Reply All - #103 Long Distance, Part II

Episode Date: August 3, 2017

This week, Alex and Damiano take a trip. This is the conclusion of last week's episode, Long Distance. Further Reading Snigdha Poonam's story on tech support scams in the Hindustan Times If you suspect you are a victim of a tech support scammer, you see a suspicious pop-up, or get an unsolicited tech support email, you can make a complaint to the Federal Trade Commission by following this link, or by contacting the company that the call center was impersonating directly. Microsoft fraud report page Apple fraud report page Microsoft did a global survey of tech support scams in 2016, and the results are pretty interesting. You can find it here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Before we start the show, if you have not already listened to last week's episode, number 102, long distance, go listen to that first. This episode is the conclusion to that story. From Gimlet, this is Reply All. I'm Alex Goldman. We're in P.J. Bo. We made it. We're here. Yeah, how you feeling? Good?

Mm. There's different. So, PJ, me and Damiano, we landed in Delhi on a Monday evening. This was about a month ago around early July. And what, like, what were you guys hoping for? So Kamal told me that he would answer all of my questions about this call center if I came to visit him. So I was there to see if he would answer all my questions. And if he wouldn't, I was going to find the answers for myself.

All right, Just Winder says he's by gate number five. So we met up with our driver. We got a driver. His name was Just Vinder. Hey, man, how's it going? I'm just playing. He takes us to our hotel. I think that's it right there.

E5 of Ellie. That's it. Jack customer you have called is unavailable to take your call. Hey, Kamal. It's Alex Goldman. Are you planning on coming in tomorrow? We want to meet you. Yeah, I'll give you a call tomorrow morning.

Take it easy. Bye. So we wake up the next day. And Kamal still hasn't called us back, which is fine because that's sort of what Kamal always does. He disappears and reappears sort of on his whim. So we do what we always do when he disappears, which is investigate at Costings more. Right. And here's our plan. We want to find the call center. At the very least, we want to know exactly where it is.

And from there, we can figure out what to do next. Good morning, Jost. Good morning, boss. How are you? So I tell Justwander to take us to this neighborhood called Punjabi. We want to go to the main drag there. It's called Club Road. Okay, anywhere around here, like here is good. God damn, it's hot out. There's not really a sidewalk here, so we're just in the middle of

oncoming traffic. So we have two addresses for our caustings, and they're both on this road. Hmm. A lot of like businesses, crammed signs. Charas Swarm up. There's a salon called Headlocks. This guy's carrying. This guy's carrying a lot of bamboo.

And do you know anything about the neighborhood? Is it like Scam City? The neighborhood's actually pretty residential. And there are other call centers there, but we're pretty sure that they're all legit. The first place we go... Can I tell you where I would go first? Yeah. I would go to the bar they hang out.

Ding, ding, ding, ding. So I think this was it. Yes. All right. So the first place we go is chug it. Chug it. That's so funny. Yeah, so Chug It's on Club Road, and it's in between these two addresses that we have.

So how do we get up there? So on this building, there's a staircase that's actually outside of the building. And on each floor there's a landing, which has the entrance to the business on that floor. And we go up three flights to where Chugit is, and there's a guy standing out in front of the bar. Hello. Hi. Hi. Are you guys open right now?

No, we're not with the group. But this guy explained to me that Chuggett actually shut down. This isn't Chuggett. What happened? Well, it's been taken over by different owners, actually. So they've changed the name to headphones. Yeah. Oh, it's a time open today?

Oh, it's not open. It hasn't even opened yet. They were doing a soft launch of it. They don't have the headphones yet. That's where the music fell out. Funny, you should mention that, because it's one of those headphone bars. That's the thing? You never heard about headphone clubs where, like, DJs play music,

but there's no sound over the speakers and people wear headphones and listen to it and dance. That is so embarrassing. Just the image of people, dancing to music you can't hear in a club. It's like the only thing that can make dancing a club less comfortable. No, PJ, picture this. Three DJs, three different kinds of music. Pick your channel. Well, it's not being open. So it's about to in three or four days. But do you know, do you know guys that come here from a call center close by on club road? There's a call center upstairs as well. There is? What's the name of the call center?

The domestic call center. Domestic call center. So you don't know any guys who come in here from an International Health Center. Not yet, because it's not been opened yet for the public. So we go downstairs and we're like, let's try the first address we have for Acostings. And that address is one club road. Hi, sorry, do you live here? We actually talked to a guy there who's really sweet.

