Speaker 1: School of Humans. It was easier to deal with poverty
Speaker 1: and death in India than the lack of spirituality in America.
Speaker 1: This is a quote from Albanian Indian Roman Catholic nun
Speaker 1: and missionary mother Teresa, who spent most of her life
Speaker 1: in India. In this quote, she points out why many Americans,
Speaker 1: including myself, are drawn to India. It's deep religious roots
Speaker 1: and sacred rights and rituals give India a spiritual relevance
Speaker 1: that's lacking in the States, which, as an American, is
Speaker 1: the only Western experience I can speak to firsthand. Like
Speaker 1: I've said before, for spiritual seekers, India is what K
Speaker 1: two is for extreme mountaineers. It's a place people go
Speaker 1: when they want more spiritually, whether that's pushing some sort
Speaker 1: of edge or finding and connecting to a deeper part
Speaker 1: of themselves. It's the extreme. The disappearances covered in this
Speaker 1: podcast could have happened anywhere. People going missing is not
Speaker 1: an Eastern phenomenon. In America, and twenty twenty alone, five
Speaker 1: hundred forty three eighteen people went missing, according to the
Speaker 1: FBI's National Crime Information Center. So for me, it's not
Speaker 1: about sensationalizing India as a place where people vanish, but
Speaker 1: about examining stories allegedly tied to spiritual quests, so that
Speaker 1: these personal stories shed light on the thin line between
Speaker 1: healing and harm and spirituality, and more closely examine the
Speaker 1: cost of enlightenment. These are all stories I chose to
Speaker 1: live with for the past year because of my own
Speaker 1: connection and curiosity around this thin line. So I didn't
Speaker 1: choose India as a setting because I want to vilify it.
Speaker 1: I chose it because as a spiritual seeker, I revere it.
Speaker 1: In America, we don't possess India's spiritual depth and history,
Speaker 1: but there are parallels between the four point five trillion
Speaker 1: dollar New Age wellness spiritual industry in the States and
Speaker 1: the influence gurus in their empires hold in India, which,
Speaker 1: as we've reported, can be used to empower followers or
Speaker 1: abuse them, which in some cases also happens in the
Speaker 1: unregulated New Age wellness spiritual industry in the West. Matthew Remsky,
Speaker 1: a journalist who's podcasts Conspirituality, a weekly study on converging
Speaker 1: conspiracy theories with wellness utopianism, shared his thoughts on this
Speaker 1: parallel with me Fi. Matthew uses the term charismatic leader,
Speaker 1: which basically means someone or something like an organization that
Speaker 1: attracts attention due to their charisma. Charisma being a quality
Speaker 1: which sets an individual apart from the ordinary and endows
Speaker 1: them with supernatural, superhuman, or at least exceptional powers or qualities.
Speaker 1: In India, we have Ashram infrastructure and the capacity for
Speaker 1: charismatic leaders to appeal to mainstream versions of you know,
Speaker 1: existing institutional religions, so that can be very effective there.
Speaker 1: But if we take the same model or the same
Speaker 1: lens and look at organizations in North America, you know
Speaker 1: somebody like Tony Robbins. Tony Robbins is a motivational speaker
Speaker 1: and self help guru, though he has a documentary titled
Speaker 1: I Am Not Your Guru. As of twenty nineteen, Robbins
Speaker 1: had seven point nine million followers across his five main
Speaker 1: platforms and he allegedly makes nine million dollars a year
Speaker 1: from those platforms and his seminars. Tony Robbins operates a
Speaker 1: very charismatic organization and he's built an infrastructure to support it.
Speaker 1: Based upon you twenty or thirty years on the workshop circuit,
Speaker 1: there is an entire economic structure of content production that
Speaker 1: backs up the self improvement, personal development and New Age
Speaker 1: spheres that in a way is kind of its own
Speaker 1: religious architecture and its sacred sites are the Esselent Institute
Speaker 1: and the Omega Institute, and its publishing companies are Gaya
Speaker 1: TV or hay House. Esselent Institute and Omega Institute are
Speaker 1: nonprofit educational retreat centers focused on spirituality, consciousness, alternative medicine,
Speaker 1: and more. Gaya TV and hay House published content on
Speaker 1: these subjects. Now, it's a lot less old than the
Speaker 1: religious infrastructure that might be supporting charismatic groups in India,
Speaker 1: but it's no less powerful. The Guru empires of the
Speaker 1: East and the New Age wellness spiritual industry of the
Speaker 1: West are different in many ways, but they're similar in
Speaker 1: one significant way, and that's in the power they both we.
