[4] HOMEBOYS & TRAINS My brother in arms Dave Gonzalez and I love to play this side of the neck (sarcastic) game of find the Rican. No matter where you dig in the history of the Americas you always find out -- if you dig deep enough -- that there's some damn Puerto Rican in there being part of the mix. "Poor Rat Bastard, Yo... let's play Six Degrees of Separican." The game begins for Dave and I while we're still at Cardinal Hayes High School in the South Bronx. We find out that there's a Puerto Rican Impressionist painter hanging in the Louvre in Paris who held his own with Van Gogh, Gaugin and the other Impressionist painters of that era. "Trust. Look anywhere and you'll find the Puerto Rican." "Time of Jesus." "Pepin el Jorobao (the hunchback)." "Pepin? Who's he?" "The Puerto Rican who sold Judas the rope after he screwed the pooch. Yo, he didn't throw all the money back and besides Pepin took 20 percent off the original asking price because it was Cananite hemp. " "Man what are you babbling about?" "My uncle Herbie showed me a really old dusty scroll in Aramaic which had an inscription on the inside that read 'O.K. it was me ... I did it ... I sold Judas the rope and the Romans the nails to permaset Chuito. So sue me ... Pepin - the wandering Rican." "Oh -- Get the ... out of here. OK the Titanic." "Oh, that's easy." "I suppose you’re going to tell me they were busboys." "Oh, Super jibaro please. It/s a Transoceanic trip ... Drag Queen from San Juan posing as a hairdresser for Jacob Astor's wife. I think it’s Monte Rock III's great uncle forever known as Mr. Natasha from Dykman Avenue. "Monte who? From Disco Tex and the Sexolettes .. Get the ... You need help ... go see someone and get long term treatment." David is one of those really smart Ricans - A Smarican. He graduates Yale and Columbia. Que hombre What a man Pero jodon But a pain in the ass Sin igual Unmatched Como un plomero Like a plumber Con un tubo y siete llaves With a pipe & 7 wrenches y yo And me mas tostao More toasted que un mani than a roasted peanut The game continues as we turn our sights on Puerto Rican emigration to New York. "Yo, man - for real -- check this out. a long time ago this Taino, uh, Guarianex Igneri, yeah, that's it - Gurianex got blown in his fishing boat.'' "Blown?" "Yeah, by a wind, man, don't be stupid (although that space alien Chupacabra would do in a pinch) anyway, Guarianex got pushed all the way up the coast and landed in Manhattan." "When was this?" "Yo, man, a long time ago like before the neighborhood changed. Yeah, before they built the subway and the Indians hadn't moved to Cleveland." "Quien lo manda? "Exactly, quien lo manda - who told him to do that -- he should have stayed home and cultivated some plantains. " "True, True." "So.... Now realizing that he couldn't get back home he settled in on the new island. Guari got tight with the other natives, cornered the local market on upscale sea shell carving and was part of the tribal band on the weekends playing lead hollow log at the original Boomboomakao club on the upper west side of the island. There's always a Puerto Rican in the crowd." "True. True." Me. I'm just a Puerto Rican from The Bronx. Just think of me as the anonymous guy smiling and waving at the camera that pops up flipping the bird in a group shot of unsuspecting Japanese tourists in Times Square. When they get back to Japan they never quite figure out who this guy is in the picture. But he knows exactly who he is and why he's there, "I'm part of the scene in New York not apart from;" a real deluxe world traveler courtesy of Kodak who leaves graffiti all over the Bronx in 1977, Jesus is coming paroled may fifth and now breakdancing on a cross near you as 'wild styler's' spray paint TAKI 183, PHASE II and ULTRA COOL 225 on subway doors and proto-B boys spin the night away at the Starship Discovery in Times Square. A Puerto Rican from the Bronx. My boy Walter is a West Indian original rumpus man (Wise upstart) from 225th street. Like me, he's a first generation island boy who knows where the best Jamaican food, clubs and girls are in all New York. We meet during summer camp at the age of twelve and graduate from Vassar and Amherst Colleges respectively while David hooks up at Yale. We three walk in that strange world that exists isolated between homeboy hangout and Ivy League culture shock. Biscuit Biscuit Head Night an Day I go around town Trying to get my Biscuits Brown Night and day I butter them up It makes me feel Oh, so tough Biscuit I'm just a biscuit head Like to take you On a trip But you got Those beaver lips Like to take you All downtown Like to put Put you in my crowd Biscuit Biscuit Head Riiiiiiighhhhht! Riiiiiiighhhhht! "Bombaclot. Me want some stew beef and rice with peas and banana. Serve me up a cup of tea and a righteous spliff and I'll be with Marley in heaven. Bombaclot ... riiiiiiighhhhht. Me coming live and direct! Yo, man, what are you reading, man?" "What the hell was that, son? Damn Bro. You got some root thing