Saturday, January 3, 2015

Overcoming Fog and Distance

It's roughly three-hundred and seven kilometers from central Hanover, Germany to Berliner Platz, Berlin. If you were to go up to a guy on the early evening of 31 December....stating you need to get there in less than three hours.....they'd generally laugh at you and say it ought to be near impossible.  Toss in enormous traffic going into Berlin for New Year's Eve, bad weather, and fog....it's just not a drive that most would want to make.

Somewhere on the late afternoon of 31 December 2014....a private jet was supposed to land in the local area of Berlin.  It was carry David Hasselhoff.  Yeah, the Baywatch and Knight-Rider actor.  Hasselhoff has a reputation in Germany.  For one brief summer in 1989....he had a number one hit in Germany, which is part of the Berlin Wall story.  Few Americans know that the guy can sing.

He's got a gig on the evening of 31 December....at the Berlin Wall.....with roughly 400,000 people lined up around the center of Berlin.  He'll sing his hit from 1989.  For whatever reason in the planning process.....he chose not to arrive a day or two early.  So, the pilot is given notice that fog is around Berlin and is told to land in Hanover.  One-hundred-ninety-odd miles or 307 kilometers apart.

Hasselhoff finds some cab company in Hannover and explains the problem.  He needs to get to Berlin and a taxi is virtually the only way to make it.  So they hustle up this German guy and gives him the job.  Bad weather, fog, and heavy traffic.

Somehow....shortly before 11PM that night....he makes to the gig.  Shortly after midnight, Hasselhoff belts out his 1989 hit song and is fondly remembered.....cheered on by tens of thousands.

Somewhere in the middle of this.....I see some four-star movie script.  An aging B-grade actor-singer from the US....sitting in a German taxi with a Turkish driver....racing along the autobahn to reach a once-in-a-lifetime one-song engagement in the middle of Berlin.

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