Tarik and I are awesome canners. Here are some of the fun stories...
1. I was getting bored, so I came over to Tarik and asked if he wanted to double-team the next car. So a minivan rolls up, and I go to the passenger side and he goes to the driver side. We both start asking them for money to help the kids, and they both roll down the window. The husband is on my side, so I talk to him. He says, "You know, I make a point of not donating to anyone that disrupts the flow of traffic."
Being aware of the world around me, I said, "We're not disrupting the flow of traffic. There's a red light right there, and you're stopped at it."
So he said back to me something along the lines of, "Well all I know is that I'm a cop, and I look to my morals to decide what to do with my money and what to donate to."
I said, "Right, and I think your morals would probably tell you it's okay to donate to these kids."
And he said angrily, "Look kid, you have no f***ing clue how I spend my money or who I donate too!" And then something about me being arrogant.
I said, "You're right, I don't, but I still think that you should donate to these kids." Then he pretty much rolled up his window for good (he had started to a few times before) and that was that.
His wife donated to Tarik while I was talking to him.
2. Tarik and I decided to have a little fun by asking people to donate to whomever they thought was cuter out of the two of us. Usually we would ask this if a girl was in the driver's seat/donating to us specifically, but sometimes we would ask the husband "You have to donate to whoever your wife thinks is cuter. She doesn't think we're cuter than you, just whichever out of the two of us is cuter." Sometimes we would also ask who had cooler hair, and sometimes we would ask who needed a haircut more.
Anyway, one time a black guy and his kid came up to the light and they were going to donate. The kid was youngish, probably about 10 or so, with cornrowed hair and a big fauxhawk going down the middle. The face was sort of soft and feminine, so when they were about to put the dollar in, I said, "Alright, whoever she thinks is cuter put it in that can." And the father pulled back his dollar and said, "...He will give you a dollar."
And I wanted to throw myself in front of his car, like maybe that would make him feel better.
3. There was a guy in a car who was going to give Tarik or I a dollar, and we did the "Which one is cuter?!" donating gig, and he responded, "I ain't no homo." We still got a dollar, but I felt bad about that one.
4. A husband and wife came up to us, I forget who was in the driver seat, I think the wife. There may have been kids in the back. When we came to them they were laughing in a good-natured way. When we explained what we were for and probably just seemed interested in what they were laughing about, the wife said, "When we were driving up my husband asked me, 'What are they collecting for, a haircut?' " It was after this incident that we started asking people who needed a haircut more.
5. Tarik has a sort of flat affect, which comes across mostly from his speech. He also spoke half-Arabic and half-English when he was a kid, and his parents are from Palestine, so he has something like 5% of an accent to go along with his affect. It makes things he says sound a little funnier. Our call to get people to donate was Tarik first saying, "Do you hate cancer?" And then I would say, "Do you love children?" And then people would laugh and feel sheepish and exploited, and we would look at them, point, and say, "Looks like you do!"
6. Tarik and I were doing so well we decided one time after a light that we needed to change our names to reflect how awesome we were. I forget who was assigned "Livin' Easy" at first, but later we decided our final names would be Jeff "Rainmaker" C and Tarik "Bank Roll" S.
7. When we would say to people "Looks like you want to donate!" and they would shake their heads no, Tarik and I would start our harassment shtick. It was surprisingly effective. Tarik and I would alternate every object sentence, almost going down a list: "Really? You don't have anything? A quarter? A nickel? A penny? Your watch? Your glasses? Your car radio? Your wife? Your kid? Car keys? Gum wrapper? Pen cap?" If they had something funny in the car, we would ask for that too - I asked one younger guy for his hockey stick. If none of these worked we would demand a high-five. Once people agreed to that, the window was down. Half of them were in.
8. There was one guy at the very front of the line that Tarik and I worked extra hard on because the Domino Effect is totally a make-or-break deal with these things. At some point in our shtick, he just started laughing and said, "Alright, you guys sold me!" with a smile on his face and donated to us. I asked him if it was because of our comical stylings, and he said it was. That made me proud for the two of us.
9. Another part of our shtick, after asking for everything in their car, or for their car itself, was to pick an aspect of the person and say that it counts double. So for a lady in a conversion van, we would say, "Conversion vans count double!" Or "Big rigs count double!" It doesn't make any sense at all, but it makes people feel special and needed, and sometimes it gets them to donate. I got at least one conversion van driver in this method. There was one guy that came to our light with a particularly gorgeous girl in his passenger seat and a baby in the back. After going down our list, I said, "Cute couples count double!" Still not convinced, I said in a more pleading voice, "....Cute babies count triple..." And they donated.
