That is a freaking riot of a story. Love it! I can just see those folks leaving the elevator.
You should have gotten off with them and watched their reactions.
Even weirder was that months later I heard an account of that incident mentioned on CNN. They said it was one way of dealing with unpleasant business encounters of the type that I faced. Okay, I'm not 100% sure they were referring to me but I did tell that account to quite a few people and it wouldn't surprise me if the story seeped up to a CNN reporter.
I originally got that garlic idea from an Armenian auto mechanic I knew. He ate some sort of Armenian breakfast everyday that included a lot of garlic. His breath was intolerable. I mean you just could not stand near him when he spoke. So I figured if just some garlic additive would have that effect, eating raw elephant garlic would be MUCH WORSE which it was.