The Muslim-Socialist “Takeover” in NYC Is Older Than You Think 🇺🇸

Harlem is the center of the universe. Everybody running around, they lost their mind. So if you keep your physical, you hold your mind together. Check this out. Jerk chicken. This part of Harlem looks a little more gritty. It's like MTV, the red carpet. Lately it's been a little rough. The media is the most dangerous thing on the planet. The media is able to make the guilty innocent and the innocent guilty. I served in the United States Marine. I'm a human being. I'm a Muslim, a Sunni Muslim. Yeah, Malcolm X, he also lived here. We have a mosque up the block. The spookiest go down below 70th Street. That's where the spooky people are. Wall Street and the rest of the motherfuckers Do we really have freedom of speech? Some things we say, we can sense it. First time trying jerk chicken, baby. Oh my God. North America belonged to the Indians. It don't belong to us. You can't discover something that was there already. There's just an eerie feeling here in Spanish Harlem. I don't know if it's the weather or if it's the area I'm in, but I think the storms come in literally and figuratively. That hotel right there is home to one of the most controversial geopolitical meetings in U.S. American history. In 1960, Fidel Castro came up here to address the United Nations, originally staying in Manhattan at the Sherbourne Hotel, where he was accused of causing room damages and eating chickens in the suites. So guess who invited him here? Malcolm X warmly received him here in Harlem, New York City, a predominantly African-American part of New York. and home to revolutionary and cultural movements such as the Harlem Renaissance and this was in the midst of the civil rights movements geopolitical tension between the Soviet Union and the United States and so that means also that Nikita Khrushchev was here among other anti-imperialists and nowadays we've forgotten that history but the relations between Cuba and the US still haven't changed but i'm sure that Harlem has changed a big amount in the years and so yeah we're going to start the video here by going deeper into this history there is so much to see in Harlem I don't even know where to start. i'm not an expert on the history here so if you're watching this and you do want to share all these interesting historical movements and do a collaboration i am open for it but this is the hustle and bustle of New York City yesterday we were in the South Bronx learning about the local culture there meeting the people and it was really lovely and so let's go around now to see what life is like here in Harlem before we head back up to the South Bronx To get more of the scene on the streets. There is a storm warning. Mamdani just... warned us that coastal flooding is coming. And so this is part of the chaos of New York. I mean, this is like unbelievable for me to see as a person from rural Wisconsin. And so tomorrow, Saturday, we're definitely probably not going to be able to record. Hold on. man those sirens will get you this is one of the noisiest places on planet earth one second bro and so uh yeah i don't know if we'll be able to record with the flooding tomorrow maybe we'll get to see how the flooding affects the city what's up guys what is this about harlem in the history tell me about harlem what do you know you guys from here i know there's a lot of crackheads a lot of everything on harlem you heard where i'm listening listen listen me personally i'm from school so i'm Some home yard, feel me? There's a lot of bullshit about going to Harlem, you know? Mostly on 125th, mostly K2 heads, crack heads, and stuff, you know? Where can I find the crack heads? I'd like to talk to them. Where can you find the crack heads? All the way down there. All the way down there? Like, you go all the way down there and ----? All right. Do you guys have beef with any other neighborhoods, like people from the Bronx? Or are you guys all cool these days? Yeah. I beef with Monroe Houses, nigga. I beef with Monroe Houses. All right, man. Stay safe out in these streets, bro. You too. Thank you. Take care, bro. You're the best. Ho-ho. What a start, man. What do you remember about growing up here in the 70s? 70s, it was a change from a revolutionary time. Because all the things that we had in the 70s came from all the movements in the 60s. 50s and 60s. And 125th Street was a meeting place for a lot of your organizations, such as Black Panthers, such as Nation of Islam, Israelites. Israelites, yeah. How is Malcolm X seen in your community? What does he mean to you guys? He was a big figure, especially in the 60s and dealing with the Nation of Islam. He was a man that was Didn't back down from adversities, and he has tried to install in all of us, whether he was Muslim or not, just being a black man, a woman, to stand up and fight for what you believe. They shut down 125th Street in May, every May of every year. They shut all the stores now in honor of Malcolm X. And me personally, I go to his grave site, which is in Westchester. I go to his grave site every May, and I put flowers on his grave site. Yeah. Are you guys worried about the storm coming in? No, I don't worry about that. Yeah, we don't worry about that. We born and raised