I have been here 3 days now and despite having arrived in a blackout, where I thought rioting and looting were about to start, I have completely fallen for this town.
I have worked out that there are 2 types of people who know about Savannah - the first have never been here and therefore are talking shite based their ignorance no doubt based on some preconception they have about the deep south generally and are minded of the stories of cotton plantations, deep fried chicken, collared greens, Amistad and slavery etc. The other group have been here and have fallen in love with the place and do not want anyone else to discover this hidden treasure - and are so dismissive about it, to hopefully put you off visiting the place.
It is rare that I have stayed somewhere that I don't want to leave - Christchurch, NZ or Boulder, Colorado and of course the Dolomites, Italy (my favorite place thus yet discovered) are the ones that instantly spring to mind. Savannah, Georgia is now on that list. It is difficult to describe why it appeals to me so, but it is somewhere I will have to come back to.
In summary it is steeped in history and in 1733 a philanthropic Englishman named Oglethorpe founded a colony to mainly grow silk to relieve the UK's reliance on imports from India and Italy (there is a lot more to the story but its not for me to tell - if you are interested its here on Wikipedia). The architecture is very similar to that of my Home town Bath (which I also have strong feelings for) and above all else the people are incredibly friendly.
I have been trying to work out now for a few days why it is I wanted to come here. Well my interest has not been with just Savannah but the whole of the Deep South, Georgia, South Carolina, Tennessee and of course Alabama. I loved Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer when I was a kid and remember being fascinated & horrified about the stories of slavery. As I know relatively little about the area or its history before I came, I have reached back and tried to recall where the influences might have come from.
Embarrassingly the Dukes of Hazard has some resonance with me, Bo and Luke tearing up the countryside in their Dodge Charger and crossing the Hazard County line escaping from the Sheriff just in time. While probably fictitious I believe the county was meant to be in Georgia. Also how can any impressionable prepubescent boy not have had the hots for Daisy Duke! Other influences have been:
Book: Barbara Kingsolver; Prodigal Summer - life in southern Appalachia (an amazing book)
Book: A walk in the woods - Bill Bryson
Film: Forest Gump - 'Greenboro Alabama'
Film: Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil - John Berendt
Film: Legend of Bagger Vance, Will Smith and Charlieze Theron (there is an interesting anecdote about the meaning behind this movie - I am so shallow I just thought it was about golf but actually a parody on Bhagavad Gita)
Film: The gift - Cate Blanchet
Film: The Patriot, Mel Gibson wading through marsh swamps with atrocious acting.
People: Anybody I have met with a melodic Sawthern Draawl
Lastly and probably the most important is Spanish Moss - it warrants an entry on its own but I have a strange interest in this plant (geeky I know!) and along with the melodic accent of this place it impresses upon me.
Oaks bent double and dripping with Spanish Moss, overgrown porches and rocking chairs, whiskered gentlemen sneaking a glance at a ladies ankle (in 1750 if you saw a Ladies ankle you had to marry her!), plantation houses, ironclads busting through the Union Navy, gumbo and shrimp boats, Victorian parlours and of course Rhett Butler calling out for Scarlett. A romantic era where men were gentlemen and all women were ladies. Hmmm this explains a lot!The photo I took yesterday on the Wormsloe Plantation about 10 miles south of SV - typifies the look of this area.
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