It’s a Tuesday, February 2nd. @sidetalknyc posts on their Instagram story that they’re having a snowball fight at Washington Square Park at 1 pm. Throughout the weekend, New York City received over 13 inches of snow. I couldn’t pass up on this opportunity so my friend and I took the A train over to West 4th station near Washington Square Park and arrived at exactly 1:00 pm. Near the park’s fountain, we could see 50+ people also here for the upcoming snowball fight event. The anticipation was building for what would be a legendary event.
A few moments later the crew of Sidetalk NYC (@sidetalknyc) came through to get footage for their video. Just as we thought things couldn’t get any more exciting, Spidercuz pulled up to the fountain ready to turn things from a 10 to an 11. Spidercuz is the embodiment of the wildly beloved marvel comic book superhero Spider-man, based in New York City, but from the hood. Spidercuz is edgy, authentic, and raunchy; traits that align with the spectrum of stereotypical NYC culture/behavior. For starters, Spidercuz speaks with a New York City accent, wears Timberland boots, sports a New York Yankees fitted hat, and can almost always be found with a bottle of Hennessy. He also always brings contagious energy that makes people laugh, dance, and bring out their own inner New Yorker.
The energy is ramping up and SpiderCuz proceeds to counts down from 10 to commence the beginning of the snowball fight free for all. The air stood still. Spidercuz is counting and gets to Number 5 and someone chucks a snowball at him before he could finish. Before I knew it, people started throwing snowballs and the chaos started to ensue. Snowballs are being thrown from every coming direction. Some people even went as far as picking up bigger chunks of snow and launching them in the air. There was this one guy who came to the park dressed as Batman. Spidercuz’s makes it very clear that he despises Batman and is his arch nemesis. In no time at all people were assaulting this Batman with snowballs per Spidercuz’s orders.
This park was turned into a battlefield. There was a moment where it felt like the ending scene in the movie 300 where the sky is full of arrows flying down at Leonidas prepared to face his demise. No one was safe.
After the snowball fight was over, Spidercuz led the people who were still ‘alive’ to gather around as he dissed random snowmen sculptures and told everyone to gather in and beat the snowmen up. People were throwing punches, some people were jumping and body-slamming and others Woo walked and danced on the remains of the snow on the ground. Someone even went as far as biting the carrot nose from the snowman and spit it out. No games were being played. Sidetalk and Spidercuz started handing the mic to all sorts of people, myself included to “Talk their shit.” for the upcoming Sidetalk video.
The entire experience was truly an iconic moment in time. I initially came to this event for the snowball fight and left with a lot more than I expected. I actually came home with the bottle of Henny that Spidercuz had brought to this event.
This snowball fight video went viral on different news platforms and channels. In the midst of this all, I was caught in the thumbnail as the guy on the right. A free for all snowball fight in one of the most notorious parks in all of New York City with Spidercuz, in the middle of a pandemic. Legendary.
