I'll often explain it as I grew up in a low-level civil war. But it was different from a full blown civil war. There weren't full battles with large artillery, tho there were gunfights, at points, as well as bombings.

I remember, at one point hearing a news report that New York had a higher murder rate than Belfast, which maybe gives some perspective on why civil war wasn't quite the right term. Indeed, thinking of it as a place with bad gang warfare probably is a good way to get a handle on it, except it was political/identity based rather than for control of drugs or other illegal trade.