The Blame Game

I´m sitting at the airport in Brussels waiting for my flight back to Chennai after veeery busy 5 days in Berlin (hence no update) but now looks like a good time to do a quick follow up on my last blog post.

Ever since I wrote my piece there have been press releases (from both sides), SRK sort of apologised to his German audience through a special video message and the German fans are ripping each other apart on account of who the truer fans are. Those who are pissed at SRK/his management for their share of the messing up but still love him as an actor/posterboy or those who already forgave and forgot everything, deeming SRK and "his people" the victims of the whole drama.















I am still standing by any word I wrote. Just in case you´re wondering. And I of course will go on watching any Indian film I can in cinemas or buy the (original) DVD´s of the ones I can´t and that look promising to me.

oops, they did it again or how to ruin a pretty well-doing market

SRK´s Temptation 2008 concerts in Germany have been canceled today. Three days before their scheduled dates. Back in August the German stop of the Bachchans Unforgettable Tour met the same fate. They informed their audience 4 days in advance about the adjourment sine die.

The big honchos in Mumbai seem to have got something wrong. Ever since the Johars and YashRaj started to make their profitable deals with REM and RTL2 the German market seemed to look like fat firang tourist in Chor Bazar to the Filmi Industry-walas that could easily be skinned for money.
Except, if you trick somebody and want to keep on milking him, don´t become too greedy. You can only screw us so far. To steal a line from K3G: Tum sirf entertainer ho, parameshwar nahin. For us Non-Desi Europeans you just produce films we like (sometimes very very much) with stars we like (and sometimes honestly love) but you can´t do whatever you like and not pay a price for it.

Take the DVD market for example.
Primary rule: If you want to sell films in Germany you have to dub them. Cinema in Germany has been German-dialogues-only ever since the first talkie in the 1920ies. Same goes for the Video and DVD market. Thankfully there are companies like REM who cater to a niche audience with high quality releases. Due to their cooperation with the RTL2 TV station they were able to produce top standard Bollywood DVD´s that sold fantasticly.

Enter greedy Bollywoodproducers. And swamp the market with C-grade movies, flop-films and bad quality production. That in itself would not be such a problem had they not tried to go the tourist-gouging routine. Even the King Khan has made some really really bad movies over the years. Sell them to the unsuspecting K3G, DDLJ or KHNH fan and you get somebody who will think twice if he will ever again spend 18,- to 24,- Euro on a BW DVD.
Mistake born out of greed #2: Quite a few of those crappy DVD´s had SRK (the only BW actor that really sells in Germany) on their cover. Even without him being in it. Instead customers got such shiny moments of Indian movie history like Hottestm@ail.com or Husn Bewafa.
Is it any wonder that sales of Bollywood DVD dropped like the stock market during the last weeks? Two years ago you had entire sections in DVD stores dedicated to Indian films. Now you can be lucky if you get a tiny part on the "B" shelf.

Then the TV ratings started to drop as well. Films were edited beyond recognition. And the big selling K3G-style extravaganzas were a thing of the past too. You just can´t expect films like D:2 or Krrish to work for an audience that is used to watch Hollywood quality action or SciFi films. Sorry. But, no.

Thank god the Berlinale 08 happened. SRK and OSO came, saw and conquered. The hard-core fans, still loyal and actually pretty active in promoting the thing they love, stroke up a frenzy. SRK made the evening news. And the German fans were led to believe that the slump that hit the Bollywood Trend in Germany was finally over. Especially since some of the Multiplex chains started to screen current films and both the Unforgettable and the Temptation Tours were announcing shows in Germany.

Bollywood Concerts and Germany do have a rather shaky past.
The local promoters like SensAsian are, lets be frank, crooks. Plain and simple. They talk, they announce, they sell tickets and they mess up, go into hiding, take the money with them and piss of the fans. Just look at SA´s track record. Apart from the very first "Dinner with SRK" in Offenbach in 2005 everything else was either canceled or had to be cut short.