10. One lady who we asked to donate to the one with better hair looked at us, put the money in Tarik's can and said, "I'm from the 70s and his hair reminds me of my decade." Tarik celebrated by singing Disco Inferno while walking to the next car.
11. Whenever Tarik would see people who looked involved in Middle Eastern culture, he would approach them by excitedly saying "As-salamu alaykum!" It translates to something along the lines of "Peace be upon you" in Arabic. One time when he said it, the people responded in completely American-sounding English, and he just sort of sighed to himself in his head.
12. One time I texted Tarik to see how he was doing when he was way on the other side of the intersection from me - this was on Saturday, before we started working together. It had been raining on and off that day. He said, "It stopped raining from the sky cuz I'm making it rain over here."
13. A woman came to Tarik on Saturday and said she didn't have any money, and asked if he could take a check. He said, "Sure, we'll take it," so she started writing. She asked him if $15 would be enough, and Tarik just said, "...eeehhhfhfhfh...", and so she wrote a check for $30.
14. I told a trucker that I would root for the Yankees if he donated since he was wearing a Yankees hat. He donated. I need to root for the Yankees sometime soon, before the series is over.
15. The last person in a line of cars one time was a nice, middle-aged black woman. She didn't have any money to donate, but she was nice and we had already tried everyone else, so we just said, "Well, you're the last one here, so do you mind if we talk to you a little?" And she said that was okay, so we just had a conversation for 45 seconds or so, until her light turn. She was on her way to Macy's, which seemed like a fun shopping trip at first, but then she told us it was to go to work, which was less exciting, because it's work. We told her what the charity was for, and she said it was a very nice cause. She left when her light changed; we both liked her, maybe she even liked us too.
16. Sometimes you get stuck in the middle of the road when the light changes. When that happened, Tarik and I would just stand right in front of/behind each other and wave the cars onward, so they'd know they could go and we would get out of the way after all of them had passed. One time Tarik was like 10 yards ahead of me. A guy started honking right after he passed Tarik, and the driver gave me the finger. He was a young white guy. I don't know what he expected me to do. Look, dude, I know I'm in the middle of the road, giving me the finger isn't going to solve any problems here.
17. Sometimes Tarik would try to sing to people when they wouldn't donate. Sometimes he would sing to them when they did donate. A couple times he tried singing Happy Birthday to people, and one time I sang See You Again by Miley Cyrus. To quote Pokemon: It was not very effective.
18. There was one car that didn't donate, but of course we try to be nice anyway, and so after saying his thanks, Tarik said, "Cute dalmatian by the way!" He thought he had seen a dalmatian in the back. From my vantage point, I could see that it wasn't a dalmatian. See, Sesame Place was about five miles away, and a lot of people were coming with kids in silly costumes, and this was one of them. So Tarik had actually just called their child a dalmatian. A cute dalmatian. I told Tarik and he just said, "...oh... whoops."
19. A man in a mustang drove past us and Tarik shouted, "MUSTANGS RULE!" The guy had his window cracked, and then rolled it all the way down and said, "Alright, you get a dollar for that trick." I don't think he even knew what we were collecting for, he just liked Tarik saying his car ruled.
20. Sometimes Tarik would say "Thank you for being awesome" when people donated. Sometimes we would tell people that if they donated, they would never die, we promise! People seemed skeptical, but I assured them that I had donated before, and that I had never died, so they could trust me.
21. One time we asked who needed a haircut more for whose can to put money in, and the guy said, "Hah, at least you guys still have hair!" I felt a little sad but the guy didn't seem too upset.
22. When we asked who was cuter, Tarik was more likely to win the older the women got. I did very well in the 7-and-under demographic. People typically thought my hair was better, and we were about split on who needed a haircut more. A lot of people, when we asked who was cuter, would just whip out another dollar so they could put it in both of our cans. One woman, when we asked who was cuter, put $1 in my can, then $5 into Tarik's can. Whenever we asked people to donate to who was cuter and they got hesitant, I would say, "Don't worry, we're really good friends and we won't get mad at each other." Then if they donated to Tarik I would immediately shout at him, "I'm mad at you!" And the people usually understood, and laughed.
Peace out!
