Seen near 1st Ave. and 9th St. in the East Village, this stripped down white bike that, on closer inspection, is someone’s elaborate ha-ha for passersby and I’m guessing the cyclists and cyclists’ families who paid their respect on the Fifth Annual Memorial Bike Ride this January 5. (Gothamist: At least 10 cyclist deaths were reported in NYC for 2009. In 2008, the number was 25).
A close up of the letter (click to read the text):
An excerpt:
A good hearted man with a caring soul was killed by police at this intersection on November 18, 2009 as he rode his bicycle. Junior was born to love and ahrd times would never break his spirit. A creative man down on his luck made some decisions that were not of his character and after paying society for his sins, he is killed by the very element that took away his freedom. Junior was released from prison on November 10, 2009 after serving 12 years for the crime of stripping abandoned cars to feed his family. Such punitive punishment for a starving family man. For only eight days would…Junior’s return to home before Gay Police Officer Trey… of the NYFP (New York Fashion Police) recklessly killed Junior while speeding to a fashion disaster in the West Village…
You dumb sack-of-shit tourists are probably crying for a dead New Yorker by now but hey the joke is on you for caring enough to look at an abandoned, stripped bicycle converted into a memorial to a car stripper. Plus does the man pictured look hungry to you? Right now I’m home laughing my ass off or maybe across the street spying on you but either way laugh and enjoy the art of Christina March…
Fuck you and go home. If you are a yuppie or hipster find a new city as your careless spending has made New York …[unlivable]
A pretty good prank effort (as someone who had to write obits, I feel it’s pretty spot on how many people would eulogize a ne’er-do-well) though probably the time and energy could’ve gone to mocking something more mockable than killed cyclists, who, if they had their way in imposing traffic-calming measures, would probably make parts of the city more livable. And telling hipsters to go away? Isn’t this a joke that a hipster-amid-a-heroin-rehab-program might pull off to show how counter-culture and ironic and edgy he is? Agh, irony overload!