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Video: Desperate Subway Busker Crosses G Train Trackbed For $5
By
John Del Signore
Published May 4, 2012
Modified May 4, 2012
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By
John Del Signore
Published May 4, 2012
Modified May 4, 2012
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How much money would it take to get YOU to jump down into the subway tracks? If you're this guy playing guitar at the G train stop at Metropolitan Avenue, that magic number is five dollars. A tipster tells us he was waiting for the G last night around 8:30 p.m. when a man on the opposite side of the tracks offered the busker $5—and tried to throw it to him by wrapping the bills around four pennies fastening them with a paper clip. It didn't work, and the money landed down in the trackbed. We now join today's Darwin Award nominee clip, already in progress:
As you can see, once the guitarist successfully returns with his money, his benefactor ups the ante, offering him $100 to do it again. The busker seems to seriously consider it, but then the money man comes to his senses... or maybe he realized the musician might actually do it. Which is too bad, because nothing's more fun than enticing others to risk their lives for a little money.
The man who shot the video adds, "When he got back up to the platform, the very next song was Pink Floyd's 'Wish You Were Here,' which made me snicker because of the opening verse 'Can you tell a green field, From a cold steel rail.'" We would have gone with something from Dylan's Blood on the Tracks, but to each his own.
Tagged
busker
darwin awards
g train
John Del Signore
Originally from the Albany area, John Del Signore has called NYC home since 1995. In addition to his thousands of meticulously-crafted bespoke blog posts for Gothamist, his writing has also been published in The Awl, Deadspin, The Nervous Breakdown, and performed at The Brick Theater in Brooklyn.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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