Flash and Fever

Flash working for Volkswagen Geneva 2011 Auto Salon.

Papol — Tue, 01 Mar 2011 06:26:12 +0000

This past week was very interesting as I was part of a large group of entertainers working for Volkswagen Group here in Geneva Switzerland , presenting all their new cars before the Geneva Auto Salon 2011. Volkswagen took over a big hall and made an incredible set 100 meters long with 2 massive TV screens and unbeleivable lighting with a full film crew , there were around 60 different entertainers , dancers , silk acts , juggelers, acrobats , bmx bikers, breakdancers, and then lots of chorographers and drivers and crew. Also present were all the CEO’s of the brands that Volkswagen owns, Audi, Porsche, Lamborghini, Bentley, and of course Volkswagen to mention a few, before my performance I had the chance to talk to the CEO of Lamborghini Stefan Winkelmann, who was standing beside me as I was warming up on my ladder, so I asked him if he was from Lambo, ( I knew who it was as one of the drivers pointed him out to me) and he said Yes, he was from Lambo, so I said ” I have one of your cars”, He said “Which one?” I answered “An old one , the Lamboghini Countach” Then I delivered my punchline, with a straight face , ” Yes , I love it , but I wish I could drive in it as its only a model toy!!!!” He laughed, and the ice was broken and we talked about the new model being presented, the Aventador, an unbeleivable car , looks like a stealth fighter with its sharp angles, fantastic, I actually saw it before it was presented to the world and press . Mr. Winkelmann was very charming and being half Italian (the other half German) , impeccably dressed and a pleasure to talk to , then it was countdown 30 seconds to my spot on stage , a minute later I was on stage with other entertainers presenting the new T5 Volkswagen Transporter before a crowd of around 1300 press and VIP’s from all over the world , and 30 seconds after that it was finished, we were done , 4 days of rehearsals for that 60 seconds on stage , what a buzz, and all those cars , i could go on and on , the new Porsche Panamera Hybrid was also there , well, all in all a fantastic experience, and tomorrrow I am off to Funchal Maderia to join a ship and a few days later I will see Lisa (Fever) my wife in Malaga, who I missed terribly and a few days after that fly home to Holland to see my sons. What a week , these are the times that it is wonderfull to be an entertainer.

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Rene Meyer & Lisa Lefever interviewed at BlogTalkRadio

Papol — Tue, 05 Oct 2010 13:34:34 +0000

Max Entertainment’s Ladder act and Quick Change act reviewed

What it takes to put together a quick change act, ladder act, and other entertainment acts. Listen to Olivier le Breton’s interview of Max Entertainment’s Lisa Lefever and Rene Meyer of october 5th 2010 at 0900PM on BlogTalkRadio

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So you want more glamour ?!

Papol — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 14:45:03 +0000

So here is another glamorous trip , we had to get from Nice to Oslo, from our work on a cruise ship to a hotel and get on another ship. It should take around 5 hours max, but it took 10 hours, and we almost used every from of motorized transport known to man. First we got off the cruise ship in Ville-France-sur-mere, the playground of musicians , beautiful people , intellectuals , exiled dictators from times past and present. It is very beautiful there, and even the French presence there cannot ruin that fact, but they try hard, if you talk to them in French they answer in English thereby showing you how bad your French is, but I counter this by answering back in German or Italian and saying I do not understand English, and the waiters and shopkeepers have that bored look and are not bothered to smile and be welcoming in any way (this they must have learnt from all the rich Russians there, experts at not smiling), the ticket dispenser at the train station is only in French, for me not a problem but for all the other tourists a big one. Anyway, we had to take a tender boat from the ship to shore, then we walked to the train station , took a train to Nice , then a bus to the wrong Air terminal, then another bus to the right terminal, checked our bags in and were told that the buggy for my son (life saver for parents) could not come with us past security and to the gate, as Air France’s policy had changed , (Air France , did I expect anything different?)

So on to our first stopover Amsterdam, ( Strange connecting there as it is usually where we get off to go home) We wait one hour , get back on the same plane and fly North to Oslo , we fly over our province where we live but could not see our farm , hard as I tried , I REALLY looked , I knew it was down there somewhere 8 km below us . Must have my eyes checked .