Speaker 1: But the East still has an infinite draw for spiritual
Speaker 1: seekers in the West, which is something Ankita, Gabby and
Speaker 1: I have become even more aware of after launching Astray.
Speaker 1: We're recording this podcast in real time, so as you listen,
Speaker 1: we read the reviews and it's had the effect i'd
Speaker 1: hoped it would. It's igniting conversation and has opened the
Speaker 1: door for people to reach out to me with more
Speaker 1: personal stories that help us further examine the cost of enlightenment.
Speaker 1: So a week ago I got an email from someone
Speaker 1: who'd heard the podcast, and the email they shared a
Speaker 1: story that sounded like the others we've reported on. So
Speaker 1: I knew I had to share it. But what I
Speaker 1: didn't know is how many questions Charlie Marinelli's story would
Speaker 1: ultimately answer. It's July twenty nineteen, and Charlie, an American
Speaker 1: born and raised in California, is ready for his solo
Speaker 1: trip to India. Hell he was born ready. He believes
Speaker 1: India is the next step for him as a seeker
Speaker 1: and explorer hungry for more answers, connection experiences. After backpacking
Speaker 1: through Thailand alone at eighteen, India feels like the optimal
Speaker 1: solo adventure for Charlie at twenty four, especially after hearing
Speaker 1: about his dad's epic travels there. But his dad, also
Speaker 1: named Charlie, warned him he has to keep his head
Speaker 1: on straight while he's in India. It's a different culture.
Speaker 1: The key, according to his dad, is to navigate India
Speaker 1: like bamboo, stay flexible, and go with the flow. His
Speaker 1: Dad says the real beauty of India is that it
Speaker 1: teaches you about patience and humanity. Charlie knows a little
Speaker 1: something about humanity. He was in Saint Croix at a
Speaker 1: plush job, living the life in the tropics with his
Speaker 1: fiance Michelle, when he got a call from his mom
Speaker 1: saying his grandfather at a stroke and was in hospice. Charlie,
Speaker 1: who was extremely close to his grandfather, was devastated. He
Speaker 1: flew home to be with him, and when he died.
Speaker 1: It shook Charlie, but it also awakened something in him.
Speaker 1: He won it out of his lucrative job, hitting the
Speaker 1: token life goals we're all told we should aspire to
Speaker 1: in the West. So he put in his two weeks,
Speaker 1: got a visa for India, and bought a one way
Speaker 1: ticket to Delhi. Charlie left Saint Croix with Michelle and
Speaker 1: moved back to California to prepare for his trip. He's
Speaker 1: obviously going to India for the experience, but he also
Speaker 1: believes the spiritual pulse of India will force him inward
Speaker 1: to more deeply understand who he is, why he's here,
Speaker 1: and why it all matters. The past four years he's
Speaker 1: used psychedelics to help with this. Charlie doesn't abuse these drugs.
Speaker 1: He sees them as a gateway to deeper self reflection,
Speaker 1: and he's considering going back to school to learn how
Speaker 1: to use psychedelics as a tool to heal and assist others.
Speaker 1: And India will give him space and time from friends
Speaker 1: and family to think about all of this on his own.
Speaker 1: Charlie has no itinerary for his trip to India. The
Speaker 1: only thing he's booked as a hostel in Delhi, so
Speaker 1: he's somewhere to sleep off his jet lag. And though
Speaker 1: his mom the Net is weary about him traveling alone
Speaker 1: with no plan, he did it before in Thailand, so
Speaker 1: she trusts this triple pan out the same way. On
Speaker 1: July ninth, twenty nineteen, Charlie lands in Delhi, and just
Speaker 1: as his dad said, as soon as the airport's glass
Speaker 1: doors slide open, it's chaos. Pungent smells, frenzied foot traffic,
Speaker 1: relentless car horns, taxi drivers yelling over each other at him.
