| UNDERCITY.ORG |
A guerilla
historian in Gotham
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Intro - On Business - On New York - On Sleeping On The Subway |
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On New York Me: How’d you make it to New York from Little Rock? Billy: I traveled all over. I go everywhere. I been in New York for quite a while now, about five years. Five, six, seven years. Me: Why did you come to New York? Billy: Because people from all over the world come here. I been in Chicago, I been in Los Angeles, I been in a lot of other places and there ain’t no place like New York. The only place I can think of that is remotely close like being like New York would be Hong Kong. [He thought for a moment.] Or Bangkok. There’s some similarities. [I was startled at this decisiveness and asked him if he’d ever been to Hong Kong.] Billy: No, but I watch a lot of films. There’s some similarities. Like with Honk Kong or Bangkok-- there’s some similarities. With Japan there’s some similarities. I watch enough film and I been in New York enough to know which is got similarities. Me: Does living on the streets of New York make you feel any different about the city? Billy: Well I don’t like New York like I did before, when I first moved here, that’s for sure. I don’t like it now like I did. I’ll probably leave, you know. Probably to another city, the police are tightened up too much here. Me: So you don’t think New York is a good place to be on the streets? Billy: No, I want to get the fuck out of New York. New York—I don’t know, it’s happening that everyone’s getting pneumonia all of a sudden. And New York is on terrorist list now, I want to get the fuck out of here. Whole bunch of people had pneumonia over in the Bronx and Brooklyn, they had a big thing about it on TV. Time to get out of New York. And these terrorists-- terrorists ain’t even got to come here, they already here. And you don’t ever know who the terrorists is. They ain’t just the Arabs [he pronounced the word "A-Rabs"], you got American terrorists too. It’s time to get the fuck out. [Another person, a woman, broke out of the stream of people on the sidewalk and dropped a five-dollar bill into his hat. "Alright, alright, god bless you ma’am" Billy murmured, ducking his head. "Goddam, man," I told him. "You do pretty well out here." He grinned happily. "you must bring a mutherfucker some luck or something, I dunno."] |
