Patreon only Sneak Peak of My Book

One day, I would like to write a book.  It will be a lot of little chapters that tell the story of some of wildest, saddest, happiest, and most unusual things I've gotten to experience.  Here is a sample excerpt I wrote about my time meeting with an Afghan Street Gang.  Let me know what you think.

Meeting an Afghan Street Gang:

A big question that comes to mind when meeting a lot of gangsters is wondering how legit they are.  Have you ever noticed that the littlest dogs are oftentimes the biggest yappers?  This observation of the canine world holds true with humans too.  Some street dudes are really about that life, but many of them heavily exaggerate their gangster resume.  “Oh I hit licks dawg.”  That can mean a lot of things.  Hitting a lick can be robbing a crackhead for the $10 in her purse or it can be defying the Chinese Triads and hitting a heist worth half a million on their illegal marijuana warehouse operation.  There’s levels to the world of crime.

Anyways, I went to Bay Area San Francisco to meet with an Afghan street gang.  The leader of the Afghan crew “Rondo” had me start the interview off by pulling up by his Mosque at a nearby playground.  His squad was there for the obligatory Friday prayer.  And this Mosque was in the suburbs.  So I thought how gangster could these guys really be?  How many opps can you possibly have when an Applebee’s is down the street?

I pulled up to a playground and about half the squad was wearing shiesty masks.  You see, the sheisty mask is the preferred attire of hood criminals.  This was the first sign that there could be danger ahead.

When I arrived on location, Rondo was giving one of his comrades a haircut on the swingset.  The kid getting the haircut was wearing the normal little poncho cape that barbers put on their clients, except this one was a purple Bape cape.  A little voice in my head made note of this.  I don’t often stereotype, but I admit I do have a special prejudice and awareness when meeting people that wear anything from Bape.  For example, if a potential tenant walks into my property for a real estate showing wearing Bape, there is nearly a 100% chance that this person has committed theft or armed robbery when I look up their record on Milwaukee’s CCAP system.

Okay, so they set the scene with an “in the cut” haircut and then we walked to the Mosque for prayer.  We took our shoes off once we entered the Mosque and we began the Islamic cleansing ritual the “Wudhu.”  It’s a cleansing process you have to do to be considered spiritually clean for prayers but it has oddly superstitious elements wrapped into it like having to wipe yourself on different body parts precisely 3 times.  It’s apparently done to imitate the behavior of the Prophet Muhammed but I just have a tough time picturing Allah, God of the Universe, sitting up in His heavenly domain counting to see if you wiped your around your ear 3 times or 4 times.  Like if you accidentally gave your left ear 5 scrubs, Allah spends the rest of the day fuming and eventually proceeds to curse your family.

As these Afghani kids began performing the Wuhdu, I noticed at least 3 of them had ankle monitors.  My mental calculation of Sheisty + Bape + Ankle Monitor scientifically proved that we were dealing with some level of certified criminals.  I asked Rondo what Allah thought about criminal activity, and he assured me that Allah forgives any sin as long as you ask for forgiveness within 6 hours of committing the act.  Again, I was skeptical of Allah up in heaven monitoring Rondo with a stopwatch, so I chalked this explanation up to the inevitable way humans de-mystify religion to make it fit nicely into a human made box.

I’m not sure what kind of crimes Rondo had committed in the last 6 hours, but I could tell he was praying earnestly.  For his sake, I hope Allah clicked his heavenly stopwatch at the 5 hour and 59 minute mark so Rondo could safely continue his felonious activities.  Man, being a religious criminal must be tough.

After prayer concluded, Rondo took me to a hole in the wall Afghani takeout restaurant located in a suburban area.  When we placed our order, we were told it would take half an hour for this chef to prepare a meal that would “knock our turbans” off.  His words not mine.  Luckily Rondo had some street associates posted up nearby to introduce us to and pass time with as we waited for our kabobs to cook.

Now for those not familiar with the sophisticated customs of urban areas, oftentimes the most powerful drug dealer on the block will demand that you “tap in” with them when you arrive in their territory.  That entails giving this non-IRS abiding entrepreneur a respectable greeting and paying homage to them to ensure your safety and that you leave with all your possessions.  It’s also a way for the local crime leader to boost their ego and further elevate their status on social media when they can post an Instagram story that claims they had you tap in with them.  In all my hood visits, I have only once have I faced the consequences for not properly tapping in.