And now we have the latest of their disasters and this time it is not simply Shilpa Shetty´s Miss Bollywood or the Bachchans (which both probably got canceled due to bad pre-sales). This time it really hits hard. This time it is SRK. I know of more than a few cases of Fans who literally had to scrimp and save to be able to afford a once-in-a-lifetime journey to one of the concerts. So this time it is personal. And that is bad news.

First they demand outrageous sums for - lets be honest - a tacky playback show and the fans pay it. And now the fans already sitting on their packed suitcases have to hope and pray that they get their 50,- to 250,- Euros back. And I am not even talking about the hundreds of fans that will surely loose money because their plane tickets or hotel reservations can´t be canceled.

(You want numbers? Lets take this very dear friend of mine. She shelled out 150,- for the ticket, 100,- for the airfare, the hotel for two nights would have cost her another 100,- add to that food, public transport and maybe some merchandise and you have at least 400,- . A sum that she was willing to spend on "her" SRK. She earns about 900,- each month. After deducting her fixed costs she has about 300,- for food, petrol etc. Do the maths!)

So, Yo! Greedy Bollywoodproducers and greedy Bollywoodstars!
If you want to save what is left of your start rebuilding some credibility in Germany to maybe have some kind of a future here: Don´t do deals with promoters you know have let you down in the past or distributors that do more damage than good. That can´t be too hard, can it?

There is that (very crass but nonetheless true) saying "don´t crap where you eat". And eating you seemed to do just fine in Germany for the last few years. But by crapping on our heads once too often I feel that you finally crossed the limit of our hospitality.


EDIT 16/10/08: Thanx to the great feedback to my rambling. To answer a few questions I was asked a few times. Yes, please copy the text if you want to (just give me credits for it) and no, I don´t have a German version of it, sorry. And since I am at a business convention for the next 3 days I won´t have the time to translate it either.

Kidnap. Meh.

I find it so hard to write about movies I feel indifferent to. I really wanted to love this one. I am a Sanjay Fangirl. I really like Minissha Lamba and I was very curious about Imran Khan (No, I haven´t been be able to watch JTYJN yet. I won´t until the DVD comes out).

But what is there to say when a movie just leave you "meh"?
Let´s try it that way:

What I liked.
- Most of the Action (except for Sanjays running. They should not let him run in the bad shape he was in while they were shooting the film)
- The twists in the story. Well, most of them.
- Imran.
- Minissha when she was allowed to do more than just being eyecandy/mannequin for skimpy clothes.
- Sanjay when he didn´t run.













What I didn´t like.
- Vidya Malvade. Autch. Too young. Too single-faced. Too awful.
- Sanjay when he ran.
- Minissha when she tried to be supersexy.
- The songs. Bleh. The opening song? Just wrong. The wedding anniversary song? Bollywood Fugly. The Item song? How very uninteresting. The lets-seduce-my-kidnapper song? Well, that was kinda sexy. But. How stupid can you be?













All characters and their story left me emotionally cold. I just couldn´t have cared less about anyone on screen. But then again. Sanjay Gadhvi is responsible for Dhoom and D:2. So what was I expecting?


All pics copyright to Shree Ashtavinayak Cine Vision Ltd.

Rock On!! - Pleasant Surprise

I feel a little weary whenever I go to watch a movie that deals with music, musicians or sound engineering. The same way I guess Doctors feel about any movie that has medicine as a topic or Cops with policework on screen.

Way too often you get actors that bearly manage to hold a guitar the right way (KKHH anyone?) Watching a recording session usually makes me cringe the way any medical staff does when encountering the ominous lonesome blood-bottle indicating a serious medical condition on the screen (actually for that matter - again KKHH anyone?).