Speaker 1: He navigates his way back to his hostel, but after
Speaker 1: a night in Delhi, decides to head to Bagsue, which
Speaker 1: is supposed to be paradise in the Himalayas. A twelve
Speaker 1: hour drive from Delhi on roads navigating steep cliffs, Bagsue
Speaker 1: is near Darmshala, where his Holiness, the Dali Lama has
Speaker 1: sought refuge for six decades. Unlike Delhi, Bagsue is quaint,
Speaker 1: with cobblestone streets, meandering cows, vendors selling chai, cafes and
Speaker 1: marketplaces with mountain view and because it's so far north,
Speaker 1: a mix if Tibetan an Indian residence. Bagsue is where
Speaker 1: Charlie finds community in India and the serenity and time
Speaker 1: to meditate, hike and explore sacred temples dotting the Himalayas.
Speaker 1: He also finds something in Bagsue. He didn't foresee a teacher,
Speaker 1: someone to take him to that next spiritual level, the edge,
Speaker 1: to find a deeper sense of self. But what Charlie
Speaker 1: didn't expect was that he would completely lose himself. If
Speaker 1: there was anything that could make me absolutely break in life,
Speaker 1: it was that I was on the verge of collapsing.
Speaker 1: It was terrifying oof it was a challenging time. These
Speaker 1: are Charlie's parents, Nanette and Charlie. I'll call Charlie's dad,
Speaker 1: Charlie Senior, for Clarity's sake. They're not married anymore. They
Speaker 1: got divorced when Charlie was young. Charlie Senior lives in
Speaker 1: Bali and the NEETs in California. He heard me talk
Speaker 1: about India, and I think that it was the next
Speaker 1: step for him to go challenge himself. I don't know
Speaker 1: if you can learn it if you don't put yourself
Speaker 1: in those positions that are going to test your edges.
Speaker 1: India is a beautiful place to learn this. You're not
Speaker 1: going to learn that in Suburbia America. I was less
Speaker 1: nervous this time because he had done the Thailand trip.
Speaker 1: He could do it, he knew what he was doing.
Speaker 1: I still, you know, took photos of all of his
Speaker 1: credit cards, front and back, his passport, his ID, and
Speaker 1: you wanted him to stay in contact with me. I
Speaker 1: would have preferred that he went with somebody else. But
Speaker 1: I did tell him because he does smoke marijuana and
Speaker 1: I knew that, and I said, you're going to India.
Speaker 1: There's no tolerance there. Do not do not, do not
Speaker 1: do drugs in that country. You can go to prison.
Speaker 1: It is not like America and That's how I left
Speaker 1: him at the airport. They gave him a huge hug
Speaker 1: and I kind of broke down and said, whatever you do,
Speaker 1: do not mess around in that country. Understand their laws
Speaker 1: and take it seriously. So as you can tell, Nanat
Speaker 1: and Charlie Senior had very different expectations for charlie solo
Speaker 1: trip and what he should be prepared for in India.
Speaker 1: Charlie Senior, who had traveled to India, wanted a son
Speaker 1: to have a memorable experience like he did and find
Speaker 1: that edge he was looking for. Nana just wanted her
Speaker 1: son to play it safe in a country halfway around
Speaker 1: the world that doesn't play by the same rules as
Speaker 1: the States. But less than two months later, these two
Speaker 1: were jolted in sync when they realized, in separate houses
Speaker 1: and on separate FaceTime calls with Charlie that something wasn't
Speaker 1: right with their son. I was immediately just shocked at
Speaker 1: what I saw. It wasn't him. It was out of character.
Speaker 1: As I said, He's pushed the edges in other ways
Speaker 1: in the past before and never went to this edge.
Speaker 1: Charlie had hit the edge of something, but it was
Speaker 1: an edge he might not come back from. Most of
Speaker 1: Charlie's time in Bagsue was spent meditating, exploring the Himalayas,
Speaker 1: smoking chill him, and connecting and learning from others who
Speaker 1: spoke a similar with spiritual language to him. But there
Speaker 1: was a turning point in Charlie's trip where things got
Speaker 1: scary for his parents, Nanett and Charlie Sior, and it
Speaker 1: was unclear if their son was feeling the same way.
Speaker 1: When I first realized that Charlie was in trouble, he
Speaker 1: fell out of contact with me for about four or
Speaker 1: five days. And he used to talk to me every day, always, always,
Speaker 1: no matter where he was, he'd call me once a day,
Speaker 1: just checking in hello. But I didn't talk to him
Speaker 1: for about four or five days, and that worried me
Speaker 1: a little bit. So I started sending him text. Just
Speaker 1: send me a quick text. Are you okay? Is everything good?
