Student #1: Who’s Helen Keller?
Student #2: She was deaf, blind and couldn’t talk.
Student #1: I thought that was Anne Frank.
–City Tech College
Student #1: Who’s Helen Keller?
Student #2: She was deaf, blind and couldn’t talk.
Student #1: I thought that was Anne Frank.
–City Tech College
Preteen boy, on his way to St. Patrick’s Parade: Mommy, how long do we have to be on this train?
Mother: A few minutes.
Preteen boy: Mommy! This is like when the Nazis took all those people to concentration camps!
Mother: Yeah, but they were German, these people are Irish.
–PATH Train
Overheard by: Shane
Girl: Well, I had to explain the plot of The Diary of Anne Frank to him.
Guy: What plot? It’s a game of hide and seek, the Jews are really bad at it, the Nazis are really good. The end.
–Starbucks, Waverly & 6th Ave
Overheard by: Lotte
Redhead: Do you keep a standard diary?
Brunette: No.
Redhead: You should. Winston Churchill did, and Winston Churchill won World War II.
Brunette: I think Hitler had a diary, too.
–Fort Greene Park
Overheard by: Lulu
Girl #1: Yeah, and I read that Hitler didn’t really make the trains run on time. You know how they say he made them run on time? He didn’t. They were always late. I read a study.
Girl #2: Of course! Because Nazis are evil! Evil people can’t make trains run on time!
–Ladies’ Room, Office Holiday Party
Girl: The Nazi?
Guy: The Nazi.
Girl: He’s not so bad.
–St. Mark’s Place
Girl: So what are you going to be for Halloween?
Guy: Retarded Hitler.
Girl: Oy vey!
–Hunter College
Chipper, young, possibly gay guy with afro to random woman, after switching seats and moving closer: Sorry to bother you, but I just had to tell you this. I have this book of all these, like, African kings and queens and princesses and stuff. And I just had to tell you that you look just like one of the African queens in it. Like, just like her! Oh, I wish I had the book with me! I would show her to you.
–Q Train
Overheard by: katiek
Super‐irate hippie chick in braids, yelling on cell: Thanks to you, everyone thinks I’m a fucking freak. Everyone looks at me like I’m fucking Pearl from the fucking Scarlet Letter!
–Court St & Bergen
Overheard by: Siobhan
Young deli clerk on phone, in confidential tones: William Shakespeare! Shakespeare!
–4th Ave & Bergen St, Boerum Hill
Cockeyed old man in hat to Strand employee: Where are the regular books?
–Strand Bookstore, 12th St & Broadway
Annoying rich girl to friend: So I got a library card so I can read more, but then I realized that I don’t like used things and I stopped going.
–Bookstore, 71st St & Lexington
Girl (outside of her AP English classroom): Wait…Huck Finn never had syphilis!
–Stuyvesant High School
Woman to friend helping her find a book: You don’t have to worry about giving away the ending. I know what happens to those six million people.
–The Strand
(a child sees a man walking in clothes with skulls and bones on them)
Child: Mommy! Can I have clothes like his?
Mom: No, sweetie. Those clothes belong to an underground gang that kill people, just like in the days of Hitler and George Bush.
–Fordham Road
Overheard by: Gus
Six‐year‐old girl to middle‐aged passenger: Well, I’m Jewish, but my parents are Aries. So I’m not really sure what that makes me.
–Amtrak
Overheard by: half Jewish, half Gemini
Guy: Oh, I know Jewish girls give good head!
–81st & Amsterdam
Awkward Catholic boy: These days there are more Jews in New York than Israel…and they all worship Barbara Walters as their Spider Queen.
–Steps of The Met
(outside the Marionette Theater’s showing of Jack and the Beanstalk)
Four‐year‐old: Fee fi fo fum, I smell the blood of a Jewish man.
–Outside the Marionette Theatre, Central Park
Drunk guy inside German bar, pointing at small guy with a jewfro: Juden!
–German Beer Garden, Williamsburg
Overheard by: POLA
Woman on cell: Well, he wasn’t as forthcoming with me as he is with you, probably because I keep telling him to stop dating that fat Asian girl and find himself a nice Jewish girl instead …
–Broadway & Prince