there. We worry about the unknown storm that we can't see. Exactly. We worry about those type of situations when you can't go to the supermarket and $20 is you can only buy two items and you're broke. Two items. We were just talking about my trip in Cuba and I said in Cuba people don't have freedom of speech. Do you feel like freedom of speech is under threat in the United States? Uh, somewhat. Somewhat, yeah. Yeah, I agree somewhat, because everybody should be able to express themselves and do their job, whether they're a reporter or whether they're a citizen. But as far as free speech is concerned, it should never be. Do you think New York City is the greatest city in the world? Me personally, I think so. I'm born and raised here. And I'm going to always represent my city. City, the United States of America, I wouldn't trade neither one of them. I served as the United States Marine, you know, but I appreciate your service. And I look at life like this. It's what we make it. That's why we're going to stay that strong country. We got to pull together and lead And have leadership that's going to make us come together. That's from the bottom to the top. Yeah. Because always up, never down. And motivation is the key to life. I was with Blair Underwood. See Blair Underwood? Yeah. This is the space. Let me show you. Right here. She pointed the gun at Blair Underwood. That's you. Yeah. In Law and Order. Mm-hmm. See, these are the types of people you guys can meet out in New York. On Blair Underwood? Beautiful. This is the scene right here, I'm in a shootout here. Here I go right there, with the machine gun right there. That's me firing. I play Russian mercenary. He's gonna shoot me dead right here. See, I went down right there. Yeah. I do a lot of stunts and all that, yeah. I'm glad you're alive, Sherman. Yeah. All right, all right, all right, all right, all right. Here we have the Apollo Theater where many... Actors and comedians got their start in this entertainment industry that has just transcended the world. James Brown, Stevie Wonder, Bill Cosby, to name a few. Those two guys we were talking back there, that Marine and Sherman, he was also an actor. And so like... It's just never-ending. The levels here are so deep. Too much for me to comprehend, and it just lets me know how little I know about the world. You would go crazy if you're trying to learn everything, so that's why you just got to enjoy the little things and realize you're very small in this world, in this big, massive city here in New York. It's the center of the universe. All you got to do is do your research, and you'll find that Harlem is the center of the universe. Everybody wants to come to Harlem. The media is the most dangerous thing on the planet. The media is able to make the guilty innocent, and the innocent guilty. An example of that is Muhammad Aziz and Khalil Islam, and Kalula slammed the the two brothers that supposedly killed Malcolm X, just won $32 million apiece for wrongful death conviction. We're going to do a long-through-desk picture. Even though Khalil Islam passed away, His family got the money and Muhammad Aziz got that money, so that's an example of the media. I just learned that Harlem is the birthplace of the five percent nation which derived from the nation of Islam. The nation of Islam came from Detroit, Michigan. we have a reference to the Alhambra over there the Alhambra referring to Granada, Spain and so that's why when i ask people where they're from a lot of times they've been telling me in the South Bronx and here in Harlem that they're from Earth or that they're aboriginal check out this place man wow and Harlem is known as Mecca and Brooklyn is known as Medina so that's why now it makes sense to me that a lot of people have told me that they're Muslims Hello sir, what's your name? Ahmad Akbar. Tell me about growing up in Harlem and then also being a Korean War veteran. Yeah, I grew up in Harlem. It's very convenient. All the stores within walking distance. Transportation, wonderful. I was on the firing line in Korea, and that was hard. What's your favorite thing about being from Harlem? It has a history of a people who was once in slavery and has now developed a community here in New York City. It's flourishing, it's blossoming. Harlem wasn't the birthplace of the Black Panthers, however, it was a very important hub on the East Coast. As we look down that way, that's Central Park. We're in Manhattan, but we're in like, I guess, the northern part of it. Anyways, the Black Panther movement was very big here, and there was a guy named Tony Bryant who actually hijacked a plane from New York to Miami, and he said, hey, let's go down to Havana. He was expecting a warm welcome by Fidel Castro, but Fidel Castro was so paranoid of the CIA. He was so paranoid that he actually imprisoned Tony Bryant and after Tony Bryant was released from jail he ended up becoming a staunch anti-communist so it's sort of just crazy to think how this is the birthplace of a lot of those Marxist movements in the United States and that's what happened as a result because Fidel Castro who came here to meet with Malcolm X ended up just being an egomaniac but of course he won over the communities here. standing in solidarity with