It says Acostings Infotech Limited is renting the third floor. No, no, it's an NGO. It's basically for relaxing for mine. It's a meditation center. He's like, I'm really sorry. I don't know anything about a college. call center. Okay. That leaves us with the other address we have, which is 26 Club Road. And 26 Club Road is the address that Acostings has on the map on their website. So then we walk, I would say

is probably half a mile, three quarters of a mile, to the, to 26. And it was hot out, right? It was truly a nightmare. Was Alex Stoic and cool about physical discomfort? He, no. He would like, he would like so there was like a cafe there was a Starbucks on the block So like pretty much Alex would only be outside for 30 minutes at a time

And then we would have to go and sit in Starbucks Because he would overheat And Alex He's like the gentleman reporter He's like so frail He also like he just like I don't maybe I haven't spent a lot I'm walking around with you

But you just like fall and stumble a lot Oh constantly constantly Do you know when you like Falls? on your arm and then you wake up and you can't really move it. Those are all of his limbs. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And he's just like stumbling around and falling.

What is going on in the studio right now? He literally, I'm trying to know what happened in Delhi. He almost fell into sewer. We're on the side of the road. What? Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Oh, I almost fell down the hole. Jesus Christ, Christ, I'm all right.

Everything's fine. So, so you guys are, you'll walk a couple of, feet, Alex will go inside and put ice all over himself, and then he falls in a sewer and you bring him out. But eventually, like, three days later, you make your way down the street from one club road to 26 Club Road. Exactly. And lovely. We get to 26 Club Road. It's this one. That one. 26. So it's this building? According to my thing. It's a fancy building. And it looks much more like a possible candidate. So on the first floor of this building, there's a bar. There's a business on the second floor, and then the third floor

had no markings, and it was all tinted windows. Wow. Should we ask this security guard if he knows Acostings? We could. Hello, sir. How are you? Is there a call center accostings in this building? A call center? Acostings? Acostings? This security guard does not speak English, and we can't really understand each other. But here's the thing. We know that Acostings is supposed to be on the third floor of the building that it's in, and this just really feels like it could be the place.

And if it is Acostings, at 6 p.m., like an hour from now, right when people in the U.S. are waking up, there's going to be a stream of young call center workers heading into this building. So we decide to stake it out. I've got my eyes peeled for any faces that I recognize. None so far.

So we're waiting, we're waiting, and by 7.30, no one has shown up. There's nothing going on at this address. This just can't be the place. So now what? I don't know, you tell me. We're starting to feel a little bit desperate. And even though he's been dodging us, I sent Kamal a text message. I said, hey Kamal, what's the address of Acostings?

I know it's on Club Road, I'm just trying to find the exact address. address. And Kamal writes back, he says, yeah, it was. I left and it's no more in operation for the time being. Dude, I'm freaked out a little bit. What if they closed down? Come on, they closed down two days ago. Possible. We like sit down on a stoop on the side of the road, and I've, I think literally have my head in my hands, and I'm just like, oh my God. We flew all the way here. to find this call center, and now we have no idea where it is, and like no real way of figuring it out. I have a huge knot in my stomach.

And then, after a day, chock full of disappointments, Kamal delivers us one piece of hope. He texts me again, and he says, let's meet up for dinner. He said, I'll pick you up, and then we can go somewhere good for night out. Great. Yeah, sounds good. So we head to this area called Cyber Hub, which is just south of Delhi,

and Kamal tells us to meet him at this wine bar there. I just got nervous, officially. So we get there, and it's like this big, huge American-looking mall. And the wine bar was in this mall. It's like near the entrance. We pull out our recorders again. Yeah. The security guards immediately tell us to put them away.

Really? Yes. All right. So we take out of the record. our iPhones. And record with your iPhones. And record with her iPhones. Do you think that's just a stray dog?

How does a stray dog get into a place with security like this? We wander around for a while, waiting for Kamal, and then he says, hey, I'm in the wine bar. Come meet me. So then Kamal comes out of the bar. And I recognize him immediately. Good. Nice to meet you, man. We give each other a very awkward hug. Hug?

Kamal kind of turned sideways. Kamal does one of those one-arm things. He tries to, like, deflect. You hate hugs. I know. How are you? Hey, wait. Good, good, good.

