Colin Quinn: The New York Story Page #4

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Yeah, that abrupt, accusatory, Germanic,

you know.

But most of them left.

Theres still some Germans...

in Ridgewood,

compulsively washing

their stoops right now.

For the most part,

they moved to Pennsylvania, Ohio,

'cause they wanted order, symmetry.

The city had no symmetry.

All the streets are, like, on top--

It was just back-- It was--

Shantytowns on top of sh--

The water was so polluted,

people had to drink grog.

They couldnt even drink water.

Have to drink beer instead of water.

Whos gonna move there?

The Irish. Yeah. Irish people.

The Irish came

and they brought the wiseass.

When people say, Why do you talk out

of the side of your mouth?

That came from the Irish people.

Cause thats an Irish quality

from trying not to get slapped in church,

they talk out the side of their mouth.

Cause we came here,

and we were cynical to begin with.

And we're cynical we got here

cause theres no Statue of Liberty yet.

There was never that poetic moment

that the Italians and Jews had.

The Italians came. They see New York City.

Theyre already cryin, emotional.

And then they look up, and welcoming them

is a hundred-foot mother.

You know? Theyre like, Oh, Mama.

-So...

Theyre like--

The Jews were like,

Look at this. Its beautiful.

The qualitys not necessarily...

Its obviously copper. Its not bronze.

But, uh... Theyre welcoming you.

Thats the important thing.

The message theyre trying

to get across comes across.

Irish showed up.

It was the same docks they just left.

Look at this f***in--

Streets are paved with gold?

Theyre paved with shite.

Yeah. We just did what every group did.

We brought our history

and put that onto it to make sense to us.

So we brought it.

We made it into parishes.

Cause parishes make sense to us.

And a parish is just, you know,

a church, some Irish people and a bar.

Basically.

The bar and the church are very similar.

Theres a lot of stained glass in both.

A lot of kneeling going on.

There used to be a lot of smoke.

Youre waiting for the one person to tell

you, The mass has ended. Go in peace.

Or, Hey, you dont have to go home,

but you cant stay here.

And, yeah, thats what happened.

The Irish showed up, went to the church.

What should we do, Father?

You go to the bar.

Tell them I sent you, and theyll

set you up with you a job.

That was Tammany Hall,

basically, in a nutshell.

The church was the Internet,

bartender was the search engine

and whatever Web site he sent you to,

that was your job.

You didnt turn it down. They were

all Irish Catholic jobs of course.

Because theyre like,

We need a thousand carpenters.

If you turned it down: Are you too good

to do what Joseph and Jesus did?

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