A Season Of Joy -- And Caution -- Kicks Off In New Orleans

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Vaccinated, masked and ready-to-revel New Orleans residents began ushering in Carnival season Thursday with a rolling party on the city’s historic streetcar line, an annual march honoring Joan of Arc in the French Quarter and a collective, wary eye on coronavirus statistics.

Carnival officially begins each year on Jan. 6 — the 12th day after Christmas — and, usually, comes to a raucous climax on Mardi Gras, or Fat Tuesday, which falls on March 1 this year. Thursday’s festivities came two years after a successful Mardi Gras became what officials later realized was an early Southern superspreader of COVID-19; and nearly a year after city officials canceled 2021 parades.

This year, the party is going on despite rapidly rising COVID-19 cases driven by the omicron variant.

“Without a doubt, we will have Mardi Gras 2022,” Mayor LaToya Cantrell said during a Thursday morning kickoff event, where participants removed protective masks long enough to sample slices of king cake, a seasonal delicacy.

“Having a Mardi Gras, and a successful and healthy Mardi Gras, is as important to this region’s mental health as it is important to the economic health of this city,” added James Reiss, an official with the Rex Organization, a 150-year-old Carnival group.

Still, in a season known for excess, the virus prompted restraint. At Bywater Bakery, owner Chaya Conrad usually has a daylong block party with live music to mark the beginning of Carnival season. After a “virtual” recorded concert last year, she had planned to return to the big block party Thursday. But after the virus sickened many of her employees over Christmas, she canceled the extravaganza. Instead, a piano player on a flatbed truck played as customers snapped up king cakes.

“I don’t need the musicians getting sick. I don’t need my customers getting sick and I don’t need my other half of my staff getting sick,” Conrad said. “When this dies down then we’ll have the big block party.”

In what has become a traditional kickoff to the season, a group known as the Phunny Phorty Phellows boarded one of the historic St. Charles line streetcars Thursday night along with a small brass band. Vaccinations and protective masks were required and seating on the streetcar was limited.

Larger, more opulent parades will follow in February as Mardi Gras nears.

“It was certainly the right thing to do to cancel last year,” said Dr. Susan Hassig, a Tulane University epidemiologist who also is a member of the Krewe of Muses and rides each year on a huge float in the Muses parade. “We didn’t have vaccines. There was raging and very serious illness all over the place.”

Now, she notes, the vaccination rate is high in New Orleans, where 81% of all adults are fully vaccinated, according to the city’s statistics.

And while people from outside the city are a big part of Mardi Gras crowds, Cantrell’s anti-virus measures include proof of vaccination or a negative test for most venues.

Sharing Hassig’s cautious optimism is Elroy James, president of the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club, a predominantly Black organization whose Mardi Gras morning parade is a highlight of Carnival. Early in the pandemic, COVID-19 was blamed for the death of at least 17 of Zulu’s members.

“I think most krewes, particularly, I know, for Zulu, we’ve been very proactive, leaning in, with respect to all of the safety protocols that have been in place since the onset of this thing,” James said Wednesday. “Our float captains are confirming our riders are vaccinated. And part of the look for the 2022 Mardi Gras season is face masks.”

Reasons for concern remain in a state where the pandemic has claimed more than 15,000 lives over the past two years. Louisiana health officials reported 1,412 hospitalizations as of Wednesday — up from fewer than 200 in mid-December.

Asked whether Carnival krewes should be making contingency plans for their balls in case of future restrictions, Gov. John Bel Edwards said he is not currently planning restrictions on gatherings. But he added that people should be careful about spending time amid large groups of unmasked people.

“Does that apply to a Mardi Gras ball? I think its pretty self-evident that it does,” Edwards said.

Muses founder Staci Rosenberg said the krewe had planned to gather in a bar near the streetcar route to await the Phunny Phorty Phellows. The virus surge prompted a move outside.

Hassig says she won’t attend indoor gatherings. She, is, however, determined to ride in the Feb. 24 parade — vaccinated, wearing an N95 mask and knowing that outdoor activities are safer.

Hassig rode in her first parade in 2006 as the city struggled to recover from Hurricane Katrina. Now, she wants to participate in the recovery from the economic ravages of the virus.

“It’s incredibly important, financially, for the city that this go well,” she said.