Do you mind if we go somewhere a little quieter? It's very loud. It's a little loud. No, inside is not that loud. Oh, it is? Let's live. Yeah, okay. So what does he look like?

He's much smaller than I imagine him to be. Because he looks big, stocky, and the photos that we have of him. Yeah, he does. And he's smiling and he's friendly, but he really wants us to go in the bar. He says, I got a friend with me. Come on inside. I got a friend with me?

So we go inside. This person has their back to us, and you can see from the back he's wearing sort of like a tight black shirt. His hair slicked back. Beefy dude. And we get around to the other side of the table, and we face him, and immediately we realize.

Hey. Hey, I like Deepak, nice to meet you. It's Deepak Ferma, the owner of Agostings. That's crazy. Yeah. Also, what a villainous. for reveal. Yeah, totally. And we're both like...

We're both like... Well, we have... We're not prepared for this. How you guys? Thanks so much for me, guys. They can't believe we're actually meeting face to face. It's crazy. So, obviously, it is very hard to understand this audio.

It was very hard to understand them in this very loud bar that they insisted on meeting us in. I thought, I'm going to try and roll with this. Damiano thought, I'm going to throw up. Why did you want to throw up? The whole time we'd been talking to Kamal, we thought that we were sneaky and that we were talking to someone who was trying to either keep us a secret or who was like sort of doing his own thing, going rogue. It's like this guy used to be in the mob. He's out of the mob.

He's going to tell us about the mob. He tells you to come meet. And then the godfather is at the table. Exactly. So I lean over and I whisper in Alex's ear and I say, don't. Don't ask any big questions, let's just watch them and try to figure out what's going on. And then I turned to Deepak. You grew up in Delhi.

You grew up in Chuckingard. Did you grow up in Delhi? I'm born in Florida, Kentucky. You were born in Delhi? Born in Boston. So we try to make awkward small talk, but Deepak just has one question that he keeps asking. What's your plan? We're just going to hang out, see stuff.

What is your plan? So what's you there? Like, what you're there? Me and I don't know yet. We're playing it by ear. Kamal, on the other hand, is lean back in his chair. He's barely saying a word. He's constantly referring to Deepak as like sir and boss.

And he's become so sort of meek that you kind of like... Like he's trapped underneath something. Yeah. And at one point during dinner, I asked Kamal, so six months ago, did you ever expect that we'd be sitting across from one another? And before he can even answer, Deepak immediately launches into what seems like a scripted. response to any question we might have about the validity of their business. Yeah, it's basically like how the call center never did anything wrong.

And like the scam call that we got was just like this funny, weird mix-up. And anyway, like, it costings is shut down now, so don't even worry about it. So I asked Deepak, you know, like, what are you doing now that you've shut the call center down? Uh-huh. And he said, oh, I got, I'm in construction now. Right. So, we continue eating dinner. He's not hungry.

I don't know what to tell you, man. Damiano's too stressed to eat anything. First day in deli, my body is like freaking out. Reasonably. But they keep ordering stuff, and I'm not going to be rude, so I'm just like, ram, rah, rom, rom, chomping away. All right, I'll get some chicken ticket. Every time I thought this meal might finally be over,

Alex was like, I'll take some chicken teika. You want a spicy or little spicy? Let's try spicy. Meanwhile, my stomach is like fucking Cirque de Soleil. Let me tell you another reason why I was so nervous. Yes. At one point, Alex just tells them where we're staying. It tells them the name of our hotel, which is Haveli House.

Did you? Yes. Why? I don't know. So I suffer through the rest of this meal, and then we finally call it at night. All right. So, nice meeting you guys. I'll see you again.

Come all. I'll finally meet you. Yep. We'll talk to tomorrow. Just talk to you to come back. Let me know what's the plan for you guys. Good night, debunk. Good night, guys.

Weirdest two hours of my fucking life. Oh, my God. Oh. We leave, and then we go to bed. So the next day, Wednesday, primarily what we do is move hotels. Right. Thursday morning comes and we're honestly starting to panic a little bit because the clock is ticking. We have two days left in India and we've gotten nowhere with these guys.

And then in the early afternoon, my phone rings. Hey, Kamal. Hey, Alex. How are you? Good. What are you up to? So we can meet in one hour. In next one hour we can meet at Kamak place.

