timothy_strickland
BRUHZ
Did you meet jay-z during those days?
Survived Early 90s Drug Game in NYC AMA
- Thread starter Piri Tomas
- Start date
How many folks u know got out with big money to this day
Piri Tomas
All Star
Like I said, the Wire made it look like there were a lot of rules in the drug game. The era was violent because there weren't rules, just a bunch of freelancers trying to get over on each other.Back in my day, nikka say the police took the pack, he had to come up with a police report number
-cuddy
Piri Tomas
All Star
Not sure what that face means, I'm new to this forum.@Piri Tomas
How was theback in in early 90s?
Did you face
Did you made deals/business with the italian mafia? Did u associate With em.
Did you pawg back then?
hoods Who were off limits for black folka because of
Italian mafia had no presence or respect in the drug game by the time I was in it. If they wanted some shyt they had to pay us just like every out of town custie. I know back in the day before my time they had the dope game on smash on the East side but they were a non-factor by the late 80s.
Never pawged in my life. Not attracted to snow bunnies.
In terms of the hood in NYC, this is not LA, we didn't have powerful ethnic gangs in the streets and mixed areas always had mixed crews that hustled together. If you were a light Latin dude you might have trouble hustling in Bed Stuy which was all black and vice versa for a black american in an all Latin hood with FOB Dominicans like the Heights. But that wasn't based on ethnicity it was more about who are you, you're not known around here. New York was about blocks and $$ in that era.
Piri Tomas
All Star
I would never do something like that.
My family? My cousins hustled and my little brother unfortunately got drawn into the drug game, but we didn't hustle together. In fact I was beefing with one of my cousins at one point over street shyt.
We all had to be armed back then and prepared to defend ourselves, no exceptions.
Piri Tomas
All Star
I've heard stories about D.C. sending New York dudes home in body bags. I'm not saying it didn't happen, I just didn't see NY beefing with D.C. while I was down there (small sample size). We had D.C. associates, I think most NY crews that hustled down there did. We went down there because they were paying more for jumbs, it was 100% about getting money for a few weeks and heading home. And D.C. dudes fukked with us because they didn't have constant access to product like that. $$ was more important than hometown pride in every era. We're from the ghetto, we hustled to eat.You must not not have been uptown.
Piri Tomas
All Star
Like I said Brooklyn was the other side of the planet, and he was not known before rap. We only knew about major Brooklyn players.
Still look over your shoulder?
Piri Tomas
All Star
I knew neutral guys who kept to themselves upstate and on the island, and then I knew guys who fukked with Kings or Netas. Bloods came a little later and they weren't a factor when I was still hustling. I don't have first hand experience but to be honest I probably would have rocked with the Ricans up top. If you came from predominantly Rican areas and you were Rican, you'd probably stick with your peoples in the system.
No idea about the crossover. I'm very far removed from that world. I haven't touched work since March '96, I'm guessing these kids aren't getting taken seriously by the old guys from my generation doing life or 50 years.
Piri Tomas
All Star
Never, I'm not in the hood anymore. I'm a different person. I have lived another whole lifetime (in terms of years) since leaving the drug game behind. I also didn't do the type of shyt out there that would earn you a lot of enemies. I was about making $$ and playing it close to the vest.
Piri Tomas
All Star
Almost none. We were kids for the most part and we didn't have the financial or emotional maturity to maintain reasonable investment portfolio or "diversify." I met one Brooklyn cat later in life who said he hustled and it was how he started out acquiring real estate but I'm skeptical about how heavily involved in the game he really was. It's an irresistible fantasy for a lot of people. Everyone wants to be a hood Gatsby, or a Ghost from Power for you kids. Those people don't really exist for the most part.
Piri Tomas
All Star
They were known Heights Dominicans, but never did business with people from that side. They kept to their markets and we kept to ours.
Piri Tomas
All Star
Knew of Haitian Jack from the club scene and rumors about street shyt. But like I said we had our own uptown legends who were more relevant to us.
Piri Tomas
All Star
Night and day. I'm a big dude (6'3 muscular) but I used to walk the streets strapped in fear. I don't think anyone young can appreciate how violent and unpredictable that era was.
There is still violence but we're not losing a generation to the streets anymore. It seems like it's mostly kids who are knee deep in gang life or old timers who can't leave it alone.
I'm not one of these "let's bring the old New York back" people--there are more opportunities here (even for convicted felons) than there were in the 80s and 90s. We don't have open air drug markets. There are still serious issues with inequality and gentrification but I'd take the present NYC over the old NYC any day of the week.
Dushane Hill
Superstar
Can you go more into this? Like who were your legends and what did they do to get their status