Do the Cartoon Sound

While waiting for the train at the subway station, I noticed seven big white panels on the floor, laying against the wall of the opposite platform. It looks like maybe the MTA is preparing to have ads on the walls of the station. It’s about time.
At the City Hall subway station four guys were singing acapella, practicing a new song. They were not busking – they were standing at a corner away from people, rehearsing a new arrangement before they take it on the trains.

The Cortland street subway station is still closed and being worked on. The train always slows down as we pass through there. That’s the stop that’s right by where the Twin Towers used to be. The station has been closed since 9/11, and will reopen when the Fulton Street Transit Center is finished.

At the turnstile of the Whitehall Ferry Terminal, as I came up the escalator, the cop with the bomb sniffing dog recognized me. “Are you on this side today?”, he asked me. “Lets go to work”, he said to his dog. The dog gave my busking gear a quick sniff. “See you later”, said the cop to me.

The intoxicating smell of cake greeted me as soon as I entered the terminal. One of the homeless ladies who is always there was sitting on the bench next to the bakery store, eating.

A toothless guy told me that he is from Bangladesh. One month after 9/11 he had a stroke in his brain. The Doctor said it’s a miracle that he can talk (he talks with difficulty). He likes classical music, he said, so I played him some Brahms.

A guy asked me to do the cartoon sound, so I did the big glissando up. He likes that, he said.

Two gentlemen from Nigeria told me that they saw me playing at Times Square. They particularly liked my ‘Ave Maria’ by Schubert, because they are Catholic, they said.

A guy said to me: “I never give money to musicians. This is the first time!”

A guy told me that in Romanian my last name, Paruz, means either ‘hair’ or a ‘small pair tree’.

As I was heading out of the terminal I heard my name called out. It was Nicola, the singer. She was busking on the Staten Island side of the ferry today. She is about to go on vacation to Costa Rica, she said. Nice.