I'll message you the restaurant. Okay. Perfect. See again. Bye. So the first time we met with Kamal, we were totally caught off guard. because we did not expect Deepak to be there. Right.

And we also kind of wanted to feel them out a little bit before we started hitting them with tough questions. But this time, we were thinking, okay, we're going into this. We're going to be prepared. We're going to ask them really direct questions about accostings. So what you're describing is your plan was to interview him in the manner of a journalist. So the place that we're supposed to meet them is a bar called Tourist Lounge. We get there early.

Hi. We bribe the waiter to turn down the music in our section. Nice. We get our recorders out. Hi, my name is Damiana Marquetti. We test the sound. Check one, check two. And we're just like sitting there at the table ready for them when they show up.

And then... They're here? Deepak and Kamal arrive. And things immediately start going off the rails. It's clear that they know everybody in this bar. The waiter that I had bribed like snaps to attention. They say hi to the manager. How's your day?

Yeah, what are you guys been up to? Oh, I'm hectic. And once they see the microphone... Are you interviewing me? Yeah, I'm recording. Don't record anything. I'm not able to interview, okay? But I traveled halfway across the world to talk to you guys.

I have so many questions for you. After all I push and sit down and ask me anything, but don't record. It's not allowed. Why is it not allowed? It's not allowed to record anything. without my, you know? Well, I mean, I'm not hiding it from you. I'm talking to you right now.

I'm letting you know that I'm recording it. What are, sir? Deepak steps away from the table to talk to the waiter, and Kamal sits down. Come on, how are you doing, man? You're not here for the interview. Why are you asking this? Like, I just came because we are friends. I know, but, like, I mean, I'm not trying.

I'm just like, so, look, I mean, I have so many questions about accostings. You know, we are working on a story about it, and I think it would be worthwhile to have you guys talking. But we are not available for story. No, we are not available. I think... Come on, there is a story. The story is already happening.

What? The story is happening whether you want to or not. Then it's fine, no problem. Go ahead. But we are not going to say anything about all these things. We are just here for you, Alex, nothing else. It's not for this shit thing, okay? You understand?

I understand. Deepak keeps saying, why are you sticking this microphone in my face? Turn it off, turn it off right now. And then he waves, he sort of like waves the waiter over and the waiter kind of leans over our table. And he says, do you want me to call the authorities? Whoa. And we say, no, we don't want you to call the authorities.

You cannot insist us to say anything or you cannot? I'm not insisting anybody do anything. All right. We put the recorder away. No one says anything. Deepak is looking off to the side. He just pulls out of cigarette and starts to smoke. But like the waiter's still there?

Deepak is talking, keeps saying something in Hindi to the waiter. So I'm sitting there and I'm just like waiting for the cops to show up. Everything in my body is telling me like we need to get out of here. And then the waiter comes over and puts like a full bottle of whiskey on the table. Deepak pours himself a drink of whiskey. Like just whiskey? Whiskey and Coke, that's his drink. And drinks it.

And he pours himself another and drinks it. And he is pouring sweat. Every couple of minutes, he would take his napkin and just wipe his face down because he was sweating so badly. This is like a guy who feels cornered by us, I think. Yeah. And I asked Kamal about Alex Martin. I'm like, remember that first call that you had with us? And Kamal, he completely denies that he was ever Alex Martin.

And even more than that, he says he fired Alex Martin. He was like, that guy was a troublemaker who used to work for me. I fired him. And what Kamala is really saying is that, like, anything you think you know about me being Alex Martin or really anything, it's a lie. Period. And then he turns to Deepak. And they speak in Hindi for a second. Huh.

And then Deepak says, Alex Martin, fuck that guy. And then he pulls out his right hand. And his pinky sort of like gnarled. He's got like this bruise on it. He says, you know how I got this? This happened when I slap the shit out of that guy. Whoa. And so at that point, I was just like, I'm done with these guys.

Like, there is no reason for us to talk to them anymore. So me and Damiano left the bar and left Deepak and Kamal there. You're right? I have no words. This world is so insane. That night, I was having a very hard time sleeping. So in the middle of the night, I just picked up my phone and called. I didn't record it.

I just picked up my phone and called the call sender. And I was like, let me talk to Kamal and Deepak. And the person on the other end just kept saying to me, who are you? Who are you? What do you want from us? Who are you? Why do you want to talk to them? And I was like, but Kamal and Deepak do work there, right? And they're like, who are you? And I was like, it still exists. It has to still exist.

