Black man #1: Are you going to go to the museum tomorrow?
Black man #2: Hell yeah! I wanna know — how they make a nigga outta wax?!
–Outside Madame Tussaud’s, 42nd St
Overheard by: Laura
Black man #1: Are you going to go to the museum tomorrow?
Black man #2: Hell yeah! I wanna know — how they make a nigga outta wax?!
–Outside Madame Tussaud’s, 42nd St
Overheard by: Laura
Young woman: Hi, I am looking for a good bronzer powder. Can you help me?
Employee: I don’t know, I don’t have your skin color.
–Sephora
Headline by: TM
Runners-Up:
· “Here’s a box of crayons, be creative!” – Steve
· “Neither do I, that’s what the bronzer’s for.” – Dave
· “Or an IQ over 64………” – Cooter
· “The customer is always irrelevant” – Janet E.
· “Why training videos aren’t made on Fridays anymore” – so pale
· “Zombies are so hard to work with” – TP
Chick: I’m interested in what’s now — that’s why I live in Williamsburg.
–Court & 3rd Pl
Overheard by: imitation rastaman
Hyper bus driver playing with overhead marquee while driving: I can set it to police bus, training bus… It’s like a microwave — what do you want? Corn? I like to change it to ‘Harlem.’ Then people get really confused. [Changes sign to ‘B6 Limited’ and comes up to bus stop. No one gets on bus.] What do you need, the B6? No? [Keeps driving.]
–B4 bus, Sheepshead Bay
Overheard by: tanechka
Smart guy: There is no West Side. There’s only Zabar’s.
–New York Palace Hotel
Overheard by: Emily
Hipster to another: You should totally move up to Harlem. It’s getting whiter.
–Union Square
Old lady to another: Yes, she’s still alive. She’s living all alone on the Upper East Side. Well, she doesn’t go out at all. You know she hates everyone, even Democrats.
–22nd & 1st
Frat boy with group of orange-tanned, fake-chested blondes: We gotta find me the Meatpacking District!
–N 4th St & Bedford Ave
Girl: So, yeah, he took me to dinner at this Japanese place and–
Friend: –What’s his background?
Girl: He went to Georgetown and majored in–
Friend: –No. What color is he?
Girl: Oh, he’s white.
Friend, disappointed: That’s so boring… You’re sure? Plain white?
–116th & Broadway
Crackhead girl talking to old pimp: I don’t know why for she call you… Just to be talkin’ shit… You know how I be is…
–Bed-Stuy
Vassar student: If I spoke France fluently, I’d be there right now!
–West 7th & Avenue T
Man leaning into friend’s car window: Nah, she aight… Nah, she aight… Nah, she aight. [Sees a guy across the street] Hey, man, you aight? Aight… Nah, she aight…
–150th & Macombs
Black woman: He coulda played for the Bears, he coulda played for the Jets, but nothing never stucked.
–14th St & 6th Ave
Overheard by: off white
Earnest student giving presentation: I was going to talk about Freud, but I decided he was tangenital to the discussion.
–NYU Silver Center
Overheard by: She wasn’t kidding, and no one laughed
Artistic hipster wannabe: Also, not to get too psychoanaliterature…
–Starbucks, Union Square West
Overheard by: Benjamin
Thug: Yo, nigga, don’t make me yo’ escapegoat!
–4 train, Bronx
Overheard by: charles elliot
NYC woman: We’re here!
Southern tourist bimbo: Laura, I thought we were here to get cheap fake purses?
NYC woman: We are — this is Chinatown.
Southern tourist bimbo: Why are there so many Chinese people?
NYC woman, slowly: This is Chinatown…
Southern tourist bimbo: Laura! You know I hate Chinese people!
–Canal St
Overheard by: The Wizard
Black employee: Yo, why you gotta be hatin’ on my family like that?
White kid: Because you’re black.
Black employee: … Your mama’s black!
–Gristedes, 20th St & 1st Ave
Overheard by: Caroline
Black guy: Yo, you know what ‘FUBU’ stand for?
Black girl: Yeah, ‘For Us, by Us.’
Black guy: Naw, it stand for ‘Farmers Used to Beat Us.’
Black girl: It does not! It’s ‘For Us, by Us’!
Black guy: That’s what they want you to think. Everybody knows it’s ‘Farmers Used to Beat Us.’
Black girl: There ain’t no ‘T’ in ‘FUBU’!
Black guy: That don’t matter.
Black girl: You ign’ant, nigga!
–Midtown
Overheard by: Greg Reeves
Disgruntled man: Fuck that.
Disgruntled woman: I know. You know she a Arabic, so she don’t care about us.
Disgruntled man: Why the fuck they let that kind of people work there?
–Elevator, Children’s Services, 125th & Lenox
White girl: Excuse me, excuse me! God, you have a great skin. Do you tan?
Latina chick: Do I what? It’s December…
White girl: No, [sighs], I mean, do you use a spray-on or do you go to a salon? You know, a salon where you lay in a booth…
Latina chick: No. This is my skin color.
White girl: I can see that, but how did you get it that color?
Latina chick: This is the color I was born with.
White girl: Okay, but how is it so brown when you have green eyes?
Latina chick: Did you just smoke crack?
White girl: Look, it was just an innocent question. I don’t see why you have to get so personal…
Latina chick, turning on iPod: I hate everybody.
–3 train
