Zombie thought to really be dead

After attending a Halloween party in Hamburg, Germany, a 26-year-old drunken man dressed as a zombie passed out on the train home. Passengers thought he was dead and called police. Apparently, Halloween costumes aren't a common sight in the town he was passing thorough. From Reuters:

A first aid team called to the scene soon cleared up the confusion. Police told the man to remove his make-up after which he was allowed to continue his journey.

Link (via Fortean Times)

• [Big Blue Monkey]

  This has perhaps been covered somewhere else in the history of Boing Boing, but I saw a piece on PBS last night about a man who appeared to be a real life zombie. Fun moment from the PBS special: They had the documents at the hospital where the zombie Clairvius checked in. They said, “patient complains of being a zombie. Also, check for hernia.”

  Zombie-Hernias got to hurt.

  Here’s Time Magazine on the event:

  “On a brilliant day in the spring of 1980, a stranger arrived at L’Estère marketplace in Haiti’s fertile Artibonite Valley. The man’s gait was heavy, his eyes vacant. The peasants watched fearfully as he approached a local woman named Angelina Narcisse. She listened as he introduced himself, then screamed in horror—and recognition. The man had given the boyhood nickname of her deceased brother Clairvius Narcisse, a name that was known only to family members and had not been used since his funeral in 1962.”

  link: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,952208-1,00.html

• [Fnarf]

  I’m wondering what would happen in the opposite situation — Halloween reveler has heart attack on train and actually dies, in a city where Halloween costumes are common. How long before they discover him? What are the reactions when they find out the cartoon-dead-looking guy really is dead?

• [raisedbywolves]

  hah! That’s hilarious.

  And yep, Halloween costumes are sadly not yet a normal sight here in Hamburg. But we’re working on it.

• [xopl]

  FNARF… there were two girls laying “dead” on the floor in the Mall of America as a psychology experiement. Not sure when/if they’ll publish, but plenty of people stopped to check on them. I realise it wasn’t exactly in a Halloween setting.

  Also, funny enough, I was sitting on my friend’s porch after the Minneapolis Zombie Pub Crawl covered in fake blood. The landlord comes out, sees me, asks if I’m ok… says he doesn’t believe me when I say I’m fine and waiting for my friend. It didn’t even occur to me that somebody unaware of the Zombie Pub Crawl mind fight a blood soaked person a bit odd. Still… he never called the cops.

• [May]

  he plays dead, it stops the train. ha ha.

• [Anonymous]

  The better story is when he gets buried alive and digs out of the grave to seek vengeance on those who left him for dead.