Hats off to the makers of Rock On. They - almost - got it right. Whats even more. I don´t think anyone who never had any dealings with garage bands and the decisions everyone connected in whatever way to a band faces when its on the verge of success can appreciate that movie the way I did.
















I had so many deja vu moments there. I know, met and worked with a lot of Joes, Aditiyas and KDs. Hell, I am married to one for that matter. So please don´t expect me to write an unbiased review. Still I´d like to give you some of my thoughts on it.

Rock On!! tells the story of the band Magik. Ten years ago the band with its members Joseph (Arjun Rampal) the lead guitarist, Aditiya (Farhan Akhtar) the lead singer, Rob (Luke Kenny) the keyboarder and Killer KD Drummer (Purab Kohli) almost made it. They had great songs, a great chemistry, great girlfriends and a record deal. And then everything fell apart.
Now ten years later they lost any contact to each other. Aditya is as far away from music as a successful stockbroker can be. KD works in his dads jewelry business, Rob is a rather unhappy session musician for Anu Malik (poor guy!) and Joe has to live on the money his wife makes with her fish shop because his music makes him none. When one day a chance meeting offers an opportunity to meet again.
















I read quite a few interviews with the cast before I watched Rock On!! I had to smirk when I saw that they made Arjun play the Steve Vai Evo Guitar. Thats a tough act to follow. But they were very clever. Arjun copes pretty well when he is playing slow songs on his Acoustic. On stage and during the solos the either shot him from the back or did a wideshot or the hands of the audience blocks the view. That´s what I call clever filmmaking. Same goes for the other bandmembers. And Farhan´s voice rocks. Literally.

What I really liked about the characters where that the screenplay avoided most of the obvious stereotypes and clichés. The decisions they have to take are very real. (At least to me) And pretty grown up.
I love the way they did the concert scenes. The dynamic is infectious.
It´s a pity that I had to watch the film without subtitles. I got most of what was going on but the finer points in the dialogues were lost to me. But hey, I wanted to buy the DVD anyway. It is the kind of movie to watch more than once. So Excel Entertainment, hurry up and don´t you dare going the Aamir Khan way to release it.
















[fangirl mode] One more word about the guys. Boy, does Farhan look yummi under the shower. It makes up more than enough for the little insecurities that still can be found in his acting. And Arjuns long rocker mane is very much to my liking. He is one of the few actors who can carry of a moustache and look genuinely sexy with it. [/fangirl mode]

So what´s left to say is a big recommendation for Rock On!! from the filmifan and the sound engineer/drummers-wife in me.

All pictures copyright http://rockon.bigadda.com/

EDIT: since I was asked by mail: The "almost" in "they - almost - got it right" refers to some goofs equipment-wise. The drums KD plays in the 10-years-earlier scenes are Basix drums that were not available back then. Same goes for the Line6 Amp in the rehearsal room. But apart from that I did not stumble upon any obvious errors. And in fact I don´t mind those that I did.
















Oh and I can finally live in peace again. For days I wrecked my brain where SEL had earlier used the Guitar-Riff that opens the "Rock On" song. Half an hour it finally clicked. It´s from the Lakshya Background score. Phew!

And one final thing. Watch the crowd at the final concert closely. There might be Cameos.

Back. And for now in Chennai.

The Filmi world has me back again. It has been very still here the past few months. Mainly due to the lack in films I wanted to watch. There just was not much that made me want to spend about 20USD for a DVD.

But now I finally made it to Chennai and today I finally made it to the cinema. YAY!

I started watching again on the flight to India (Jet Airways has a great selection of films from all over India). That way I finally got to see Taare Zameen Par. Which left me underwelmed. It is a good film but growing up in Austria we has tons of "TV movies of the week" that dealt with the same subject or a similar one. They were not executed so nice, I must admit. I guess I am just not the target audience for it. And maybe I was only feeling less then enthusiastic for it due to the big expectations I had. Well still, count me to the very surprised people if TZP makes the Oscar shortlist.