Speaker 1: He didn't reply for a little while. Then he finally
Speaker 1: did reply and he said, I'm fine. I just want
Speaker 1: to let you know that I'm not going to have
Speaker 1: my cell phone on me for a while. And I said,
Speaker 1: well why not? And he said, because I found my
Speaker 1: teacher and Bob a Gee will be the person that
Speaker 1: will contact you. Once in a while to let me
Speaker 1: know how I am. And I said, Bob a g
Speaker 1: is going to contact me. I said, and why can't
Speaker 1: you have your phone? He said, Mom, because I'm going
Speaker 1: through this process and I can't talk to any family
Speaker 1: or friends. I can't have any contact with them. And
Speaker 1: I said, well that doesn't sound right. Anybody who wants
Speaker 1: to keep contact keep you away from your family and
Speaker 1: friends is up to no good because they don't want
Speaker 1: you to have anybody referencing and saying is that right?
Speaker 1: Or why are you doing that? So I was pretty
Speaker 1: worried about that, and I said, well, how long is
Speaker 1: this going to be? And he said maybe a couple
Speaker 1: of years. I said, are you kidding me? I'm not
Speaker 1: going to have contact with you for a couple of years.
Speaker 1: I said, what about Michelle, Oh, she's coming with me.
Speaker 1: Nanette reached out to Charlie's fiance Michelle, who was in
Speaker 1: Hawaii at the time, and she said she had no
Speaker 1: plans of going to India, but she'd also noticed that
Speaker 1: something was off with Charlie and who was this Baba Gee.
Speaker 1: Charlie Senior has spent time with Bob as in India, who,
Speaker 1: as you know, are also called sadu's. He had met
Speaker 1: the ones that were the real deal, who transcend the
Speaker 1: material world with the wisdom and spiritual insights they teach followers,
Speaker 1: but he'd also run into what he calls bogey yogie
Speaker 1: or fake baba's. The challenges is, if you're a little
Speaker 1: bit vulnerable, you can end up with these babas. And
Speaker 1: I think that my son, he's a good person and
Speaker 1: he tends to be trusting, and that can get people
Speaker 1: in trouble. Charlie Senior knew his son was in trouble
Speaker 1: when he got a call from Michelle saying that something
Speaker 1: was definitely wrong with Charlie and he had to get
Speaker 1: a hold of him. Now. I got him on on
Speaker 1: a video call and I went, oh, this isn't Charlie.
Speaker 1: Something's going on. He had something wrapped around his head
Speaker 1: and he had no shirt on, and he was in
Speaker 1: a cafe. And Dad looked at my new house. I
Speaker 1: just this is where I live. And look at the
Speaker 1: paintings on the wall and look at the whatever, and
Speaker 1: I went, oh. Nanette also had a bizarre FaceTime call
Speaker 1: with Charlie, but on her call, Charlie wasn't alone. There
Speaker 1: was someone else listening in. The next time I talked
Speaker 1: to him, he facetimed me, and I was immediately just
Speaker 1: shocked at what I saw. He was in the dark,
Speaker 1: he had huge earrings on, a shawl wrapped around him,
Speaker 1: and he just looked gaunt. He looked hollow in his eyes.
Speaker 1: He looked so thin, he looked like he was starving.
Speaker 1: He just looked so unhealthy. And he said, Mom, I
Speaker 1: want you to charter a plane and get to Hawaii.
Speaker 1: I'm like, what are you talking about? And I knew
Speaker 1: him and his fiance I wanted to get married in Hawaii.
Speaker 1: I said, did you guys make a date? Are you
Speaker 1: getting married? And he goes, no, you'll see you'll see
Speaker 1: charter a plane and bring the whole family. I said,
Speaker 1: charter a plane. He goes, Mom, quit your job. You
Speaker 1: don't have to work anymore. And I said, Charlie, you're
Speaker 1: losing it. I don't even know what you're saying it
Speaker 1: and I was just talking about did you win the
Speaker 1: lottery or something? What's going on. He goes, well, it's
Speaker 1: something like that. And he kept looking up in the
Speaker 1: corner someplace at somebody. His eyes kept averting and he
Speaker 1: would make a little nod, and I said, who are
Speaker 1: you looking at? And he goes, nobody, nobody, it's nothing,
Speaker 1: and he just keep looking up like somebody was directing him.
Speaker 1: In a text exchange with Charlie that followed the initial
Speaker 1: call they had about the Baba, Nanat asked what Charlie
Speaker 1: was studying with him. Charlie responded, I don't know, spiritual things.