Graceland Commemorating 45th Anniversary Of Presley’s Death

Elvis Presley’s Graceland will be celebrating the 45th anniversary of the singer and actor’s death with new museum exhibits, record giveaways, concerts and other special events at the tourist attraction centered around Presley’s life and career in Memphis, Tennessee.

Each year, Graceland commemorates Presley’s death with Elvis Week, which includes a candlelight vigil attended by fans from around the world. Presley died in Memphis on Aug. 16, 1977, at age 42.

This year, Graceland will be giving out 1,000 special Elvis 45 rpm records to visitors who tour on six select days. All records will feature a custom jacket.

Also planned are four new exhibits featuring Presley’s guitars, his clothing, a celebration of the 40th anniversary of his Graceland home opening to the public, and a fan tribute.

is also celebrating Presley’s birthday this week with a party, a sing-along to the film “Viva Las Vegas,” and a cake cutting He was born on Jan. 8, 1935, in Tupelo, Mississippi.

Hong Kong Bans Flights, Imposes Other COVID-19 Restrictions

Hong Kong authorities announced a two-week ban on flights from the United States and seven other countries and held 2,500 passengers on a cruise ship for coronavirus testing Wednesday as the city attempted to stem an emerging omicron outbreak.

The two-week ban on passenger flights from Australia, Canada, France, India, Pakistan, the Philippines, Britain and the United States will take effect Sunday and continue until Jan. 21.
Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam also announced that restaurant dining will be forbidden after 6 p.m. for two weeks starting Friday. Game arcades, bars and beauty salons must also close during that period.
“We have to contain the pandemic to ensure that there will not be a major outbreak in the community again,” Lam said at a news conference, adding that the city is “on the verge” of another surge.

The measures came as new omicron clusters have emerged over the past week, many linked to several Cathay Pacific crew members who broke isolation rules and dined at restaurants and bars in the city before testing positive.

Hong Kong has reported 114 omicron variant cases as of Tuesday, with most being imported. On Tuesday, it reported its first untraceable case in nearly three months, which authorities said was likely caused by the omicron variant.

Hong Kong officials have moved swiftly to block the spread of the variant, locking down residential buildings where people have tested positive and mass-testing thousands of people.

That includes about 2,500 passengers who were being held Wednesday on a cruise ship in Hong Kong for coronavirus tests, after health authorities said nine passengers were linked to an omicron cluster and ordered the ship to turn back.

Authorities forced the Royal Caribbean’s Spectrum of the Seas ship, which departed Sunday on a “cruise to nowhere,” to return a day early on Wednesday, according to a government statement.

The ship returned to Hong Kong on Wednesday morning and passengers were held onboard for most of the day while they awaited testing.

One passenger, Claudy Wong, said Royal Caribbean had tried its best to follow pandemic regulations.

“The pandemic has gone on for so long, actually passengers like us who board the cruise are already prepared for such situations to happen,” Wong said.

Royal Caribbean said in a statement that the nine guests were immediately isolated and all tested negative, and that the company was working closely with authorities to comply with epidemic prevention policies and regulations.

It said guests who were on the affected ship would receive a 25% refund on their cruise fare. The ship’s next sailing on Thursday was also canceled because the crew must undergo testing, and those guests will receive a full refund.

The city has reported a total of 12,690 confirmed coronavirus infections as of Tuesday, including 213 deaths.

Rodin’s Hands, February 4, 2022–December 2023, At The Rodin Museum In Philadelphia

“Rodin is the sculptor of hands—furious, clenched, rearing, damned hands,” wrote the French critic and poet Gustave Kahn, describing Auguste Rodin’s talent for concentrating emotion and storytelling into this body part. The exhibition invites visitors to consider how the artist’s modelling gives hands a tension and vitality that may be more expressive or dramatic than a figure’s face. Rodin almost obsessively explored the expressive power of hands, using them to convey an infinite variety of emotions and experiences.

The exhibition highlights fifteen bronzes and plasters—many of them rare or unique to the Philadelphia collection—to discuss Rodin’s process. Drawing on a vast stock of sculpted hands in his studio, the artist reused, reoriented, and repurposed hands in his sculptures to create unexpected juxtapositions and infuse works with new meaning. It was not lost on Rodin or his contemporaries that sculptors are first and foremost modelers reliant on their hands.