going on, partner. Yo, this? It's Richard Hofstadter ... American Political Tradition. This cat breaks down that the Founding Fathers were just businessmen looking to get theirs ... Yo, man, I think George Washington and his boys were Puerto Rican." "What are you talking about, man, did you smoke dust again?" "No, man, check it out. I'm walking up Gun Hill Road and I see this sign on the lamp post that says the reason it's called Gun Hill Road is because during the Revolution, the dude ... " "Who, Washington?" "Yeah, but they called him Georgie Papi Chulo in those days. He set up these big ass guns at the top of the hill and when the British came by ..." "Where?" "Down at the lower part of the valley where the Jamaicans sell weed now." "What? Mugsy and Daz' spot over on 211th?" "Exactly. But the Arabs hadn't taken over the 24 hour store yet, the Italians still had it - I think it was Johnny "Rimbambid" (the Imbecile) Monks running numbers out of there, anyway Georgie started throwing down some fire on those English cats, lit 'em up and won the day!" "So how does that make him Porto Rican?" "Yo, we got things in common" "What - Guns?" "No, man, don't be stupid man, yo, the dude messes with the British because like this cat Hofstadter wrote about, Georgie and his boys wanted a bigger cut of the action and they weren't getting any respect. Yo man: serious class disrespect. Georgie and his gang finally stood up and said give us our green and our props, man, or I'll blast you. Boom Boom Boom let's go back to my room and that's HOW Gun Hill Road got its name and Georgie mixed his salsa. Yo, Dave what do you think of that?" "Damn. Quien lo manda. So when does the new Revolution start?" "Call me." "When." "Anytime, I got call waiting." "Call waiting?" "Yeah, call waiting. Call. If I don't answer the phone wait and call again. See, call waiting. Tell you what, I'll fax you but I think it's already going down on the Number 2 Train." I ride the Number 2 Train a lot I glide in the front car looking at myself in the windows Hide In the middle cars next to the conductors And when I feel daring I go down to the Third World Club Car At the end of the train Catching a contact buzz From all the cheeba smoke I love the drama One time my boy Sha Sha And me hitch a ride Outside the caboose Screaming all the way From Jackson Avenue to 149th Where we get away From the transit cops waiting By skipping across The tracks to the Uptown Side ALL ABOARD I sing my first song on the Number 2 When I’m only 7 As the train roars through the tunnels On our way to Brooklyn Amusing my self By singing Henry the 8th I Am I Am Over and over To the clacking Of the train wheels And find I like my voice I don't have to go To the movies as long as I have The Number 2 and the Bronx The quick live dramas captured In the 2's windows and wagons As it rumbles Through station after station Are like the coming attractions At the movie house At 223rd and White Plains Road The Art by Simpson At any station I get off And I'm in the middle Of a Technicolor Revolution The rap going on between Puerto Ricans, Dominicans, Mexicans, West Indians, Central and South Americans in El Bronex shows how Puerto Ricans first get a foothold on the mainland and survive. They interact and never stop chismiando/gossiping. That's the revolution. It doesn't have to be guns. You can blow up the spot with information. Latinos are dominating the entire U.S. as they expand out of the Northeast and Southwest and Ricans experience the trip first up here in el Norte. En Nueva York. En el Bronex. I'm bound to it all by being in the right place at the right time. New York's Puerto Ricans survive assaults like getting flooded with dope in the 60's. We’re burned out in the 70's, Coke and AIDed out in the 80's, cracked out in the 90's and we just keep on coming like the energizer bunny with a Timex watch up it's tail. I know this for a fact because I still got that watch up my ass. "Alo! Quien llama? Oye men, tiene la hora?" “Hello! Who’s calling? Hey man, do you have the time?” The whole time this is happening the Number 2 train takes me to places where I see the seeds of 21st Century Raza sown live and direct. Gangster rap, La Vida Loca and Oz on HBO? Oh, super Negro please. Back in '71 Felix, Romero throws crazy outdoor Latin Reviews throughout the South Bronx (go to 125th and take the 6 to Brook Avenue) that feature rude vignettes parodying the themes that are now commercial gospel for the terminally hip. We catch Mikey Pinero and Short Eyes straight out of the Lower East Side in ‘73. He makes The Life all clear in two hours on stage at Lincoln Center (66th Street Station) that even includes a homeboy/mambonick rap piece titled Mambo Tu Le Pop. Funny mothers? Yo, Spookarican Rick Aviles is “it” in Loisaida (Astor Place Station) and Hungarican Freddie Prinze is really funny Uptown (50th Street Station) in a cute way before he gets coked out. Cutting edge? Eddie Figueroa runs a kicking place named the New Rican Village (14th Street