Anyway. I´m back. For good. Watched Rock On!! today at Satyam Cinemas. Plan to catch Drona and Kidnap on next Thursday and Sunday. (I dont have much time to do anything outside work unless it´s sunday or an office holiday)

PS: for those able to read German. I started a Blog about my adventures in India. It´s mainly for friends and family to stay in touch. But you´re very welcome take a look too (got some cool Auto-Riksha vids there) You´ll find it at http://babaindia.blogspot.com

Interlude: Requesting Fanart

Shamelessly copying from Beth´s blog (because A. is my friend too..):

My friend Aradhana, a production designer in Indian and American films, is doing a project on Shahrukh Khan fan art and is seeking submissions for her research. She welcomes anything that isn't an actual photograph - drawings, graphic art, paintings, etc. Please email her on here to submit your handiwork and include your name (not just your email address) and where you live.

Something is rotten in ...

the state of Bollywood at cinemas in Vienna. I don´t know how it happend but from being forced to decide between three different films on one day we just dropped to nothing. Zilch. Nada.

For more than a month now there has not been one single show of any Indian film here. Even in the past when we had fewer Bollywood here the summer was good. There are always a lot of summer cinema specials. Open-Air screenings. Whatever. And they always had a few films on. But this year it just stopped dead. Sarkar Raj was the last film that was on. Ever since that not-so-exciting-thingy there´s nothing. Zilch. Nada. But I repeat myself here.

And there is no explanation for it. Sigh. Well, I guess we just have to wait a little more. And make do with a single screening of Monsoon Wedding, MHN or whatever deadbeaten film they will show late August.

I want to see Sing is Kinng! Bleh! The Germans get it and we don´t. Not fair.

Anyway. As you might (or not) have noticed I am still in Vienna. I should be in Chennai for a month already, but my stay gets delayed and delayed and delayed. But I am still hopefull that the next few weeks will finally see me going. Hah. And then I wont have any trouble with cinemas not playing the kind of films I want to see.

In the meantime I make do with Mamma Mia! (Did I mention before that I was raised on ABBA? Plus, it has Colin Firth and Pierce Brosnan singing. *Squee* And the devine Meryl Streep. Bless her.) And Dr.Horrible. And as you might have noticed from this posts title I am (re-)reading Hamlet. The commentary book I got yesterday is more then thrice the number of pages of the play.. Why am I reading it? Well. I love Shakespeare. I haven´t read it in ages. Its summer. I have a beautiful green shady terrace with very comfy chairs. And what´s more, I can´t go to Stratford-upon-Avon to watch Patrick Steward and David Tennant perform.

So there´s that.

How time flies

As I am writing this, I sit in the lobby of my hotel in Chennai, waiting for the transport that will take me to the airport to catch my flight home. It is a bit surreal. Outside there are almost 40 degree Celsius. In the lobby it is freezing cold and they play the Best of Kenny G CD. Just now the song is Winter Wonderland. Oh I love it here.

The trip was busy and stressy and fun. I did not manage to see much apart from the taxi rides and offices and hotelrooms. So my filme experiences mainly consisted of in-flight entertainment. That means I got to see Vel (with Surya and Asin) on the flight to India which I liked. And 4 (!) times parts of Welcome on my domestic flights with Kingfisher. Why of all the films in the world did it have to be Welcome? There is one single good scene in it and that is when Anil Kapoor makes his extortion call to Paresh Rawal who thinks it is a prank call. I love the way Nana Patekar cracks up laughing. Then I watched the Kolkata Knight Riders get destroyed by Mumbai on TV. Oh and I managed to buy the Dusavatharam Soundtrack and the Raijnikanth Biography. Had no chance to listen in on the soundtrack though. My Macbook Air does not have a CD drive..

Now for the really cool part. As of today it is confirmed. I get to come back to India. Very soon. In early July. And then I will stay for at least 3 months. So all you people I was not able to visit this time. I´ll be coming to hound you..

