20-something chick: Besame!
Boyfriend: Piss on me? Really?
20-something chick: No! Besame! It means “Kiss me” in Spanish!
Boyfriend: Oh. Can I do both?
20-something chick: If you were bilingual we wouldn’t have this problem.
–Penn Station
Overheard by: Vicksburg
Frustrated bouncer: You don’t speak Spanish, you don’t speak Chinese, what the fuck do you speak?
–Broome Street, Chinatown
Woman, talking to friends: And I love how his "Dominican" wife has an Irish accent.
–109th & Broadway
Overheard by: Cassandra
Crazy guy running: The British are coming! The British are coming!
–8th St & 6th Ave
Woman talking to friend: So this Chinese guy told me he was speaking Vietnamese. I never knew that Vietnam was in china! I felt so ignorant after that.
–St. Mark’s & 1st Ave
30-something woman to her female friend: I didn’t know he was gay. I just thought he was French.
–E 34th St
Foreign woman, after the entire audience has been screaming "Cunt! Cunt!" at the end of "Reclaiming Cunt" during "The Vagina Monologues": I think my English is improving!
–New School
Blonde: You know what I just learned? G-E-O-R-G isn’t pronounced ‘George’ — it’s pronounced ‘gay-something.’
–49th & Broadway
Overheard by: It’s too cold for stupidity
Fag hag to queer pal: It’s like, we’re like… cotillion-izing!
–Columbia University
Overheard by: jaded library dweller
Ghetto chick: Yo, he is datin’ Sheryl now. I told him, ‘Tell me when you kiss her.’ He was all, ‘Why?’ so I said, ‘So I know not to kiss her!’ I’m bilingual, yo.
–L train, 3rd Ave stop
Overheard by: katiebeans
Loud woman: That is ‘conniving’ with a capital ‘K’!
–St. Mark’s & 2nd Ave
Angry wife to husband: You are so patronistic. I seriously can’t stand how fucking patronistic you are.
–56th & 5th
15-year-old girl to group of friends: I be takin’ AP English this year, yo. I the only one in that motherfucker that don’t be lookin’ like they be deliverin’ yo’ egg rolls when they ain’ts in school an’ shit.
–210th St & Bainbridge Ave
Overheard by: gutterlush
Angry woman to friend: I have a contention with the way people pronounce my daughter’s name. I did not name my daughter ‘Lady Nasty’! I named my baby girl ‘La Dynasty.’
–JFK
Overheard by: The REAL Lady Nasty
Customer: So, can I have three tacos — two with chicken, and one chorizo?
Waitress: Eh, what was the last one?
Customer: Chorizo taco!
Waitress: Oh, I don’t know… The chef may not understand that. Y’know, he doesn’t really speak English…
–El Sombrero restaurant, LES
Spanish teacher, reading student’s homework: What?! What is this?! Novia? You’re going to ride your girlfriend?
Student: Doesn’t that mean ‘ferris wheel’?
–Stuyvesant High
Overheard by: No, he meant girlfriend
Tall foreign model #1: … And we nicknamed each other’s, you know, junk…
Tall foreign model #2: Really? What does he call yours?
Tall foreign model #1: He keeps calling it ‘Gina’ — I don’t get why.
Tall foreign model #2: Huh.
–12th & 4th
Nurse on phone with patient: You speak Korean? Is that like Mandarin Chinese or Cantonese? So it’s called Korean? It’s not Chinese?
–New York Presbyterian Hospital
Dude #1: Hey, how do you say ‘brains’ in German?
Dude #2: I don’t know. Why?
Dude #1: I need it for that movie I’m making — ‘Nazi Zombies.’
–Barnes & Noble, 8th & 6th
Lawyer at deposition: What is your native language?
West Indian woman, offended: English!
Lawyer: Lady, you must speak some other language, because I’ve been questioning you for an hour and I haven’t understood a goddamn word you said.
–Supreme Court, 360 Adams St, Brooklyn
Overheard by: Big Larry
JAP #1: Well, call me on your phone.
JAP #2: What?!
JAP #1: Call me on your phone?
JAP #2: Oh. I thought you just said something in French or something.
JAP #1: I can’t speak French!
–Washington Square Park