Speaker 1: This response sounds eerily similar to the other stories we've
Speaker 1: shared of men who had cryptic sign offs before disappearing.
Speaker 1: But at this point, Nanette, who was still on FaceTime
Speaker 1: with Charlie, had eyes on her son and I said, Charlie,
Speaker 1: why are you wearing this shawl all around you? You
Speaker 1: look strange to me? And he said because it's getting
Speaker 1: cold and the Himalayas, mom, it's cold. And I said okay.
Speaker 1: And with the earrings, he goes, do you like that?
Speaker 1: I did it myself. I said, I don't know. That's unusual.
Speaker 1: It doesn't look like you. So he said, So here's
Speaker 1: what I want to do is I'm going to send
Speaker 1: you some money. I'm going to send it to Andrew's bank,
Speaker 1: Andrews's brother, my other son, and I want you to
Speaker 1: charter plan and just get over to Hawaii. And I said, Charlie,
Speaker 1: you're not making any sense to me. Just hold on
Speaker 1: just a moment. So I went in my daughter's room.
Speaker 1: I wanted to verify am I hearing this correctly? What
Speaker 1: he's saying to me? That he's this off? And so
Speaker 1: she verified the same thing. And then my son Andrew
Speaker 1: came in the room and he looked at him and
Speaker 1: he said, Mom, there's something wrong. He's on drugs. So
Speaker 1: then of course my alert goes into, you know, high
Speaker 1: gear as a mom. You know, hey, who is he
Speaker 1: looking at. He's in the dark, he's on drug someplace.
Speaker 1: While my other kids were talking to him on FaceTime,
Speaker 1: I called his fiance really quick and I said, have
Speaker 1: you talked to Charlie lately? And she said, yeah, I
Speaker 1: talked to him last night. And I said, how did
Speaker 1: he sound to you? And she said, he told me
Speaker 1: that he was scared and he thought somebody was drugging
Speaker 1: him and he didn't know how to get out of there.
Speaker 1: So I went back and I wanted to get on
Speaker 1: the phone with him, and he said and then he
Speaker 1: was walking someplace in the dark. He had no shoes on.
Speaker 1: I said, Charlie, where are you going. I said, I'm
Speaker 1: going to go get on a bus and I'm going
Speaker 1: to get out of here. And I said what bus?
Speaker 1: He goes, Mom, don't worry about it. I'm gonna get
Speaker 1: on a bus. And my phone's about to die. And
Speaker 1: his phone died, and then I was unable to get
Speaker 1: a hold of him. Ninette knew she had to act fast,
Speaker 1: so I called the embassy right away and I said,
Speaker 1: you know, this is the situation, and explained exactly what happened,
Speaker 1: and they said, get on a plane as fast as
Speaker 1: you can and get to India. When Ninette and Charlie
Speaker 1: Senior realized something was off with their son and he
Speaker 1: might be an immediate danger, they wanted to rescue Mode.
Speaker 1: I immediately found I stoked his friends on Facebook, or
Speaker 1: I think I found someone on Instagram who I had
Speaker 1: seen in a picture or one of his friends he
Speaker 1: mentioned or something. And I got this guy and I went,
Speaker 1: you got to go back up to Bagsue. You got
Speaker 1: to go back up there, and you got to go
Speaker 1: get Charlie. He's in a bad state. This friend in
Speaker 1: the picture was Rennick, who Charlie had met in Delhi
Speaker 1: when he first landed in India and he's like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: you know, I don't know if I get up there,
Speaker 1: and I don't have money in this and that. So
Speaker 1: Guy Western unioned him some money and had him go
Speaker 1: back up there. Having Rennick tracked down Charlie and Bagsue
Speaker 1: was the first step. The next step was for Nanette
Speaker 1: and Charlie Senior to get to India and fast. We
Speaker 1: both applied for visas and we got him really quick.
Speaker 1: We got them the next morning. I don't know, if
Speaker 1: you know, somebody at the embassy made a phone call.
Speaker 1: I don't know, but we got really lucky. We got
Speaker 1: them fast. The embassy got in contact with the local
Speaker 1: police and they gave all of Charlie's information and she
Speaker 1: said they're going to be looking for him, and that's it.