Enlarged hands or those distended by age or disease were vital components of figural sculptures such as The Burghers of Calais, The Three Shades, or The Helmet-Maker’s Wife. Later in Rodin’s career, works like The Cathedral or The Hand of God are comprised of hands, cut at the wrist or forearm, that offer symbolist essays on humanity and creation.

Exhibition highlights include The Cathedral, a sculpture modelled in 1908 that depicts two over-life-size right hands whose fingertips are about to touch. The sculptor published a book on the Gothic cathedrals of France in 1914 and renamed this piece, formerly known as The Arch of Alliance, after the rib vaulting found in Gothic churches.

Rodin almost obsessively explored the expressive power of hands, using them to convey an infinite variety of emotions and experiences. It is thought that he conceived The Clenched Hand and The Left Hand as studies for The Burghers of Calais but rejected the hands as being too animated. Recently, Stanford University scientists have proposed that the model for The Clenched Hand suffered from Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease, a nerve disorder that causes muscle contractions. Rodin’s desire to study nature and represent it truthfully inspired him to study medical specimens at the Dupuytren Museum in Paris.

A piece unique to the Rodin Museum is the bronze sculpture of clasping hands titled Two Lovers. The plaster model for it at the Musée Rodin in Paris is inscribed: “Hands of Rodin and Rose Beuret,” suggesting that the hands are those of the sculptor and his mistress and partner.

In Rodin’s vision of creation, The Hand of God emerges not from heaven but from earth and cradles a rock from which male and female figures emerge. The divine hand with its open, curving palm and outstretched index finger is identical to a right hand that appears twice in The Burghers of Calais: once on the figure of Pierre de Wissant, who raises it to his face in a gesture of acceptance and offering, and again for his brother Jacques de Wissant, from whom the hand hangs in a gesture indicative of hesitation and doubt.

Curator

Jennifer Thompson, the Gloria and Jack Drosdick Curator of European Painting and Sculpture and Curator of the John G. Johnson Collection

For more details, please visit: https://philamuseum.org/visit

Colorado Ski Towns Take Safety Measures As Omicron Spreads

BRECKENRIDGE, Colo. (AP) — Colorado resort communities are taking steps to control a surge in COVID-19 cases as seasonal visitors flock to the area for outdoor recreation.

Starting Thursday, people will have to wear masks in public indoor spaces in Summit County, home to several ski resorts. As of Wednesday, the county had nearly 3,743 new confirmed cases per 100,000 people, according to John Hopkins data analyzed by the Associated Press.

In a news release, the county’s public health department said the decision was made in response to an “alarming” increase in cases during the past week. Officials believe that’s due to the spread of the highly contagious omicron variant, likely at indoor holiday gatherings.

Summit county has among the highest incidence rates in the United States, as does the Aspen area in Pitkin County which saw around 3,506 new cases per 100,000 people as of Wednesday, according to AP data.

On Thursday, Pitkin County closed several municipal buildings to in-person services as the county experiences an influx of seasonal visitors and staffing issues due to the omicron variant spread, the Aspen Times reported.

Summit County leaders had been reluctant to re-impose a mask mandate partly because it would put service workers in the difficult position of enforcing it, the Summit Daily reported. However, they were also concerned about the number of workers who have had to quarantine and saw the move as a way to help businesses.

“To me, it’s just a really commonsense approach and something we need to take to help mitigate this, even if it’s minuscule in what it does,” county commissioner Elisabeth Lawrence said. “It also provides a level of comfort for our locals.”

On Tuesday, Denver extended its latest mask mandate through Feb. 3.

The Pitkin County administration building on Main Street is closed, but the departments are available by phone or online, including the Clerk’s Office, Human Services, Public Health, Community Development and Assessor’s Office. The Sheriff’s Department’s main office is closed to walk-ins.

Investments In New Projects On Tap For 2022 In Atlantic City

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (AP) — Atlantic City’s casinos are forging ahead with ambitious new projects in 2022, even as the coronavirus pandemic continues to make it harder to do business.

And non-casino projects involving family entertainment, education and the offshore wind industry will take flight in the new year.

But challenges lurk, as well.

In-person gambling revenue at seven of the nine casinos is down compared with 2019, before the pandemic hit. Sports betting and internet gambling revenue has filled some of the gap, but that money must be shared with third parties, including technology platforms and sports books, and is not solely for the casinos to keep.