Station and walk down Avenue A to 6th Street) that is set up by five of the original Young Lords. A place where you can eat some Rican food, hear Puerto Rican poetry inspired in New York and the creme de la creme of "Heavy" Latin musicians led by Andy Gonzalez and Conjunto Libre. I ride those old black trains with Raul Julia (125th Street Station) and the "honorary" Rican Ruben Blades (Bleecker Street Station) just as they’re getting ready to switch to riding in new black limousines. I see that special look real innovators get in their eyes when they know that what they do is good and it's taking them somewhere special. And I visit hell doing blow with Hector Lavoe at a bar called John’s up by 233rd and White Plains Road. I later watch a guy claiming to be his son get slapped around by a dealer because he overplays his credit based on his father’s fame at the same place. Yep, bound it all by being in the right place at the right time. These days they even got trains on the Number 2 line that talk to you in English and Spanish. Can you imagine how a leftover white guy from the old neighborhood must feel like. "Damn, just what I need, a bilingual train that talks to me. Just when I got to the right dose of Haldol and Prolixin to get those voices in my head under control. It's not enough I got Cool Pipo Timbon rapping into a CD burner at one end of the wagon and another Jamaican talking to himself ... " (a half West Indian half Chinese named Shabba Everton "Eba" Chin who really is talking into a wireless phone with a headset while writing lines on his laptop) " ... No, now, I got the Number 2 talking to me. Damn, yo, shut up. Give me a visual to let me know what's up. Flash the stop on a screen. Flash the announcements, Yo. I got other things to be doing with my senses without the train talking to me. I need to talk to my imaginary friend next to me. " Checking out a NY transit map I notice that the other boroughs are islands. I'm seeing this girl Rosie Hurricanes out in Brooklyn the winter of 1977 and I want to know how far I got to travel to get a kiss. Yo, man. She lives at the end of the J line and I live near the end of the Number 2 Line. J like in Just sit down and read some Don Quixote because "You going for a long ride my little friend for the next two hours." Way out there at the end of the line -- in Brooklyn. Biscuit I’m just a Biscuit Head Riiiiiiighhhhht! Riiiiiiighhhhht! Quiero bailar Contigo Quiero dar te Todo mi amor Tu ere Mi negra santa Tu ere My unica amante Biscuit Biscuit Head Riiiiiiighhhhht! Riiiiiiigght! Yo, Brooklyn. It’s so far out that my family left Brooklyn for the Bronx in 1964 to be closer to civilization. So far out, I don't even think they have bathrooms in Rosie's house. Yeah, man. At that time there are still tenements in Brooklyn with community bathroom's that are out in the hallway for two or three apartments. Old buildings with ancient Jibaro (campesino) spirits from the turn of the century. Spirits of the first Puerto Ricans who came after the U.S. invasion in 1898. First they live near the Brooklyn Navy Yards and then spread out. You can feel those spirits still roaming in the chestnut brown stairways getting ready for work, "Ingrid, nina, donde esta mis pantalones que tengo que ir a la factoria tempranito por la manana pa trabajar el overtime. Ingrid -- los pantalones -- que te ta luciendo nena? Te lucsiste? Te ta luciendo. Los Pantalones - ahora y despues a pipi y a mimi!" Rosie is worth the trip but damn, it takes two hours for me to get there to get my freak on. Then it’s just kiss, squeeze ass, fondle, get hot ... oh, I have to pull out and go home. Hornitis Porto Ricanness Interuptus When that long black Number 2 Shoots out the subway tunnel At 149th Street coming home I spill onto the New World The proverbial Puerto Rican seed Once you're in el Bronex You're officially on the mainland Of the Real America Living in The Outer Provinces Of the New Empire "Welcome. You got Ricans -- a lot of Ricans -- more Ricans than you can shake a lechon (roast pig) at." I guess Little Latin Rosie Lu serves a purpose by being way out there on Crooklyn Island. I recognize the truth about Ricans in New York -- especially in The Bronx. We're the northern gatekeepers on the mainland. The first Latinos in the Northeast to represent the Real AmeRica: a super continent of beans, rice/tortillas and a ton of brown workers who take in stride the everyday realities of surviving in the United States. And, get this, Ricans are a leg up on everybody because we come with built in green cards. You go boyyyyyyyyy. Once you pass that gate in el Bronex you're likely to witness strange and magnificent sights -- sometimes in the short span of twenty-four hours. Yep. Witness just about anything from a saint blessing you one day to seeing a flaming orange Volkswagon with a surfboard fixed to its roof in the next. Just about anything. What are you going to do? I laugh … I cry … It’s an experience. |
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