Taking overnight trains in India sucks as it is. But when you have a jackass who won't take his spot on the top bunk so you can fold down the bottom bunk to which you bought the ticket for, well that just adds insult to injury. This particular creep not only acknowledged that he had the top bunk but that he did not wish to switch for the bottom one so I can go to sleep. Instead he sat in my seat receiving phone call after phone call (with quite possibly the most annoying ring tone of all time). 30 minutes later I decided that he can go to hell and climbed up to his bunk, despite him yelling at me that he wanted his seat. Apparently the four guys in the next section were his entourage who also yelled up at me that the seat was his, to which I just shut the curtain and put my headphones on.
10 minutes later while stopped at the next station I hear a big commotion below me and open the curtains to find a slew of reporters, complete with TV cameras and recorders interviewing this guy who's sitting directly below me about some scandal. The next morning while I'm flipping the channels I see the interview from the train in the seat below the bunk I was laying. Apparently this guy is some famous writer named Paul Zacharia who spoke out against the government and was beat up by some political goons. It was all over the papers and tv that day so I'm guessing it was the big story of the week. My theory is that the whole thing was staged. In each of the dozen phone calls he received I heard him arguing over money and saying that the money for something can't come from him. Shady Indians… I told you you can't trust them!
10 minutes later while stopped at the next station I hear a big commotion below me and open the curtains to find a slew of reporters, complete with TV cameras and recorders interviewing this guy who's sitting directly below me about some scandal. The next morning while I'm flipping the channels I see the interview from the train in the seat below the bunk I was laying. Apparently this guy is some famous writer named Paul Zacharia who spoke out against the government and was beat up by some political goons. It was all over the papers and tv that day so I'm guessing it was the big story of the week. My theory is that the whole thing was staged. In each of the dozen phone calls he received I heard him arguing over money and saying that the money for something can't come from him. Shady Indians… I told you you can't trust them!
P.S. Never walk the train tracks in India. The bottom of the toilet is a hole thru the bottom of the train
**Update**
So it appears I have as tenuous a grasp of the Malayalam language as I do English. It appears he was only allegedly threatened by some goons. I kinda wish he was actually beat up. Stupid lazy mallu goons! I shake my fist at them! It still doesn't explain what all the shady conversations about money and paying people off were about. This is the interview from the train car. Keep in mind I'm laying on the bunk directly above this :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBdar-YcqeQ
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