Preface: I covered my arrival in Delray Beach, Florida and ended in Tampa 28 months later in the early 1990s. It was during that short period that all 3 of my non-Iraeli children were born, the youngest of whom is now turning 15.
1995, Tampa, Florida: Tampa is a very interesting city. First of all practically no-Jews live there so I found it exotic since it was the 1st time in my life that I wouldn't be around Jews. Even during my 1 year in Thailand and Cambodia (1992) had not been without fellow Jews.
In the 1880s the town became a major producer of cigars. Needing experienced workers it heavily recruited Cubans (where as by 1945 a Cuban was very rare in Miami). Instead of native Cubans though recent Spanish immigrants to Cuba were the ones hired. At the same time New Orleans, across the Gulf of Mexico, was home to a burgeoning Sicilian immigrant population. Needing room to expand large groups of Sicilians made their way east to Tampa. The 3 groups, Cubans, Spanish and Sicilians quickly intermarried (about the only place in the US that this happened). Neighbourhoods like West Tampa and Ybor City (suburbs at that time) became somewhat homogenous and the locals, known as "Tampenos" (I don't have the correct font but pronounced "Tam-pay-nyos") developed their oen distinct form of Spanish, heavy on Sicilian vocabulary.
The architecture in those 2 neighbourhoods is EXACTLY like New Orleans with the "Shotgun Bungalows" (so named because all the rooms lined up in a row with doors all aligned so if one fired a shotgun through the front door and all doors were opened the shot will go straight through and exit out the back door!). The stores are built like those in the French Quarter of New Orleans as well. I enjoyed the environment. I also liked that unlike Delray, Tampa had a cold winter, I prefer cooler temps.
After I began my relationship with the mum of my daughter, my youngest child, I ran across a Puerto Rican guy I knew from New York. He was pulling out of the carpark of a West Tampa bakery when he saw me. Calling me over we greeted one another though we had talked a week before. I was finally off of opiate/opioids having been habituated to morphine in the army at age 17. By age 20 the army made me get on methadone (Israel doesn't criminalise addiction, it is regarded as a health issue, and since I got it from a combat injury I wasn't treated like a pariah. They did however make methadone mandatory for me). In Thailand I switched to heroin since it was widely available though methadone at that time was illegal there. In Delray I used whatever my relatives had but then quickly ran out and since then had been straight). Like the addict I had definitely become, there wasn't a single day that I wasn't preoccupied with finding opiates/opioids, but Tampa had none on the street. There were 2 methadone programmes with a total of 120 clients, all from the northeast apparently. I did NOT want methadone, even before I understood its chemical limitations I knew subjectively it wouldn't provide me with the euphoria all opiate/opioid addicts crave. I asked people I knew and it was this subject that my friend brought up as I stood at his car window.
One of his friends had begun dealing small weight, Colombian #4, chocolate brown powder. I was like a cartoon character, "WHAAAAAAT???, Let's go NOWWW." He haf 2 women with him snd told me to wait a few minutes he would drop them off at the other end of the project (West Tampa Homes). We then drove over to Ybor City, and pulled up outside one of those shotgun bungalows. 10 or 15 Puerto Ricans were hanging out and since I didn't know them he told me he would go fetch a sample. He took about 15 minutes but it seemed like 4 or 5 hours. Finally he came back and we pulled away. At his project flat he took me into the bedroom and closed the door. He was a freak for Salsa (an Afro-Carribean music) and had DJ Soundsystem speakers which he cranked up. Sittimg on his bed as I sat in a folding chair he carefully opened a corner of seran platic wrap. Tjat had been double knotted. Inside was a half gramme rock and I could smell that acetic anhydride (strong vinegar odour). I knew I would be feeling heaven in less than a minute. It is impossible to conjure up the emotion I fwlt, now, 16 years later and with as much opiates/opioids as anyone could ever wish for and yet my heart beats rapidly and my senses sharpen even now as I recall that sheer anticipation.
I offered him some and he wouldn't hear of it. He didn't like opiates/opioidsm I offered him a finder's fee, which strangely isn't as clear as my anticipation. I imagine I gave him a few 20s. I asked him for a razor, and of course he didn't have one but he did manage to find a utility knife. Using a dirty fucken utility knife I cut a piece off, maybe 50 mgs. I ground it by pressing a skillet over it and then chopping it with that utility knife. Finally small enough, I put it in a metal ladel, took a baby eye dropper full of water ontop, 4 times, it almost totally dissolved without heat, I swear I was hard. Cutting a piece off a plastic straw I insufflated 25mgs and WHOOOOOOOOOOM, "I'm home honey, how you been baby? I missed you."