Speaker 1: We packed a bag and got on a plane. While
Speaker 1: in the Neet and Charlie Senior were on their seventeen
Speaker 1: hour flight to India. Rennick was navigating the winding twelve
Speaker 1: hour route from Delhi to Bagsue. By the time we
Speaker 1: were in our layover in Istanbul, I got a phone
Speaker 1: call from Rennick and also from the embassy that the
Speaker 1: police had found him, but they let him go. They
Speaker 1: said he's fine, and I said, he's not fine. They
Speaker 1: don't know him. So however he was talking, they might
Speaker 1: have interpreted as he's okay, but I'm telling you that
Speaker 1: he's not okay. He's in some sort of psychotic state.
Speaker 1: So she called the police back and you put them
Speaker 1: back on the alert to go find him again. And
Speaker 1: Rennick got up there to the cafes and he found Charlie.
Speaker 1: The police asked Rennick to come to the police station
Speaker 1: and sign off a piece of paper that says I've
Speaker 1: got Charlie, I'm in charge of him. Rennick went and
Speaker 1: did that, but by the time he got back up
Speaker 1: to the cafe, Charlie was gone. Charlie performed a vanishing act,
Speaker 1: and it wasn't the last time he was following him,
Speaker 1: and what all of a sudden, Charlie would disappear. He
Speaker 1: would be on the phone with me, I'm like, you
Speaker 1: got eyes on him, and all of a sudden, he's like,
Speaker 1: you're not gonna believe it. He just disappeared. I don't
Speaker 1: know where he went. So after a couple of incidents,
Speaker 1: for Nick would find Charlie and Charlie would suddenly just disappear.
Speaker 1: There came a point where Rennick couldn't find Charlie at all,
Speaker 1: so Charlie went missing. Rennick started the search party and
Speaker 1: got everybody to go looking for him. Finally, some tourists
Speaker 1: found him and they said he looked really confused. So
Speaker 1: I said, Rennick, get him to a hospital. Take him
Speaker 1: to a hospital. Just do what you gotta do to
Speaker 1: get him to a hospital. Whatever you have to do.
Speaker 1: I'll make it up to you. Just please get him
Speaker 1: to a hospital. But Charlie didn't want to go anywhere.
Speaker 1: He was acting erratic and was unstable. Eventually, Rennick was
Speaker 1: able to force Charlie into a car with the help
Speaker 1: of Indian police that were sent by the US embassy.
Speaker 1: He sent me a picture of them in the car
Speaker 1: with Charlie in the middle, and they had two guys
Speaker 1: on the side because I guess apparently he tried to
Speaker 1: escape out of the car again, so they blocked him
Speaker 1: in the car. First hospital they got to, I think
Speaker 1: they were full. They couldn't take him. They went to
Speaker 1: a second hospital. They wouldn't take anybody with any type
Speaker 1: of psychiatric events happening. So they got to a hospital
Speaker 1: in Darmschala. Charlie was refusing to go in at that point.
Speaker 1: He wouldn't go into the hospital. So Rennick facetimed me
Speaker 1: and he said, can you talk to him? He looked
Speaker 1: nothing like himself. He was so thin, He looked like
Speaker 1: he was starving. He had two holes in his hands
Speaker 1: and he held them up seeing and he said, do
Speaker 1: you know what that means? I said, no, Charlie, what
Speaker 1: happened to you? He said, Mom, I don't need water
Speaker 1: or medicine or food. Do you know what this means?
Speaker 1: And he kept pointing to the palms of his hands.
Speaker 1: There were holes and both the palms of Charlie's hands.
Speaker 1: Nanette couldn't tell from FaceTime if these were actual puncture wounds,
Speaker 1: or if he had burnt something into his hand, or
Speaker 1: if it was just ash, but she did know what
Speaker 1: Charlie meant by it. He thought he was the Messiah Jesus,
Speaker 1: the chosen One that didn't need anything in the world
Speaker 1: to survive because he wasn't of this world. He believed
Speaker 1: he had transcended. Journalist Jessica Ravitt spoke about Jerusalem syndrome
Speaker 1: in episode one, which is defined as a psychosis where
Speaker 1: people become so overwhelmed by the Holy City of Jerusalem,
Speaker 1: that they believed they're the Messiah. I had put this
Speaker 1: in the same category as India syndrome, something to debunk.
Speaker 1: But Charlie's behavior is proof that people can arrive at
Speaker 1: a state where they believe they're the Messiah. I asked
Speaker 1: his parents if he had exhibited this sort of behavior before.