him and so it was very strategic for him to stay at that hotel when he came here in 1960. this is how the new yorkers get exercised All right, Dream. was that your first set no that's like your tenth set no we're doing a thousand a thousand We doing 45, 44, 43, 42, 41, all the way to zero. this is the open air gym yeah basically now this is we're down to 23 but we started at 45s do you guys do this every day He does that every day. I do it like 80%, maybe four days out of the week, five days out of the week, maybe. So Brother Pete is the gym master out here in the streets of Harlem. Yeah, bro, and we're here to keep motivating the people. So if y'all see me, that means to get busy at home. So let's go. He also does a harder version of a push-up, he does a tricep push-up. Pushups, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23. That was a cakewalk for you. Yeah, I'm used to doing it though bro. So to motivate yourself, you got to get used to it. To get in your system, I guess, you know, I got it in my system, so I'm used to it. So they pull me in just when they want you out, they pull you back in. So apart from just taking care of your physical health, what's the message? Why do you want to stay fit out here in the streets? Everybody running around with their mental loss. They lost their mind. So if you keep your physical, you hold your mind together, too. So it's not just about your body. Even in a city full of millions of people, you find this community here on the streets. This part of Harlem looks a little more gritty. We have some abandoned lots here and some new construction projects. How tough is it even to survive in a neighborhood like this? Look at them motherf***ers! Where I guess it's not difficult to get standard jobs, but how is a standard job supposed to pay the bills in New York? I can't imagine that it's very affordable here even. in the north part of Manhattan or Bronx say you have to move to the outskirts way out the suburbs or North Bronx or whatever it is that long commute in the subway at night that millions of people do you'll see the subways full last night riding back to the Bronx the subway was way more packed than going from the Bronx to Manhattan that's the daily life of so many people here and it really just adds an element of stress check this out this is common the life underground This is how the product enters to supply these stores. there's a whole underworld and some of these subway tunnels are very very very deep i'm just impressed how the ingenuity can do it because i thought that you know New York is at water level check this place out Life spire garden we never forget maybe this is referring to the communities that live here but also something to do with 9/11. very interesting we see a little community garden here i've seen better ones but that's part of one of the things that i guess city administrators did to improve these abandoned lots in the case of South Bronx we're not in the South Bronx right now with all these burned out lots and buildings and the arson they did a lot of that to reform the area it's brought a lot of green positivity to the city so to speak here we got the classic shoes hanging on the line we've seen in many countries that that means that's where they sell the good old stuff you know and in cuba In Cuba we learned that they just were copying what they saw in the movies. It wasn't because it's a drug selling point, in fact, if you got caught or get caught selling drugs in Cuba, you go to jail. We see some shoes, now you know in the United States or Latin America, when you see the shoes, that's usually where they sell drugs. But here, that's not the case. No, no, here not the case. People see it on the television, or in American movies or whatever, and they see ---- like that, they do the same thing. It's not that they are selling dope. How you guys doing? Is this the Spanish Harlem? Yeah. Alright. how y'all doing good hi so yeah we see sometimes on the streets it's like a 50 50 chance of all right i approach a group of people you see them on their stoop you know you see them at the corner by their car smoking blunts and it could make for a great interview but a lot of times here in new york and in chicago for that matter i was met with great suspicion great suspicion who are you i'm from wisconsin and then i asked them where are you from they say i'm from planet earth wow these guys These guys are doing the... The fatty thing. Oh, man, that's sad. It's an unfortunate reality of the United States, American cities. Wow, okay, this is what I was looking for. Another commercial area, Lexington Avenue and 116th. I think this is where the New York Ricans are. I'm not sure. Yeah, Puerto Ricans live here, though. Alright. Are you from here? Yeah, I'm from here. I was born in Harlem Hospital. What's it like growing up here? It's like MTV, the red carpet. And lately it's been a little rough. Something came here, like voices and stuff like that. So, you know, mental health and health and health in hospitals. And they pretty much influenced you to do things that's not where we was born. Where we was born, we was taught to earn. And your wages in life is your job, a paycheck. And lately it's been your wages in sin is death. And we don't