Three days after the kick off the Berlin Film Festival, most of the crew members were free to tour around. The producers, on the other hand, had started their busy work of promoting Dog Warrior in order to sell as many copies of the overseas screening rights as possible. Each transaction was a matter of gold and silver and determined whether they would make money or lose money from this film.
The premiere at Berlinale Palast had received great reviews. Distributors and agencies interested in the film were coming over to contact the producer and negotiate how they could cooperate with each other. Yet, the business deals didn’t concern Zhang Zian. He knew almost nothing about them because of his position in the production team.
Many parties were still waiting to see if Dog Warrior could get an award in the Berlin Film Festival. If it did, then its promotion and box office sales would both increase greatly.
It was said that when the members of the committee had selected a film for Competition, they actually already had a score for this film and would not change it unless something significant happened. This meant that whether Dog Warrior could win an award or not had already been determined, but it would only be announced on the last day of the film festival.
Zhang Zian and Famous had previously been assigned to some promotional activities, as well as the task of standing in the kiosk at the European Film Market. However, due to the conflict yesterday with the team lead Nie Yuan, they were both put aside for now. Nie Yuan had canceled all of their promotional activities.
This worked out in Zhang Zian’s favor, however, as he now finally had a few free days to walk around Germany with the elfins without being worried about being called back by the production team.
The so-called “being put aside” meant not attending the official promotional activities of the production team. In fact, there were quite a few members of the media that were trying to reach Zhang Zian through various means and asking him for interviews with Famous…
The day before, Famous didn’t show up on the red carpet at the Berlinale Palast. The happiest person was Lin Feng, as there was finally no person, or dog, that could steal his thunder. He had a blast on the red carpet.
Once he woke up that morning, Zhang Zian contacted Pi, like he had the past two days, and asked how it was doing at the shop. Pi’s answer was the same old, “Everything is fine. Don’t worry. Have fun in Germany.”
Lu Yiyun was under a lot of pressure. There were more members of the media coming to the shop these days than customers. As Wang Qian and Li Kun––the two dumb***es––could not control their mouths and could not be counted on, she had to send all the media back by herself.
After confirming that nothing was wrong in the shop, Zhang Zian felt relieved.
After asking around, he found out that the address that Reina had written down on the name card was a small city by the ocean in northern Germany, not too far from Berlin. He could either take a train or rent a car to get there.
Train travel in Germany was well-known, as the scenery along the road was as beautiful as a picture. It was the best option to tour around Germany if one had plenty of time. Once he considered the inconvenience of taking the elfins on the train, however, he finally decided to rent a car for the freedom of it.
He took Famous and the invisible elfins out of the hotel. The rental car had already stopped outside. The elfins sat in the same spot as the last trip. Fina and Snowy Lionet occupied the front passenger seat, while Old Time Tea and Galaxy occupied the back seat. Famous took the trunk alone, while Richard flew around everywhere.
Before departure, there was one more thing to do.
Zhang Zian drove around Berlin, then stopped in front of a souvenir shop that was officially designated by Berlin Film Festival. He was planning on sending some limited edition postcards to his friends in China. They were only sold during the film festival and had the stamp of Berlin on them, both vintage and memorable. If he didn’t act fast, some of the popular post cards might sell out.
The festivity of the film festival was still growing, as there were people lining up for tickets outside every cinema.
It was getting warmer in Binhai City, but in the streets in Germany, many local residents and tourists were still wearing winter jackets.
Zhang Zian asked the other elfins to stay in the car for now while he walked into the souvenir shop with Famous.
As soon as he entered, a huge Berlin Bear toy was standing right in front of him. Its body was brown and fuzzy and it wore a triangular, red scarf around its neck. It stared at each customer that entered the door with two small, black and round eyes that were full of innocence. It was as if it was saying, “What took you so long to arrive? Take me home!”
This massive toy was cute, but too big to be posted and transported. He had to choose a smaller one. Luckily, the face and gesture of the smaller one was the same as the big one, and it was still cute enough to make a young girl happy.
There were a variety of products in the souvenir shop and various official souvenirs in a glass display cabinet, such as t-shirts, hoodies, scarves, hats, clothes, and more. There were also shopping bags and backpacks with the Berlin Bear printed on them, as well as wine glasses, mugs, markers, keychains, and notebooks. Most of them were red. Red was also the color that most people identified with in China. With the festive atmosphere during the Spring Festival, the film festival this year was almost tailored to the Chinese.
Many customers came and went in the souvenir shop, speaking all kinds of languages. Even Chinese could be heard occasionally.
These small souvenirs were delicate and practical, appropriate to either be placed in one’s room or put to use.
Zhang Zian had originally planned to buy the souvenirs right before his return, but under the influence of the festive atmosphere in the shop, he was carrying a bag in each hand without realizing it. After his return, the souvenirs he bought would be given as gifts for customers that had bought pets. He expected them to be very popular.
Once he reached Reina’s father’s house, he was going to ask him about salt water pets. He had no idea about the courtesy rituals in Germany, but he didn’t feel like knocking on his door with empty hands. Therefore, he bought some souvenirs for him as well, not knowing whether or not he would like them.
There was quite variety of official postcards for the film festival, most of which had a bear on the cover. Some were brown, some were red, while some were blue under the light. All of them were taken from the posters of the film festival this year––the postcard with a white bear in a hot spring seemed particularly popular. By the time Zhang Zian noticed the card, there weren’t very many left. He quickly grabbed the remaining few in his hands––along with a few others––then went to the cashier to check out.
The cashier gave him a pen to write down different words of blessing on the back of the postcards, then he wrote down the addresses under the cashier’s instructions.
As he wrote, he saw in his side view that Famous was lingering around one of the display cabinets. He walked up and asked, “Famous, is there something you like?”
Famous was looking at a collar, which was also an official souvenir from the Berlin Film Festival. A few white Berlin Bears were printed on the black leather collar in equal distances from each other. The combination of black and red looked very handsome.
“Do you like this?” Zhang Zian asked.
Famous nodded without turning its eyes away. “This is very memorable. I’d like a collection of souvenirs from different film festivals, so the Berlin Film Festival seems to be a good start.”
Zhang Zian understood what it was hinting at. It had great confidence about itself; it knew that it would play more roles in the future and that it would step onto the stage at many different film festivals.
Your stage is as big as your heart is.
“Okay, let’s start from Berlin.” He smiled, feeling equally confident for Famous.
He added the collar to the shopping list and headed towards the checkout.
After coming back to the rental car and putting all the newly purchased items into the trunk, he turned the steering wheel and headed north of Berlin.