Speaker 1: He never had those tendencies. He had been on other
Speaker 1: journeys before. He had pushed the envelope in the name
Speaker 1: of self discovery and really taking it on a journey
Speaker 1: that never happened to him before. So my only conclusion
Speaker 1: was somebody drugged him. I think somebody kept him on
Speaker 1: some think for a long period of time, good intentions
Speaker 1: or bad intentions. I have no idea, but they want
Speaker 1: a stray. That's what happened. When Charlie Senior references Charlie's
Speaker 1: other journeys, he means psychedelic journeys that at the longest
Speaker 1: would last twelve hours tops, not two weeks like the
Speaker 1: psychotic state his son was in. Now standing with Rennick
Speaker 1: outside a hospital in Darmshalla, refusing to go in. So
Speaker 1: he said, no, Mom, I'm fine, I'm not going into
Speaker 1: any hospital. And he saw me cry. And then the
Speaker 1: phone went dead and then Rennick called me back and
Speaker 1: he said, ma'am, I have to let him go. He
Speaker 1: just hit me in the face. And Charlie's not violent.
Speaker 1: I've never seen Charlie hit anybody in his life. Never.
Speaker 1: And I said, Rennick, why did he hit you? And
Speaker 1: he said because he said, I made you cry. So
Speaker 1: I said, Rennick, you have to get him into the hospital.
Speaker 1: He said, ma'am, I can't do what people are looking
Speaker 1: at me. You can't do this. He's white, we're Indian,
Speaker 1: we're so round. There's people around, there's police officers here.
Speaker 1: I said, ask them to put some handcuffs on him,
Speaker 1: even if it's against his will, and get him into
Speaker 1: a hospital, please. And he said, it doesn't work like
Speaker 1: that here. You can't do that. If somebody doesn't want
Speaker 1: to go to a hospital. In India, you can't force
Speaker 1: him to go to a hospital. And I said, Rennick,
Speaker 1: if you let him go, I'm never going to see
Speaker 1: him again. Hey, Charlie, can you hear me? Can you
Speaker 1: hear me? Yeah? I can into Southern room. My service
Speaker 1: isn't the best in my apartment, Okay, I'm just like nearing. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is Charlie Marinelli, Nanette and Charlie Senior did see
Speaker 1: him again, though at times it took force, antipsychotics and
Speaker 1: a lot of patients to get them home. They know
Speaker 1: they're the lucky ones they found their son and are
Speaker 1: eternally grateful to the generous community of doctors at East
Speaker 1: West Medical Center in New Delhi for helping Charlie get
Speaker 1: to a state where you could function enough to get
Speaker 1: onto a plane back to the States. Charlie is the
Speaker 1: one who wrote me that email saying you'd heard the
Speaker 1: podcast and the stories we covered were so similar to
Speaker 1: his own that at one point he thought I was
Speaker 1: talking about him, and I went and listened to it,
Speaker 1: and it was even more weird because up until now
Speaker 1: is like I'm working with an alternative therapist, like psychedelic
Speaker 1: therapy and stuff like that, and I mean, they never
Speaker 1: brought up the term India syndrome. They've never brought anything
Speaker 1: around that up. So like hearing that parallel story, he's
Speaker 1: speaking about Ryan Chambers story that we shared in episodes
Speaker 1: one and two. Charlie related to Ryan's story. There are
Speaker 1: some parallels with his own. But however, I came back
Speaker 1: it was really really intense. What I've realized from doing
Speaker 1: this podcast and speaking to experts, specifically doctor Rochett, who
Speaker 1: was an episode two, is that the labeling of it
Speaker 1: as India syndrome is wrong, but the psychosis is real.
Speaker 1: What happens to people, Oh yeah, it's very, very real.
Speaker 1: So so we'll hear about how real it is on
Speaker 1: the next episode of Astray. Astray is a production of
Speaker 1: School of Humans and iHeartRadio. Today's episode of Astray, Charlie Marinelli,
Speaker 1: was produced, written, and narrated by me. Caroline Slaughter and
Speaker 1: Kita Nanda is my co producer, and Gaby Wants is
Speaker 1: our supervising producer. Astray was sound produced by Tune Welders,
Speaker 1: with score and sound designed by Jason Shannon and mixed
Speaker 1: by HARPERA. Harris. Executive producers are Brian Lavin, Elsie Crowley,
Speaker 1: and Brandon Barr. Thanks for listening School of Humans.