h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

... to comment on this entry. Well, I like it. I never really thought about the history of living statues but I enjoyed learnign a bit about it.

We have some here in Berlin, too. It's impressive how someone can hold one position so long. It really is.

From the detailled tips I gather you tried it yourself?

Methos

I was recently in Barcelona and went to Las Ramblas (a tourist MUST) and there were loads of human statues there. One was a guy, totally white from head to foot, wearing a bowler hat and carrying an umbrella but sitting on a toilet with his trousers and pants round his ankles. As people dropped money into his tin he pulled faces as if he were straining.

Another bloke seemed to be the antithesis of this. He'd cut himself out a couple of wings from a bit of scrap cardboard and tied a red bit of cardboard to his head. He didn't look like a statue and moved a fair bit. Whenever anyone put money in his tin he crowed like a rooster. I'm not sure if he'd got the hang of it or whether he was spending all of his earnings on cheap Spanish brandy.

I've seen one who served a completely different purpose. Earlier, when Bush first announced the war in Iraq, a guy painted completely gray stood in the quad at my university motionless from sunrise to sunset for peace. Not sure how it accomplished anything but it was very profound.

"Put your weigh on both feet"- Is that supposed to say "weight"?