I managed to put some pics up on flickr. They are mainly shot from inside of our car. But in Delhi I even had 3 hours time for some sightseeing. Yay.

2 reasons

I have two reasons for being so quiet here ever since the PEIBBM. One is good, one is even better.
The good one is in fact not my fault. Blame Kaddele, Maria and Ezri. They hooked me on Doctor Who. ´Nuff said. *babyfangirlsqueee*

The better reason is so bilkul first class. I´ll be going to India. Soon. Very soon. I always wanted to. But there never were any concrete plans. And then four weeks ago a chance turned up that was too good to resist and now for starters I´ll be flying to India for 9 days in May and if that trip goes well, I might set up camp in India for a few months from late June. As you might imagine there is some hectic preparation work to be done.

But yes. I still watch movies. Just yesterday we went to the cinema and saw The Dream Team Krazzy4. I liked that it had (a mostly wasted, but I take what I can get) Rajat Kapoor, liked the 4 krazzy guys, Hrithik´s moves, and that so many of my favorite supporting actors made an appearance. But the rest was either a 1:1 copy or ranging from not very good to plainly bad. I don´t think it is a good sign that we thought the post-climax moral-of-story speeches were the funniest part of the movie. And imagine my suprise at hearing my dad´s fave song from the 60ies in Rajesh Roshan´s oh so "genuine" soundtrack. Here (song starts after about 20 sec).

And I watched U Me Aur Hum. And kinda liked it. You know first time director and all. But I liked it.

Two Naa three more things before I have to get back to work. We were written about in Tehelka. And Filmiholic did a terrific interview with Mani Ratnam. Read it. And there are of course tons of pics from the fantastic Bloggersmeeting in Munich on flickr. Here my collection and here the flickr group.

Edit: Oh my. In between all the Doctor Who and India job and WTF Krazzy4 moments. I totally forgot to mention our very clever project that was conceived at the Sunday brunch at Munich´s PEIBBM.







Its group blog listing all cinema screenings of Indian or Indian related film in the German speaking part of Europe. Setting it up, editing and updating would be reason number 3 for my unforgiveable silence here.

PEIBBM Liveblogging

I late, but we´re live.

michael+mike+mirie, maria, beth, kaddele, marco and enia4x a whole lot of others are as well liveblogging.

13:45 kaddele and beth asre singing dhadak and are waiving their wonderfull BaB cutouts..

13:50 I still have to get into the groove. but hell, its been ages since i saw BaB and AB2.0 looks soooo nice :D

13:54 uh-oh Bunty. i know you´re pissed, but you must not talk to your dad like that.. tsktsk

13:56 to 14:04 bleh. blogger.com is acting up. it eats my post. so we missed Babli´s pink room. and Bunty´s first scam.

14:05 I haven´t seen BaB for ages. I didn´t remember how very pink it was..

14:06 *sigh* now they finally met. what a cool pick up line.

14:08 Ohh. I also forgot how very nerve-grating Bablis crying is. Breaks every man :D Note to self: Try on husband..

14:15 I´m lagging behind. But now we have "yeh world" for the 3rd time. Yay!

14:17 weehh. bahut accha. I keep repeating myself. but i forgot how very cool stuff there is in that movie. Like the music during the Q-Q-Qureishi scene.

btw. we here are some of the cutouts















and they will come in very handy soon...

14:26 ok Babli is a bit slow but now we have the titlesong!!!!

14:30 Yey my favorite is the hotel-bying scam during the song. Thats AB2 in AB1 mode from Agnepath, right? And now theres Sholay :D Love it!!!
And the crowd here is singing!

14:35 Mummyyyy!! Oh no she´s crying again.

14:36 Collcetive sigh. The first romatic sparks are flying. Shooo Shweeet..

14:46 Uh_oh blue pleather coming up..

