Mumbai: Indian-American comedian Zarna Garg went to a Herm\u00e8s store in Berlin this week, and ended up spending nearly as much time trying to leave its bathroom as one might expect to spend securing one of the luxury brand\u2019s famously elusive handbags.<\/p>\n
Garg, a Mumbai-raised comedian now based in New York, who is in Berlin for her Million Dollar Excuses comedy tour, said she was trapped inside the store\u2019s bathroom for about an hour and 20 minutes after its sliding door refused to open. Her team and her children documented the episode while they waited on the other side, which was later posted as an Instagram Reel on 20 August.<\/p>\n
She is a former lawyer who turned to stand-up in her 40s. Her comedy frequently draws on Indian families, immigration, marriage, and motherhood, and her 2025 memoir This American Woman became a New York Times bestseller.<\/p>\n
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Locked in the bathroom, Garg initially did what a stand-up comedian might be expected to do: turning the predicament into content. Garg joked from inside the bathroom, played with paper towels, and even fashioned them into an origami.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe started recording thinking we\u2019ll make a funny video about what you can do when locked in a bathroom. I made an origami village of paper towels and played games like guess how many towels I\u2019m holding,\u201d she wrote on Instagram.<\/p>\n
In the video, after being stuck for more than 20 minutes, she remarked on the irony of it happening at the store of a brand so particular about perfection.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is so funny that a place that is so persnickety about perfection, this is happening there,\u201d Garg said, as she sat inside waiting for the door to be opened.<\/p>\n
The humour, however, began to wear thin as the wait stretched past an hour.<\/p>\n
According to Garg, her team asked store managers to call the fire department when attempts to open the door failed, but the staff initially resisted because they wanted to protect the door. Garg said she was eventually asked to push it from inside as those outside worked on it with a crowbar. Firefighters ultimately helped free her.<\/p>\n
When the door finally opened, Garg appeared visibly shaken. \u201cThank God there was no fire,\u201d she said in the video as her daughter Zoya consoled her.<\/p>\n