promote death like that. Yeah. Death is not something you get paid for. Death is not something that you go tell your mom. That's not what we do. So you know, all glory be to God that when he came, y'all wasted no time. No time, because now I know that it's real. But growing up here, that's what you'll get. It's also the holy Mecca. Yeah, Malcolm X, he also lived here. And we have a mosque up the block, 116 Lexington Avenue, we have a mosque up the block, and it's famous for stuff like that. A lot of famous dudes, Mason Beathard, Cameron, Cameron lived here, a lot of famous actors, rappers, entertainers, they come from here. I've been looking for someone who knows how to speak like you, man. I'm sorry. You got a sharp brain, bro. Thank you. You're very sharp. Thank you. What's the biggest problem right now here in the streets of New York? And the streets of New York, you can grow to become an entertainer, an actor, a rapper, something like that. But if I'm on stage and I'm still having problems with this voice and stuff like that, then we gotta win there. And you're doing the little breath thing and all that. Then again, like I told you, oh glory be to God, because when he came to me, I said a I just maybe found three cars. I didn't ask for all these, the voices, the noise, the train gate, and stuff like that. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. People like you putting that out there. Thank you. You hear voices. Yeah. How long has that been going on in your life? I've been hearing voices since 2018. I've been listening to voices and they've been influencing me and telling me that I'm And everything is yours, and you can go in the stores, like Pop Smoke, you give what you please. We can get it on. Take off those drawers. What was it? Yeah, that song and all that, yeah, that came to me as well. Do you think that marijuana affects the way you see the world? Because I've had friends who have, when they started smoking, they also started hearing voices because marijuana is very strong in the United States. I don't like the way it tastes, but I think K2. K2? K2, that's my DOC, that's my drug of choice. K2? Yes. How much does K2 cost in New York? Two dollars, two dollars. And K2 is like a cure, it's like a cure. When COVID-19 was running around, I was one of the ones that didn't wear a mask. And I heard a brother out there say, K2 is the cure, K2 is the cure. So I kept smoking. And old glory be to God, I'm still here. And sometimes that's how God will come to you if you try hard. You feel me? Yeah. Since you're a good person, bro, take care. Yeah. I have a friend. You remind me of a friend I grew up with. Yeah. All right? Troy's out there, man. The whole topic of addiction is complicated. There's a lot of people, you know, suffering from that here, as in any big city in the United States. And they're very hard to approach sometimes because they're going through so much. Yeah, he reminded me of a friend I grew up with. My name is Buck. Buck? Yeah, Buck. Oh, look at my hat, bro. Yeah. Milwaukee Bucks. Oh, ----. Goddamn, man. What a coincidence. This is not Spanish Harlem. This is El Barrio. I wanted to meet some Puerto Ricans, but... Listen, you don't have to say it like that. Just say you want to meet cultural people that know about the geographic zone. Harlem, East Harlem, and West Harlem. So what's it like living around here? How long have you lived here for? It's beautiful. It's colorful. It's like going to Baskin Robbins, man. You got 31 flavors. You just got to know how to adapt. There you go. That's it. Listen, let me tell you something. The spookiest ---- go down below. 70th Street. What does that mean? That means that's where the spooky people are. Wall Street and the rest of the motherfuckers. Those are the real criminals. Right, exactly. The real mafia. They got good lawyers and they feel they can do what they want to do. Forget about that. The Rockefellers, the DuPonts, and the rest of them. J.P. Morgan. These are all the people that came to New York to open up banks. I always tell people, North America belongs to the Indians. It don't belong to us. We were here. You can't discover something that was there already. So Christopher Columbus never discovered America. That was all bullshit. The Indians was here. The pilgrims came and they killed them all. The same ---- they doing today. Put the drugs out there and we ease our pain by using drugs instead of just figuring out what's going on and get your life together. Isn't it a choice, though, to start using drugs? No, everything's a choice, man. It's like a light switch. Off or on. Everything in between is bullshit. It's rhetoric. You understand? So therefore, like I said, man, we complicate our life. I always say stay focused and pay attention. Those are two key words in life. Focus and pay attention. That's it. Everything else is bullshit. It's buffoonery. The media. The media. Someone told me earlier. Listen, the media, everything is subliminal. So you put a subliminal message out, you feel you need it. Okay, I wrote an essay on beer in 1988. Beer commercials only come out when it's sports. You never see a beer commercial throughout. If it's no sports on, there's no beer commercials. Because they want you to get intoxicated. They