Friday, September 14, 2018

Trump seems to negotiate w/friend & foe alike in the manner of NYC fishmongers 🗽🐟💪

The establishment of both parties have conniptions that Trump doesn't behave like Little Lord Fauntleroy. Instead, his negotiating technique seems much more similar to New York City fishmongers.

A clip from 'The Sturgeon Queens" documentary:












Narrator: Became fodder for his New Yorker essays and even a novel

















 Calvin Trillin [reading from book: Trillin, Calvin. Tepper Isn't Going Out: A Novel. , 2003. Print. ]:





































  The counter man said, "You know it can get pretty irritating with some of those customers. They'll say, 'Gimme a nice white fish.'

So I'll say, 'One white fish, coming right up.' Cheerful, pleasant.


















Trillin: And they'll say, 'A NICE white fish.' [sarcastically] 'Oh, well I'm glad you said that because I wasn't going to get you a NICE white fish....'

















Trillin: 'If you hadn't said that I would've looked for a white fish that's been sitting there since last Tish b'Ov. An old greasy, fershtunkene white fish




 Morley Safer: There's a kind of wonderful noise about the place. People didn't keep hushed tones in any of those places.














Narrator: Mark Russ Federman, Anne and her son, witnessed the Russ and Daughters scene from an early age. Mark said his most pungent childhood memories are of early morning trips to the fish smoke house with the Russ men.














Mark: The smell is both sweet, smokey, briny, and acrid, all at the same time.   Most stores had their fish delivered to them by middle men. But Russ and Daughters thought it was necessary to see, taste, and feel each piece  of fish.  And it was more like a street brawl than a commercial transaction.  My family would reject a piece of fish and say it's awful and then the verbal brawl began. 'What do you mean it's awful? You don't even know a good piece of fish! If you knew a good piece of fish you wouldn't have to sell fish.' 'I know fish. [My family has] been selling fish for generations.  That's a bad piece of fish.' And then the cursing would start  both in English and Yiddish.  Whatever words or phrases they could come up with at that moment they used.   Somehow, at the end of all of this abuse they all lit up cigars and put their arms around each other and told jokes and we left with a truckful of smoked fish.













Narrator: After the smoke house, the men would stop off at Ratner's Dairy Restaurant on Delancey Street where the blintzes were sweet and the waiters were salty.














Mark: These guys were...were...they did it as an art.   They could insult you, and you enjoyed it.





Posted by adagioforstrings at 7:40:00 PM
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