So Friday morning, we wake up and we're feeling at this point, confronting these guys isn't going to make any difference. If we want to get anywhere while we're here, the only thing we can do is find that call center. The only problem is we have no idea where it is, and we only have one day left in India. So we decided to find Acostings, but we had no idea where to start. So we went back to Punjabi Bagh, we went back to our Starbucks, and we met up with this reporter named Snigdapunum. Hey! How are you?

Good, how are you? It was actually someone that we had been in touch with before. We talked to her a lot while we were in the U.S. She works for the Hindu stand times, and she did sort of the defining gigantic feature story, Indian feature story about call center scams. She spent months running after these guys. We were always like showing up somewhere and figuring out that, thank you, that the place didn't exist there. And then we would like spend days finding out where the place actually was. Basically what she learned is that this is a problem of epidemic proportions.

There are call centers of maybe 10 to 15 people. There's call centers of like 400 to 500 people. And almost all of these tech support scams that hit the U.S. come from India, like close to 90%. And why can't they just arrest everybody? It's really hard for Indian authorities to stop these places because new ones are starting up every day. And as soon as you take one out, it'll pop up somewhere else under a different name. But Snigda has figured out a way to always find these call centers.

Which is what? Even scamy call centers post their job listings online. These people are desperate for employees all the time. So, like, they won't give you a fake address. Like, not if you were coming to interview. We should call, I should call accosting, saying that I have an appointment, and I can't find the address, and to give me the address.

Do you have the number? Hello. Hello, Pooja, I'm talking about you. Very quickly, she's like, yes, I speak English. And I've done some call center work. You know, I mean, I'm looking to work at a place like Acostings where there's more opportunities for growth and to further improve my communication skills. Today what time? 7 o'clock. Okay, I'll come, but can you send me the address, please?

Punjabi club road. Club Road? Why don't you just text me the entire address and I'll come to the building? Thanks. Thanks a lot. Okay. Bye. So what did she say?

She said to come for the interview immediately. Did she give you the address? No, she's going to text me the address. And maybe 15 minutes later, we get the address. What's the address? So, uh, it's one club road. Wait, but one club road was the meditation center. Yeah, that was One Club Road.

But this is One Club Road, plot number one, third floor, Punjabi Bog extension, New Delhi, opposite the 24-7 store and above Figuero Salon. Okay. So we go outside, we start wandering around. It's supposed to be on the other side of the street. Well, now we must have passed it, no? Snigda is asking people, like, Figaro Salon, Figurostalon. She's walking up in the middle of the street. She just walks in the middle of the street with such grace and dignity.

Confidence. Yeah. And I see Figuroselon. And then I realize, oh my God, I know where the call center is. You're not going to fucking believe this. It's the place right above headphones. Shut the fuck up. It's the place right above head.

Oh, my God. Acostings is above headphones, the bar that we visited the first day we were here. Whoa. So when they were going to chug it, it was in the building. Yes. So you guys were right beneath them. Yes. It's the place right above headphones.

It's been that, it's been right above it all. So crazy, Alex. We were there on the first day. So we're like, listen, we want to go up there and see if we can talk to anybody. And Snickda says it is probably not a great idea for two white guys with microphones to go blundering. into this call center that they've spent six months harassing. So look, why don't I go up there, do the job interview, and I will get a lay of the land and see if it's safe for you to go up there.

I've done this sort of interview like now, like 10 times. I just hope that really nothing goes wrong. But I can't think of any reason they would like suspect me of shady stuff. So Snigda says, if I'm not out in 10 minutes, call me. If I don't answer, call the police. Wow. So we post up across the street and Snigda heads into the building. I look at my phone at 7.02 p.m.

She needs to be out of accostings by 7.12. So we're kind of looking down at the entrance of headphones. How long has she been up there? I don't know. Oh. Nope, that's not her. Another woman. Come on, Snigda.

Call her. Call her, call her. Here she comes. Here she comes? Yeah. She comes across to us and we go back to our Starbucks to regroup. Okay. It's like a really weird. It's like no way to guess this structure.