14:48 wow. sycronized clapping in the house.. and quite some amusement over the fugly costumes.

14:56 *sigh* and kiss-kiss sounds from the crowd. all that for a peck on the cheek. i cant wait what will happen in the secound half.

and Papa B draws a huge applause

15:24 INTERVAL over. And we get the first glimpse of the Taj Mahal

and btw. we had to reprimand the "hat-fraction" from Frankfurt/Munich.. they were caught watching SRk stuff on their Laptops during the first half. Tsktsk..

15:26 poor Bunty. What a wasted wedding night..

15:28 war of noses. and cat-calls from the audience..

15:35 oh no. technical problems. but we came prepared. quick change of DVDs. and during the unscheduled break Beth and Kaddele enact what we are missing on screen with the paper cutouts. YAY!!

15:43 and the big Taj Mahal scam is starting. And while we watch it unfolding I need to add two more liveblogs.
willi for umananda
nefret

15:57 oh the Big B is just made for slow motion.

16:01 Ahhh question: Is it possible that the barman at the hotel is the same guy as the receptionist from Jab We Met??

16:02 Oh what a beautiful story. Inspector AB2.0 ka pehla pyaar.

16:07 Yay. Family reunion! Sorry gotta dance pretty soon

16:17 Now that got the crowd rocking. I think I saw even the guys dancing in their seats

16:24 We´re heading fast to the climax. Oh and Amitabh Bachchan runs!!! I love when Amitabh Bachchan runs!!

16:34 And another "Yeh world" and an ultimatium

16:38 Oh noooo. Caught. Oh noooooooo

16:44 I see tears in the crowd. And hear some sniffeling.

16:48 Big Applause. And now for some rapping AB1.0

So we´re off to Maharani Restaurant for an early dinner and then at 20.30 we´ll have the ACEBA presentation and the party afterwards.

Bahut Masti Hai.

Oh btw. I´ve already shot hundreds of pics. I´ll need to sort them still but keep coming back for them. ..

Bollywoodbloggers. The program.

While other people are busy packing. We were/are busy with preparation work.

And so now we can announce the full and (almost) final program of the 2nd Annual Pan-European/International Bollywood Bloggermeeting (Why oh why was I thinking that it was funny/cool to have an as long as possible title for it last year)


Friday March 7th:

During the course of the afternoon we meet at the Bollywood-Flat, Eversbuschstreet in Munich/Allach. To chat and basically simply hang out the Bollywood way

At 7:30 PM Dinner at Restaurant "Bollywood", Donnersbergerstr. 44 (yes. there is an indian Restaurant in Munich with that name)

Saturday March 8th:

10.00 AM - Brunch, Leo's Lounge, Rosenheimer Str. 98, S-Bahn Rosenheimer Platz. Food is 10€, drinks cost extra.

1.00 PM - Liveblogging at SAE Institute Munich Bayerwaldstr. 43, S6 Perlach. This years film will be Bunty Aur Babli

5.30 PM- Dinner at Restaurant Maharani, Rottmannstr. 24

8.00 PM - ACEBA ceremony & Party, Flaschenbar, Schleißheimer Str. 43

Sunday March 9th:

Since OSO will have its theatrical release on March 6th throughout Germany, we are still negotiating a matinee show for Sunday morning. And it looks good that we will have one.

If we dont manage to lock that down the Plan B is to have Brunch again.

SRK. OSO. Berlinale. A State Of Nation Speech.

OSO had its German Premiere at the Berlinale Filmfestival in Berlin last Friday. And the Big Khan was attending in person. Plus he even gave a public lecture at the Berlinale Talent Campus on Sunday.

News like that made the German speaking fan-universe go crazy for the last few weeks. For various reasons.

