less tawdry places to get your booze on in New Orleans. Frenchmen Street is the less trashy, higher scale version of Bourbon Street where all the locals go, and rumor has it that’s where all the best live music is these days. So if you’re tired of vomit on your shoes and can go without seeing any boobs for a while, head northeast for a different flavor of Saint city festivities.

NOT RECOMMENDED

Expecting living in N.O. to be the same as visiting there
A buddy of mine who went to Tulane for Law School told me he once called a plumber because his toilet wouldn’t stop overflowing and the plumber didn’t show up for two days because he “didn’t feel like working”. And thus, the downside of the “Laissez les bons temps rouler” lifestyle. When you party all the time, your house kind of smells like stale beer all the time. I should know, I’ve lived in a couple apartments like this.

Not saying everyone’s like this in New Orleans, but remember that most people who move to a town do so because they dig that town’s reputation, and New Orleans’ reputation is “take it easy.” And those are a lot of the people who occupy the French Quarter; people who live in New Orleans live away from Bourbon Street and never go there, the same way people who live in Las Vegas never go to the Strip. So just remember that visiting Bourbon Street and getting an accurate taste of Louisiana’s most famous city are two completely different things. But for the former, the Big Easy always promises to roll out a good (if depraved) time.