A law passed signed by Gov. Phil Murphy in December gives the casinos some relief from big increases in payments they were due to pay to Atlantic City, Atlantic County and the schools system in lieu of property taxes.

A big unknown is how long and how seriously the COVID19 pandemic, and particularly the fast-spreading omicron variant, will affect customers’ willingness to come out and gamble in person in 2022.

And a big challenge is right around the corner when New York begins allowing people to bet on phones or other mobile devices anywhere in the state, as soon as January but almost certainly in time for the Super Bowl in February.

Gambling industry executives and analysts expect New Jersey to lose at least 20% of its sports betting volume as New York residents who formerly had to cross over into New Jersey to bet will be able to do it at or close to home.

Mark Giannantonio, president of Resorts casino, said he is “tremendously optimistic for a great year” in 2022.

Starting in February, Resorts is renovating its rooftop pool, adding a retractable roof to enable it to be used year-round. Resorts also is investing $5 million into new table games and slot machines, remodeling its high-limit slots area, and creating a new VIP Asian-themed room.

The Ocean Casino Resort plans to begin a $75 million project in spring or summer to finish 12 floors of hotel rooms that were never completed when the casino first opened as Revel in 2012.

Caesars casino will start work in 2022 on a new theater and resident show due to open in the first quarter of 2023. The project will incorporate the facade of the former Warner Theatre from 1929, which is currently part of the casino’s exterior facing the Boardwalk.

Also planned for Caesars in 2022 is a new restaurant opened by a hospitality company involving actor Robert De Niro that also will renovate hotel rooms there. Caesars Entertainment is partnering with Nobu Hospitality for a project to be called Nobu Hotel Atlantic City.

Bally’s will unveil 750 renovated hotel rooms, a redone hotel lobby and bar, and an indoor-outdoor entertainment venue in 2022.

A $100 million indoor water park to be built next to the former Showboat casino, which now operates as a nongambling hotel, plans a ground breaking for early 2022.

Atlantic City will host a three-day country music concert on the beach in August headlined by Luke Bryan and Morgan Wallen.

Construction is to begin in 2022 on a new ShopRite supermarket in Atlantic City, designed to end the city’s status as a “food desert” without a major supermarket. The project should open in 2023.

Stockton University hopes to complete a new student residence hall in the city in 2022.

Atlantic City will play a big role in the burgeoning offshore wind energy industry. Atlantic Cape Community College plans to open a wind energy workforce training center on its city campus in the fall, and wind developer Orsted hopes to start work in 2022 on a maintenance and operations center in Atlantic City to support its offshore wind projects in the area.

And a plan that has gotten little attention outside of Atlantic City but which will affect most visitors to the city is due to begin in 2022.

The city plans to reduce Atlantic Avenue, one of its two main north-south thoroughfares, from two lanes in each direction to one lane in each direction, in the name of pedestrian safety.

But many residents and businesses oppose the plan, predicting that traffic that is already difficult to navigate under current conditions will become even worse with only one lane in each direction.

World Cup Hotel Shortage For Supporters Planning Qatar Trips

Qatar wants to attract 1.2 million people to the World Cup but will struggle to accommodate many of them.

With ticket sales beginning in January, supporters are in for a shock when they look for somewhere to stay: Qatar already looks sold out.

Extensive searches by The Associated Press of leading hotel chains and aggregation websites found only one property with availability for the entire tournament which runs from Nov. 21 to Dec. 18.

Most rooms have already been block-booked by World Cup organizers, in part to prevent price gouging, but mainly to ensure availability for teams, FIFA officials, sponsors and media.

“If a team is qualified, it’s now that people are trying to find accommodation,” Ronan Evain, executive director of the Football Supporters Europe group, told the AP. “And at the moment there is nothing.”

Qatar’s Supreme Committee, which in charge of World Cup planning, has provided the first details to the AP acknowledging the accommodation challenges after weeks of questions.

Only approximately 90,000 rooms will be made available to the public via a website. That is around the same number of fans from the United States who had tickets for the 2018 World Cup which was spread across Russia and had hotels available on the open market.

