Salami on the Ceiling

How a Pork Store Represents Immigrant Sincerity at its Finest

I’m hanging salami on the ceiling, you’re mangling origami in the Sebring. That’s not a ChatGPT lyric, nor is it a line composed by rapper-gourmand-New Balance-wearing, staircase-scenario-telling, cutlet-coddling rapper Action Bronson lyric or his acolytes’ Accidental Bronson poetics. Nope, Bobby Baclava sat this one out. Instead, Paulie Prosciutt’ himself came up with this absurdity. 

I’m not a rapper, nor do I have any interest, but cured meats make me think I can do anything. So when I started Insta following New York City and Arthur Avenue’s own Calabria Pork Store– home of the “sausage chandelier”– it inspired spring-like whimsy in me. This brilliant store, owned by my fellow Calabrese (check my 23 and Me) suspends swine from their ceiling like only southern Italians can. I’m unsure why exactly they do it this way, but I can only respect their commitment to Southern European culture and its humble glory. 

My Calabrese just do things because they can, no apologies for no damn body. Just like their Norman forebears, the paisans who opened up Calabria Pork Store hung salami on the ceiling to cure because they know who they are. Apparently, it’s not legal anymore for health reasons to do this, but these Nards were grandfathered in. 

Ceiling swine is a symbol of an immigrant people who’ve made the long journey to a new land, waving the flag of their ancestors. Some in the States have seemed to forget that that’s what truly makes this country great (also, the commitment to free speech and due process and general law and order as outlined in the Constitution). What’s so beautiful about this is that these immigrants could have just assimilated and cured their pork in the back, so as not to scare the ‘Merigans. 

But they didn’t. They remembered who they are, and where they came from in the face of an ever-changing capitalist landscape that devalues family, culture, and tradition. These Calabrese tell you who they are from the jump, and in this America, that display of commitment to tradition and authenticity should always be celebrated. 

Salami forever. Immigrants forever.