One. That´s a quite simple one. Om Shanti Om will finally get a theatrical release in Germany. Eros and the big Khan himself promised a release with 50 copies nationwide. (That doesn´t sound much. But it is. Its actually the biggest Indian film release ever in Germany) Unlike us fortunate Austrian and Swiss fans who got OSO in cinemas at the same time as the rest of the world, Germany had to wait.

Two. SRK made his last public appearance in Germany back in 2005 at an ill-fated "fan-dinner" that is only remembered by mass-hysteria, tilting boats, shady organisers and fans loosing money. Since then he´s been pretty much a no-show in our part of the world.

Three. Germany is SRK territory as far as it concerns Bollywood cinema. That´s a plain fact. The so-called Bollywood Boom started in 2004 when K3G played on German TV for the first time. And back then it was SRK who captured the hearts of the viewers. Distributed by Rapid Eye Movies, a small German distributor specializing in Eastern cinema, a hype was born. K3G was followed by KKHH, KHNH and MHN. Ever since then the notion for viewers was (and for the main public it still is): If its there is a Bollywood film - it has Shah Rukh Khan in it. As if nobody else existed in Indian cinema.
Much to the chagrin of more broadminded or lets call them more committed Indian movie fans. That and the fact that the Mumbai film industry killed the German DVD market with the release of crap quality releases of almost all (even the stinkers) SRK movies to make a fast buck. Or even films that only show SRK on the cover. Or monkey business like that. Resulting in a steep drop in DVD sales, poor TV ratings and basically a dwindling interest by and a loss in credibility with the public. But I´m digressing here.]

















©berlinale.de

So SRK came. He saw. And as far as the media coverage and the fan reactions go. He very much conquered. The tickets for the premiere were sold out in 7 (!) minutes. The ones for the lecture only took 15 minutes until the house full signs went up. Even tickets for the additional screenings (the ones without a personal appearance) where gone in under an hour. Blackmarket ticket prices went as high as 390$ for the 11$ premiere tickets (As seen on Ebay!)
On the night of the premiere itself all those waiting were treated to 40 minutes of an autograph signing, handshaking, hug and waves sending incredibly charming Shah Rukh on the red carpet and a good-humored SRK answering even the most rediculous questions with utmost patience and charm after the premiere. The media and fans loved it and him. From Friday night until this morning he was dominating the media coverage of the Berlinale. In the beginning the journalists were more stunned than impressed but during the course of the weekend SRK´s charm got them all. Here´s a link to the Berlinale website with a 30 min video of the (highly intimidating) photo-call and after that the official press conference on Friday. (The Talent Campus Lecture is also rumored to be put online in March)










©berlinale.de

So what do we, as non-desi Bollywood fans in Central Europe, take home from this weekend?
A) It looks like the "Restart" of Bollywood in Germany had a terrific initiation. In March we will see if the Boxoffice will react accordingly.
B) The German fans were right with their SRK infatuation. I have yet to read a feedback post in Marcos forum that has anything negative to say about his public appearances in Berlin. I don´t see any other (Bollywood) star of today pulling that off.
C) As for the really important stuff. He learned the German words: "Ja, Mann" and "wunderbar". He is said to have incredibly soft hands. And he seems to smell so-oho good. Well informed sources believe it to be Azzarro Silver Black *g*

Have Macbook Air. Will Post.

Hi, sorry for the lack of updates. But there has been just too much going on in my private (yes I do have one) and work-related live.

So just a short update to tell you all is well.
We already do have quite an impressive line-up for the Bloggermeeting in Munich. So far we´re running at 35 registrations (mainly from Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Beth is so far again the lone "international" party. And she is having nightmares about being forced to speak German. So. You out there. Show some compassion. Join her.)

Then another important thing. If you´re located in Europe and are able to read German. Go and vote for the 5th Annual Central European Bollywood Awards. Just click here. Results will be announced on March 8th at the PEIBBM in Munich.

Oh and concerning the title of this entry. Its only to make Michael go green with envy ;-)

MiniKhan and I had a blast unpacking it yesterday evening.