To be continued...
1995, Tampa, Florida: Tampa is a very interesting city. First of all practically no-Jews live there so I found it exotic since it was the 1st time in my life that I wouldn't be around Jews. Even during my 1 year in Thailand and Cambodia (1992) had not been without fellow Jews.
In the 1880s the town became a major producer of cigars. Needing experienced workers it heavily recruited Cubans (where as by 1945 a Cuban was very rare in Miami). Instead of native Cubans though recent Spanish immigrants to Cuba were the ones hired. At the same time New Orleans, across the Gulf of Mexico, was home to a burgeoning Sicilian immigrant population. Needing room to expand large groups of Sicilians made their way east to Tampa. The 3 groups, Cubans, Spanish and Sicilians quickly intermarried (about the only place in the US that this happened). Neighbourhoods like West Tampa and Ybor City (suburbs at that time) became somewhat homogenous and the locals, known as "Tampenos" (I don't have the correct font but pronounced "Tam-pay-nyos") developed their oen distinct form of Spanish, heavy on Sicilian vocabulary.
The architecture in those 2 neighbourhoods is EXACTLY like New Orleans with the "Shotgun Bungalows" (so named because all the rooms lined up in a row with doors all aligned so if one fired a shotgun through the front door and all doors were opened the shot will go straight through and exit out the back door!). The stores are built like those in the French Quarter of New Orleans as well. I enjoyed the environment. I also liked that unlike Delray, Tampa had a cold winter, I prefer cooler temps.
After I began my relationship with the mum of my daughter, my youngest child, I ran across a Puerto Rican guy I knew from New York. He was pulling out of the carpark of a West Tampa bakery when he saw me. Calling me over we greeted one another though we had talked a week before. I was finally off of opiate/opioids having been habituated to morphine in the army at age 17. By age 20 the army made me get on methadone (Israel doesn't criminalise addiction, it is regarded as a health issue, and since I got it from a combat injury I wasn't treated like a pariah. They did however make methadone mandatory for me). In Thailand I switched to heroin since it was widely available though methadone at that time was illegal there. In Delray I used whatever my relatives had but then quickly ran out and since then had been straight). Like the addict I had definitely become, there wasn't a single day that I wasn't preoccupied with finding opiates/opioids, but Tampa had none on the street. There were 2 methadone programmes with a total of 120 clients, all from the northeast apparently. I did NOT want methadone, even before I understood its chemical limitations I knew subjectively it wouldn't provide me with the euphoria all opiate/opioid addicts crave. I asked people I knew and it was this subject that my friend brought up as I stood at his car window.
One of his friends had begun dealing small weight, Colombian #4, chocolate brown powder. I was like a cartoon character, "WHAAAAAAT???, Let's go NOWWW." He haf 2 women with him snd told me to wait a few minutes he would drop them off at the other end of the project (West Tampa Homes). We then drove over to Ybor City, and pulled up outside one of those shotgun bungalows. 10 or 15 Puerto Ricans were hanging out and since I didn't know them he told me he would go fetch a sample. He took about 15 minutes but it seemed like 4 or 5 hours. Finally he came back and we pulled away. At his project flat he took me into the bedroom and closed the door. He was a freak for Salsa (an Afro-Carribean music) and had DJ Soundsystem speakers which he cranked up. Sittimg on his bed as I sat in a folding chair he carefully opened a corner of seran platic wrap. Tjat had been double knotted. Inside was a half gramme rock and I could smell that acetic anhydride (strong vinegar odour). I knew I would be feeling heaven in less than a minute. It is impossible to conjure up the emotion I fwlt, now, 16 years later and with as much opiates/opioids as anyone could ever wish for and yet my heart beats rapidly and my senses sharpen even now as I recall that sheer anticipation.
I offered him some and he wouldn't hear of it. He didn't like opiates/opioidsm I offered him a finder's fee, which strangely isn't as clear as my anticipation. I imagine I gave him a few 20s. I asked him for a razor, and of course he didn't have one but he did manage to find a utility knife. Using a dirty fucken utility knife I cut a piece off, maybe 50 mgs. I ground it by pressing a skillet over it and then chopping it with that utility knife. Finally small enough, I put it in a metal ladel, took a baby eye dropper full of water ontop, 4 times, it almost totally dissolved without heat, I swear I was hard. Cutting a piece off a plastic straw I insufflated 25mgs and WHOOOOOOOOOOM, "I'm home honey, how you been baby? I missed you."
To be continued...