Here. Snigda gets a napkin and she starts to draw a layout of the inside of Acostings. This is the staircase. First she says take the stairs to the third floor. There's a glass door and in front of that door is a security guard. This young guy who's just sitting there with a... with a notebook outside the doors. Once you go through that door,

the calling floor, the place where they're actually making the calls, is on your left. And how many people? She says well more than 40 people. Wow. So Snigda says there's these rows of desks. And there's this aisle,

and this, like, tall, muscular man stands here. Like, literally tall, muscular man stands here looking menacing to his left end, it's right. Just making sure that people are working, I guess. It was really weird, but you can see it through the door. What did he look like? Not like any of these stories.

He was a floor manager. So we want to go up there just to see if we can get into the call center, see if we can talk to anybody, basically how far we can get. But the problem is we obviously can't go in if Deepak and Kamal are there. Right, because we don't want to have a confrontation. We don't want to have a fight. So here's what we do. Hi, Kamal.

I call Kamal. Can we meet later this evening? And I make plans to meet up within way across town, like an hour from now. But we are going to go to the call center. You guys are finally getting some leverage on these guys. Okay, we'll call you. If we're not, if we don't call you and... I'll give you generals.

So at this point, the sun's gone down. Snigda leaves us across the street. Okay, crossing the streets. We go into the building. Stairs. We go up to the first. Here's floor. Here's Figaro's salon.

The second floor. Here's the soon-to-be opened headphones bar. Third floor. Okay, now we're approaching Costings. Walking up to Costings. So when we get to the front door of a Costings, there's nothing there. That's the road. That's it.

Knock. The gate is closed for some reason. There's a great pull down over the door. There's no security guard. There's an empty, like where she said there would be secure. Worse that there would be security, and the chair is empty. There's no marking saying that it's a costing. All that's there is a security camera.

Snigda was here 10 minutes ago, and now it's completely shut down. I think there's someone right behind the door. Hello? Padman from the outside is a big of you. So we're standing there waiting, occasionally knocking on the grate, but we're not getting any answer, and we just don't really have any idea what to do. Suddenly, we see Snigda coming up the stairs. We had forgotten to, like, take.

or call her or anything. And so she's super freaked out. She doesn't know what's going on. She's like coming to the building to see what the deal is. So we tell her the grate on the front door is closed. And Snake does seems really rattled, right? Yeah. So this is what happened, I think.

It's because like if that's how everyone thinks it's a domestic call center. They pull down the shutters and then they do their scam shift. So that they look like a closed business. This is like proper crime center. like proper crime setup. Snigda has found a million shady call centers before, and she says that even the sketchiest ones leave their door open to give it the patina of respectability.

Yeah. And the fact that Acostings has their door shut, and they're trying to look like they don't exist, is just very worrisome. These are bad dudes. And then she says basically, look, if you guys want to continue pursuing this, that's fine. but the fact that these people are hiding,

the fact that this call center even exists, makes them seem a lot more dangerous to me. It's up to you. But we are standing at the front door of the call center. We're not just going to walk away. So Snigda calls the woman who had originally given her the address, and the woman says, oh, if the front grade is closed,

just go upstairs with some security guards. They'll let you in. So Snigda leaves, and we go up to the roof. It's dark up on the roof. To the right of us, there's the shack, and there's two guys sitting under a light just a couple feet away. Excuse me, third floor? The gate is locked. Gate is locked.

Yeah. Yeah. And then one of the guys at the top of the stairs shouts at these two other guys that are on our left that we hadn't even seen. They're completely shrouded in darkness. Hey. Can you have? No. It's closed, no.

Close. It's closed? It's closed? So no one can open the door? I didn't know what he's seen. Huh. It looks like there's lights on in there. And the guy calls back over to the dudes that are in the shadows.

I don't know what those guys say, but this guy responds. He's like, it's closed. So we go back downstairs, but we feel like our time in this building is limited. We have just alerted Acosting security guards to the fact that we're trying to get into their company. But we want Kamal to know. that we were there. So I pull out my phone, I stand in front of a Costing's door, and I make a little video to send to him. Can I, can I have the, here.

Ox? Yeah. So that, that is, that's the door. The grate behind me is. You're wearing a hat and smirking before the video even starts. And there's like the, the, there's a little garland across the top, which is, it looks like Christmas lights. It's, um, it's actually, um, mango leaves.

mango leaves are like a traditional Hindu thing where you hang them above a door to ward off bad karma evil spirits Alex Goldman yeah Alex Goldman's basically American podcasters okay so this is what I said hey come all it's Alex um sorry I missed to you um I went to the call center to see if you were there so we could hang out but um maybe next time I guess uh I'll be in touch uh it's been fun hanging out this week I'll talk to you soon bye You rude little scamp. You're just smirking. So what happened?