want you to go buy Domino's. It's bullshit. It's a foolery, however, people like to entertain themselves. And now gambling is a big thing. It's all bullshit, man. These are the people, man, they don't have nothing going on. This is why I say stay focused and pay attention. Get into yourself. Do introspection. Learn to know who you are before you leave. Because you'll realize all this ---- is bullshit. That ---- wasn't here when I was smiling and running around being a kid, being youthful, and having fun. They distracted us. This is why you see people walking down the street with their phones going like this. And it's not really an emergency. It's bullshit. This is why, like, when the phone was here, you had to run upstairs to get that phone call. If not, you had to wait for them to call back. It's all bullshit. It's a matrix. It's a matrix. i don't get into it i'm old-fashioned this is why they got TikTok and all that ---- because they TikTok your ass TikTok means they TikTok your brain to keep you from getting into you have a problem a serious problem and guess what you go to TikTok so you can relieve it TikTok ain't gonna help you with your problems man i'm gonna sign off on this one man young buck yeah but old school buck goddamn right and make sure listen make sure you put that on there man words of wisdom words of wisdom out here man man listen Don't be fooled by the bullshit. There's just an eerie feeling here in Spanish Harlem. I don't know if it's the weather or if it's the area I'm in, but I think the storms come in literally and figuratively. I felt a lot different on 125th and then yesterday on 3rd Avenue in South Bronx. There was a lot more vibrance. This seems a lot more rough. Where there's people clearly consuming, there's going to be people who sell to them. that's why fentanyl became such a big thing because the dosage is you barely need any and it's quite cheap for the consumers it's just poison man it's terrible and when i did a video in Bogota, Colombia it was actually called the Bronx of Bogota, San Bernardo there was a street where the gangs there would sell the residuals of cocaine paste called basuco and it was literally like 20 cents a dose or even less and so that's why sometimes in Colombia and Bogota or Medellin robberies are so high because people need to get their fix i don't think that's much of a thing here armed robbery or you know there's not true levels of poverty here there is poverty of course but it's not really comparable how you doing bro oh that guy was very battered and bloody man oh i don't want fried chicken i don't want burgers and fries i want something that has flavor and somewhat healthy so this Caribbean restaurant has a lot of options look at this protein upon protein pasta Ribs, jerk chicken, sweet potato, yams, collard greens. Oh, finally. And I don't want to go downtown to Manhattan to eat. I want to eat here, right where my hotel is in the Bronx. I got me some jerk chicken, some oxtail, which we eat in Spain. Rice and beans, plantains, yams, some salad. A perfect mixture of flavor and health. Oh. Oh. First time trying jerk chicken. Oh my God. Let's try the oxtail. What the hell? mmm it tastes just like Spain man right here in the Bronx yeah baby this is what i was looking for with the food let's try the yam very sweet man rice and beans with cabbage best choice i've made yet eating in New York wow look at it outside right now oh my gosh it's the calm before the storm I'm like, I got this. We're out here in the South Bronx with Bacardi. Yeah, Bacardi 1. Look at the sky, man. This is trippy. Yeah, it was just a big-ass rainbow. I said, oh, ----. So anyways, you film out here in the streets because you're out here with your friends. And what are some of the craziest things you've seen out here, man? Damn, it's too much. Yo, nigga, go to the concert. Bacardi 1, it's all there. Every day is a movie. We on 3rd Ave. It's a new New York thing. People underestimate the Bronx because they're not here. They don't know we got Pelham. they don't know we got Rosedale they don't know we got our own beaches we got City Island Y'all gotta come to the Bronx and experience before y'all make your opinions off of the internet you get caught in the wrong place at the wrong time of course it's dangerous the Bronx is It's probably the most dangerous out of all of our boroughs. Why do you think that is? It's a lot of poverty here. It's a lot of poverty. It's a lot of drug addictions. It's a lot of mental health issues. And when you mix those all together, you're going to get the problems. But I bet you it's gotten better throughout your life. Getting better every day. Like, they got a lot of new buildings up, but I want to see more of my people in them buildings. I want to see more New Yorkers getting in these new buildings. Look at that sky. I really don't know what to think because on one side it's beautiful. and on the other side it's dark we can even see the street light is moving with the winds the storm is coming hey brother represent good night what a place man i gotta go back and pray that the storm doesn't trap me here delay my flight but yeah when the sun goes down here the world changes so uh we'll catch the journey to the airport hopefully i make it out