Many years ago and back in my rapping era, I found myself in West Garfield Park Chicago attempting to shoot a music video.  West Garfield is one of Chicago’s most dangerous neighborhoods.  I was with my friend Kiwane who I met in college.  West Garfield was the neighborhood Kiwane grew up in and he belonged to a well-known street gang, the Gangster Disciples.  Against all odds, he found a way to make a friend in a rival gang, the Vice Lords, and this friend lived 15 minutes away deep in enemy gang territory.  My friend insisted that we find this guy and film a scene of our music video with him.  This involved packing up four cars and driving in a caravan of GD’s into rival territory to look for a man who sold narcotics and was driving around a giant van loaded to the brim with life sentences.

A few blocks in, my car got “checkpointed.”  This means that a group of urban gentlemen literally stood in the middle of the street to block my car from passing.  A result of not tapping in.  I rolled down the window and the lead Brotha of the crew said “who’s that White Boy?”  My friend Kiwane rolled down his backseat window and said “he cool. he with me.”  Surprisingly, that short explanation was sufficient and the man who stopped us proceeded to try and sell us drugs.  “Y’all want Skittles?”  I’m not sure what drug Skittles was, but hearing him ask that was fantastic compared to the alternative of getting robbed and shot by his crew.  So needless to say, making sure you “tap in” with locals can take much of the danger out of your visit to the hood.

Now back to the Afghanis.  We had to wait for our food, so I walked over to meet the local street dudes that were posted up by the restaurant.  I shook hands with a serious looking fella who looked like what you would get if you met a Taliban member who was transitioning his career to become a gangster rapper.  He had on an all black Nike Tech sweatsuit, gold shoes, and black leather gloves.  He surely participated in a business venture that succeeded in large part by not leaving fingerprints behind.  But like most Afghani’s, he was warm and exceptionally welcoming.

All of the sudden, a car door swung open and out onto the sidewalk strode a ridiculously jacked, bald, and angry Afghani man.  He made a beeline to me and asked me who I was and what I was doing on his block.  Mind you that we were on a suburban street in Fremont California; this wasn’t the Bronx.  For some reason this guy was as territorial as a panther in mating season.  Luckily for me, he switched his focus from me and locked eyes with a kid from Rondo’s crew, “Beazy.”  There must have been bad blood between them, because this irate Arab man erupted into a belligerent frenzy.

He took his shirt off and began repeatedly punching a traffic sign with his bare fist.  Again and again, he shouted warnings to us, reminding us that he claimed dominion over the very sidewalk we stood on.  He started charging at Beazy.  He would allow himself to get within striking distance and then would have his comrade Gold Shoes pull him away.  Then he would charge again.  It was like watching a gorilla on Planet Earth.

It escalated to the point where Beazy pulled out a crazy looking knife with a long blade.  I wouldn’t say it was 8 inches long, that’s not a measurement I’m very familiar with, but due to my regular experience with a 4 inch object, I can safely say the knife was around that size.

After some tense moments, Gold Shoes forcibly pushed Big Angry Bald into the backseat of a car and had his associate drive off in a hurry.  As we walked back towards the takeout spot, the kids in Rondo’s crew were aggressively muttering threats about what they would’ve done if he would’ve charged them one more time.  In that moment, I kind of thought they were yapping a bit.  I later found out that various members of this crew were responsible for a streak of wild and heinous crimes.  I’m talking kidnapping an adult and stealing his car with him sitting zip-tied in the passenger seat of his own car.  I’m talking 6 figure heists.  I’m talking robbing a postman.  And that’s just scraping the surface of what these guys have done.  It was scary stuff.

But here’s what’s strange.  They treated us with the utmost hospitality.  They were kind, friendly, and genuinely nice to be around.  They bought me and my crew lunch and ice cream.  They took us to their church to show us their religion. The dissonance was weird and a bit unsettling.

After hearing one of them discuss his string of violent offenses, I asked the kid if he thought he was evil.  He explained that he was like a saint to his friends and family, but if he don’t know you, he was evil.  He said this without shame or hesitation.  It was an interesting insight into the mentality of how same of these gangsters think.  Hearing this kid casually state he was evil is an uncomfortable memory I have stored away and to this day, it makes me stop and think.