Editing C5 NOLA (section)

==The Place==
New Orleans exists in a state of elegant decay.  The past and the present seem to overlap - the city does not easily give up its ghosts.  Mysterious, romantic, and steeped in history, it welcomes such an unconventional convention as Convergence. 

There is so much to do that it's impossible to include it all here. The cemeteries of New Orleans are a must-see.  Due to the high water table, there are no underground burials - rows upon rows of whitewashed sepulchers form above-ground necropoli, true cities to house the dead. The Westgate Gallery is a purple and black mansion that contains a collection of paintings, sculpture, jewelry, and books dedicated to portraying Death as a sorrowful, compassionate entity.  You can visit a real voodoo ceremony; take daytime or evening walking tours focusing on any subject you can imagine (haunted places, vampires, cemeteries, Anne Rice, you name it!); tour Antebellum plantations, Civil War battlefields, primordial swamps, and gracious turn-of-the-century manses; or just sit on a wrought-iron balcony or in a lush courtyard, sipping a cool drink and watching the sun set.  Of course, there are also many fine museums, two lovely public parks, an award-winning zoo and record-setting aquarium, steamboat rides and horse-drawn carriages. 

The selection of Goth-friendly stores in New Orleans has never been better.  There's exquisite silver jewelry at Armed & Dangerous, fancy clothing for men and women at Gargoyles, CDs at St. Germain, and ooo-la-lingerie at Siren Song.  Masks and other costume accessories are available in a variety found no place else, due to the city's passion for dramatic celebration.  Antiques stores abound both inside and out of the French Quarter, filled with glass inkwells, ebony walking sticks, silk parasols - there's even a shop specializing in culinary antiques, where you can find that absinthe spoon you've been wanting.