So we go back downstairs. We meet up with Snigda at the Starbucks again. Yeah. And we haven't even sent Kamal this video yet. And... Hello? Hello? Hey, what's up?

And I get a call from Kamal. Interesting. And I assumed it was going to be like, hey, where are you guys? Let's meet it. What's a call, Barr? Yeah. What's going on? What can I do for you?

I thought the call center was closed down. Now tell me what you want. I thought the call center was closed down. You want to come to office again or what? I thought the call center was closed down. You've lied to me this whole time. Hardly matters. I lied to everyone.

Doesn't make any difference. You're not a god. What do you want? What next? What? I don't want to meet you right now. You guys know where I stand and you lie to me. So why should I meet you right now?

You're not going to tell me the truth. I'll come and see you in Haveli, okay? Just wait for me there. What? You're going to see me where? I'll see you in Haveli, okay? Which is the hotel where you told him you were saying. Yeah. And I said, you know what, go for it. Go to come to Haveli whenever you want.

But this sounds like a threat to me. Are you threatening me? Can you admit to me that you're a scammer, please? What do I want? I know everything I want. Listen to me. I know about Neha. I know about Usmahn.

I know about streetwise marketeer. I know about everything that has to do with your business. I know where your front door... I know where your front door is. I wanted to know who was the person who called me and tried to scam me, and I figured it out. And I... No, I don't know about him. Don't bullshit me, Kamal. It was accostings, and I know it was accostings.

So what? I want you to admit that you guys are scammers and that you steal money from people. No, that is not going to happen, don't worry. That is not going to happen. Then I think that we don't have anything else to talk about. Are you there? Let's get out of this neighborhood. Wow. He never called me again. So now we're going to the airport.

Your story is complete here? I think so. Yeah, I think it is. I think we're all done. Suppose we are reaching the airport. Do you feel like you guys got what you went there for? You know, this is sort of the reversal that I wanted to feel is this. I think that everyone, I think there's been a crazy uptick in fraudulent calls in the U.S. It's not even something that's really under discussion.

And it feels like a gamble anytime you pick up a number you don't recognize. It sucks. It's like a feeling that feels like it has no control. There's no control. And all I wanted was for once to express that, to like reverse that feeling, to make those people feel like, oh, they don't. know what's going to happen either. We're playing with a loaded gun if we call people. And I happen to be the bullet in that gun. A very sweaty, clumsy bullet. Shut the fuck up. That loves to eat delicious Indian food. I'm not going to say no to Indian food. Stays in a hotel and gives you the

address. And ultimately sends you a video of itself. That's the way it kills you. Reply All is hosted by PJ Vote and me, Alex Goldman. The show was produced this week by Shreuthy Pinnamini, Fia Benin, Damiano Marquetti, and Austin Mitchell. Our editor is Tim Howard. More editorial help this week from Jorge Just. Production assistance from Sharina Ong. This is Sharina's last week. She has been amazing.

Sharina, thank you for everything. We were mixed by Rick Kwan and Matthew Bull. Special thanks to Willard Foxton. Matt Lieber is a bonfire on a beach. Reply All is available on Spotify, so go check us out there. You can also listen to the show on Google Play. podcasts, or wherever you listen. And one more thing, don't ever let anybody remotely connect to your computer.

Just because I did it doesn't mean it's a good idea. We're going to be running some of your favorite episodes over the month of August, but we'll be back in September. Thanks for listening. You'll be hearing from us very soon. I know we should keep moving, but I'm having fun getting mono. Get it? Because, like, we can only hear one sound at a time on this planet.

Mono. It's a funny joke. Hey, you all right? Do you want to play another duet? Would you like to yell all your worries into the cold void of space while I play drum machine? Alright, give it here. Okay, trade me. In space without internet can't find our way home and even if we could might not go back because of trumpinous

and crap-de-mone. Crapnel bathe's even try to rhyme anymore. It's just five different courses over stock trapping. If I fast, I don't even bother us for a reason I'm as fumbles. Yeah. I feel better. This seems like a safe place to sleep. We can keep looking for internet in the morning.

Good night. Menu. Sleep mode. 6 hours. Good night.