Flight uneventful, same dry cardboard sandwiches as usual but at least they were free , got to Oslo Airport and took another train from there to the center of town which took about 30 min, and then walked 25 min. to the Hotel. Did I forget to mention we have one of my work ladders with me and 2 small cases that I have strapped to a small trolley with wheels, and my wife is pushing my son in the buggy, all this for the purpose of saving money on taxis , so far doing good on that front but my 7 month pregnant wife and 4 year old son are tired by now as its been 10 hours since we left the ship, Finally help is at hand , the Hotel is in sight , I can see it , it is on the other side of Oslo bay!!! I printed out the wrong directions! We need to take a ferry across, so we do that , finally we make it to the Hotel. Man, we are starving, we order a burger , 2 omelets , 2 glasses of wine and an apple juice, 80.- €, there goes the money I saved on Taxis all day!!! Norway is terribly expensive. To top off the trip we were woken up at 3 in the morning with the fire alarm going off, we are on the 8th floor and I am very paranoid being trapped above a fire (with visions of the Trade Center on 9/11) so we run out real quick and make it down stairs and wait outside and its bloody freezing ( My wife has the sense to sleep in pyjamas but I only sleep in a t shirt so I am in my underwear outside, what if i slept al fresco? i cannot imagine) and after half hour are given the all clear by the fire brigade and it was a false alarm and the lifts are still not working so we walk up 8 floors with the wife and child and of course cannot get back to sleep . In the morning we have to get to the ship in Olso port , but I am tired , so we take a taxi this time. Finally we get to the ship, Oh, the taxi ride was 35.- for 3 km, I won’t be eating out or taking taxis in Norway any more if I can help it.!!! But I always say that.

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Travel & Glamour ?

Papol — Sat, 22 May 2010 21:37:03 +0000

The travel to our workplace and the stress getting there is sometimes overlooked by many thinking we have a glamourous job, here is a recent trip we took as our next contract was on a cruise ship on its way from Dubai to Barcelona. Leaving our house in Holland around 12:00 , myself, my pregnant wife and 4 year old son were getting on board the ship in Alexandria and getting off in Barcelona , but because of flight restrictions due to the recent volcanic eruption in Iceland , we did not fly there direct from home, instead the cruise company we work for flew us to Athens first, unfortunatlly with a 7 hour layover, which would be terrible in some places but Athens is not such a bad place , so instead of waiting at the airport , we took a bus into town and in an hour we were in the old town called the Plaka, full of souvenir shops selling plaster copies of Greek gods , and pornographic calenders with ancient Greeks in compromising positions, and lots of leather sandals for sale, soon we were hungry and went back to a place we knew from earlier trips for dinner, had the usual Tsatziki (so-so) , Calamari (old oil), Greek salad (OK) , stale bread , and to wash it all down , some liquid that they called wine and I call vinager , to top it all off, we were over charged , , but Athens was in the middle of civil unrest due to the recent economic downturn so maybe the cook had other things on his mind. Anyway, back to the airport and on the flight to Alexandria. Flight leaving at 01:00 in the morning, we arraived at 3 in the morning , pushing and shoving to get on the bus, nobody cares here if you are a woman , and being pregnant does not help. At last we made it to immigration and had to buy entry visas, that went well , but took awhile, and then on to the luggage belt with the same dreaded thought as always, did all of our 70 kg of equiptment make it there or not? Thankfully it did, and there was also somebody waiting for us to pick us up (call me Mohhamed) , as soon as the porter was tipped ( i made sure that I had a lot of small bills in money as its that kind of culture in Egypt, ) we boarded our bus with one headlight and were off into the dirty night streets of Alexandria arraiving at the hotel around 4 in the morning, the Hotel Windsor looked like an old Colonial style palace , as its name suggested , with a marble lobby and palms in large pots everywhere , only Mr. Poirot was missing but unfortunatly in his place there were more porters and security guards that needed tipping , at this stage `i was getting nervous as I was running out of small bills, but finally we made it up to our room with the help of 2 bell boys , it had vaulted ceilings , saggy beds , and moldy carpets, and a balcony that needed serious repairing , the lift was the best part, 2 could fit in and it was all wrought iron and you had to close an iron gate before it creaked up or down. very old fashioned , I was told that Winston Churchill stayed at the hotel with Rommel , WOW?!? Rommel and Churchill together in the same hotel? , To my knowledge Rommel never made it to Alexandria, El Alamein was as far as he got, anyway I asked to be picked up at midday as it was 5 before we went to bed. So promptly, at 9 the phone rang and our pickup told us to be ready very fast as we had to go through immigration and customs before we could join the ship. So we were picked up with a load of other entertainers that also were in the hotel and were piled into a bus and off to the port we drove , we waited for 1 hour to get our passports checked outside the port police, then the whole circus went to customs and all the bags were unloaded by 2 porters ( they are everywhere in Egypt) one of them could hardly push the cart he was so old, 1 more hour at customs, and then off to the general direction of the ship, but we had to unpack all to go through a metal detector and once through that , back the way we came as it was “not possible” to go this way to the ship, so we had to reload the luggage on the carts , by this time i realize that one of the porters is half blind and half crippled , of course he has to be like that in order to get more money, and i had to help them load and unload the cart because I felt for them so I was pretty dirty and hot by the time we finally got to the ship, where they pleaded and begged for more tips from everybody, ( i also got a good tip ) then we waited another half hour as the gangway to the ship was up because they were repositioning the ship, and of course , once on board, the whole luggage had to go through the x ray again, and thats it. We were on board, now to wait for our show, 3 days away.

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