If you don’t know the blog ‘Humans of New York’, which captures beautiful images of the city’s colourful characters, you need to check it out here. A few days ago on the site, I spied this teeny tiny character:

Today I was wandering downtown and took a walk through Washington Square Park, and who did I spot, but the very same mini marionette – ‘Stix’. So I waited for a show.

The way Ricky Syers, the puppeteer (actually called a manipulator), moved this little guy to show him dancing, walking, breathing and snoozing was just amazing. The details were fantastic – the way he sucked on his cigarette, glugged from a bottle of moonshine or wiped his brow. It was so easy to think that it actually was a mini human.

Stix is just one of Syers’ 13 homemade marionettes. It’s a dying art, so I’m glad there was such a brilliant – albeit simple – show so close by.

I love Washington Square Park on a day like this, when the weather’s beautiful, the people-watching is top notch and all sorts of musicians are out. It provides hours of entertainment. But by far the best find today was Mr Stix and his moonshine.