Multiculturalism, Overheard Style

Effeminate guy on cell phone: …And we don’t want any fat German ladies
in the house.

–Post office, 23rd and Lex

Overheard by: Megan Buckley

Guy with headphones to passerby in the rain: I hate that umbrella! I’m gonna break that umbrella! I’m gonna knock that umbrella out of your hands!

–Union Square

Overheard by: Letting go of the umbrella

Teen boy to another teen boy: I really hate my mom because she grounds me all the time, that’s why I got grounded.

–B44 bus, Nostrand Ave & Ave Y

Overheard by: o_O

JAP: And so he was like, ‘Wanna go make out?’ and I was like, ‘Okay,’ so we did and that was fun or whatever, but I don’t know… We don’t actually like each other at all, we really can’t stand each other.

–The Tea Lounge, 7th Ave, Park Slope

Overheard by: mortalfool411

Black female after being insulted by a Black male clerk in a store: I hate Black people.

–Graham Avenue, Brooklyn

Suit: Fuckin’ guy, that fuckin’ attorney. I hate him. I hate ’em all. Myself too, I shouldn’t have gone to law school. He probably hates himself, unless he’s too fuckin’ stupid to regret it. We’re all a bunch of miserable self-loathing fucks, nobody likes attorneys.

–J & R, Park Row

Crazy yelling bitch: He’s a hater, I’m telling you he’s a fucking hater! What? No I fucking hate him.

–33rd & 8th

Overheard by: devila

Girl on cell: What? With pills? Why’d he do that? Because everyone hates him?

–62nd & 2nd

Overheard by: Ralph

Chick on cell: Yeah, I’ll put a tarp down, but everyone spraypaints on the roof. There’s graffiti all over it ’cause it’s the ghetto. There’s crackheads everywhere, so no one’s going to care about some little White girl with a spray can.

–7 train

Overheard by: Ani Sin

Thug kid: Yo man, Welsh is the place to be. They drink as much as the Irish, but they don’t got the rep for it yet.

–Times Square

Overheard by: Pegs Landing

Latina: My sister married a Puerto Rican, my brother married a Puerto Rican, I don’t wanna marry no Puerto Rican. I wanna step up–marry some White guy.

–42nd & 3rd

Crazy Black man: I ain’t sucking on Whitey’s balls! Are you? I ain’t playin with Whitey’s dick! Are you?

–Union Square

Guy: I’ve never seen an English porn. It’s probably bad teeth and fish
‘n chips and stuff.

–27th Street office

Man on cell: Do you hear all this noise? You’d never hear people honking their horns like that in Singapore…it’s considered to be insulting!

–23rd & 6th

Bus driver: Anyone on here who speaks Russian? I need someone to tell this lady that her transfer is already on the card. Anyone on here who speaks Russian?…Please tell her that her transfer is on the card.
Woman: The transfer is on your card.
Bus driver: In Russian! In Russian! I coulda told her that in English!

–B82 bus

Chick #1: Do you have a book called White Supremacy by Fredrickson?
Store guy: No.
Chick #1: Can you see if any other Barnes & Noble has it?
Store guy: No, none in Manhattan. I take it it’s for a class or something?
Chick #1: No, it’s for my own, uh, personal knowledge. Thanks anyway.
Store guy: Sure.
Chick #2: I need a book of art or photographs by crazy people.

–Barnes & Noble, Astor Place

Next Wednesday, 2/22, the Overheard staff–both of us–will be reading and signing the new Overheard in New York book at the above location. It starts at 7.

Girl on cell: I shit you not, it was a small studio apartment converted into a four bedroom on the 6th floor.

–47th & 9th

Fat suit on cell: How many people play the drums in Poland, really?…What? Wow. Cool. Well, plenty of time to practice I guess.

–Penn Station

Overheard by: Max T-M

MTV chick: When I used to read, I went from the last chapter to the first.

–MTV cafeteria

Hipster: They’re always on the same train, so the first time you give them money, then remember your face. Every time you get on the train after that, they’ll follow you around. It’s like having your own 6-foot pet!

–1 train

Overheard by: spike

Black guy: …And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who would attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know my name is the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon thee.
White guy: Are you trying to mug me or what?

–7 train, 74th St Roosevelt

Dude: Is she a stripper?
Girl: I don’t think so. Although she does hang around a lot of French people.
Dude: What about the guy…is he French?
Girl: Must be. He smells like hardwood floors.

–Union Square

Woman #1: But not all Asian girls are pretty.
Woman #2: Oh I know, but he just thinks that, on a scale of 1-10, Asian girls start off with like a +10.
Woman #1: Oh, well that’s good, because most white guys just see that they’re Asian and don’t consider whether they’re really pretty or not.

–78th & Lexington

Suit: So, you wanna bring the strippers to paintball?

–45th St & Ave of the Americas

Suit: They are not stupid people, even though they are from the Midwest.

–53rd & Park

Overheard by: MJ

Suit: We’re meeting in conference room G, but there’s still blood in there from the last meeting.

–53rd & Park

Overheard by: Russo

Suit whispering baby talk into another’s ear: Freddie, wash my butthole.

–Brooklyn-bound Q train

Late-50s suit to another: My next-door neighbors, they don’t know how to communicate with their Mexicans.

–N & R platform, 49th St

Overheard by: Wish I could have heard more

Suit to another: I don’t care what they say — once a french maid, always a french maid.

–Rockefeller Center

Suit on cell: If it wasn’t for goat’s milk I don’t know how I would’ve made it through college.

–45th St & 6th Ave

Overheard by: y2jon