Yet the AP has been told that surveys and data modeling by Qatari officials based on travel to previous World Cups show they now anticipate 850,000 overseas visitors will require rooms. World Cup organizers have also said more than 1.2 million visitors will come. The most recent data from the Qatar Tourism Authority said there are 33,208 rooms in hotels and hotel apartments.

What Qatar boasts as being its key selling point — the most compact World Cup ever with the eight stadiums within a 30-mile radius of Doha — could prove the barrier to visitors going or being able to make lengthy trips.

“It becomes a bit of a dystopian World Cup if the stadium could be anywhere in the world ... in the middle of the desert and then you just fly in and out,” Evain said. “That’s certainly not the experience of the majority of fans are looking for.”

Despite the pressures on hotel stock in Qatar, there will be no system in place to equitably split the rooms between fans of participating nations or prevent them being bought up for the entire tournament en masse.

“There will be no ballot,” the Supreme Committee told the AP. “Visitors will be able to book on the accommodation portal on a first come, first served basis.”

Further restricting the availability, Qatar will not allow one night stays for fans to make short trips and free up rooms for others. No prices have been disclosed.

“As is standard practice in many events around the world minimum and maximum lengths of stay will be applied,” the Supreme Committee said. “This will be a minimum of two nights for the group stages — the same as in Russia. Long stay bookings will be possible, and even more so for visitors keen to stay for the entire tournament.”

There will be 4,000 cabins on cruise ships that will dock in Doha for the tournament. While camping in the desert had previously been touted as a means of finding space for fans, that is now being downplayed as a significant option.

“The campsite availability will make up a small percentage of the overall accommodation options in Qatar,” the Supreme Committee said. “We have always viewed the ability to camp as an offering of traditional Qatari hospitality, not as a solution to speculation around accommodation shortages.”

Flying in and out of the country for each match could prove to be the only viable option for many fans.

“We might end up in a situation where, at least for the European, and some of the Asian teams, the best option for fans will be to travel in and out on matchday which would come with a cost,” Evain said. “But also it would come with quite an extraordinary environmental footprint.”

Direct return flights from London and Paris for next November and December currently exceed $1,000; from New York it’s more than double that price and from Sao Paulo even higher.

“If the focus remains on premium accommodation and if the flight prices remain where they are,” Evain said, “then there will be people that will just not be able to afford traveling to Qatar.

“We know that FIFA operates on the basis that there is this fantastic fan base somewhere in the world that is ready to pay a fortune to follow the World Cup. But previous tournament don’t show that. There are games at every tournament that are not sold out.”

The group stage features 32 teams with games across 12 days when Qatar anticipates 559,000 flying in with a peak of 276,000 ticket holders around Nov. 27 and 28 requiring an estimated 128,000 rooms — more than the country’s entire hotel stock for fans.

Just taking Nov. 27, after searching leading travel portals, only three hotels could be booked on the open market on the internet. The cheapest available rooms there would cost $1,028, $1,431 or $5,276 for the night.

The Supreme Committee pointed out that Moscow and St. Petersburg did not sell out the hotels reserved by organizers, but those are cities larger than Qatar with far more rooms.

“No one is seriously arguing that Qatar should build a million hotel rooms,” Evain said. “There is probably some sort of middle ground and solution, temporary housing or anything like this, but for the moment it’s hard to see this happening.”

When trying to book for the entire tournament on travel portals, the only room the AP could find on the open market was $1,056 a night at a four-star hotel near to the airport through Agoda.

The Accor, Hilton and Intercontinental, Marriott and Wyndham chains, which run most of the leading hotel brands, are all showing no rooms available during the World Cup at their 28 properties in and around Doha — the only built-up areas in the oil-and-gas rich desert nation.

The lifting of the economic, diplomatic and travel boycott of Doha by Gulf rivals does open up the possibility of fans commuting from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia or Dubai, which are both about a 90-minute flight from Qatar’s single airport.

“They are countries with an even worse human rights record than Qatar,” Evain said.

Some fans will also be put off by the Gulf nations’ anti-LGBTQ+ laws. Even opting to go to Qatar at all could present fans with a moral quandary given the well-documented poor working conditions and human rights violations which have only been partially addressed with changes to labor laws after scrutiny of the abuses and deaths of the low-paid, largely migrant worker population building facilities for the World Cup, including hotels.

“It’s a dilemma every fan will have to deal with,” Evain said.