A pinch of James Bond

We loaded our now aging Mercedes 310 with the exhibition stand, packed all the exhibition vehicles onto the trailer and Lukas and I drove to Düsseldorf to the Rehacare trade fair. Two other staff members joined us by plane. At the fair, Lukas, Dani and I stood at the stand while Stefan Rittler examined the products of the co-exhibitors. He came back with interesting information: There were some Russians, he said, who had exciting drive concepts and supercapacitors for energy storage. Supercapacitors? I knew them from the press. They were much more efficient than the lead batteries we were using at the time. They had almost infinite cycles and much more energy stored per unit of weight. I went with Stefan to the Russian stand and examined their batteries. There were some scientists there. One of them: Sergey. He had forgotten his business cards and was busily writing new ones by hand. I wanted to know many technical things and their translator, Elena, assiduously translated all the questions into Russian. Our visit aroused interest among the Russians and their boss Oleg joined our discussion. I was amazed at the performance of their drive and supercapacitors if the information they provided was accurate. We went back to our stand. The next day, the whole Russian delegation came to our stand and they had just as many questions about our company. Satisfied with the answers, they went back. They asked if we would be interested in having dinner together? We immediately said yes: The story with the Russians and especially their technology interested me. In the evening we were picked up at our hotel: a silver Mercedes E-Class appeared. At the wheel was the beautiful Elena - the rear windows tinted. The passenger got out and opened the rear doors for us: we were to get in. What would James Bond have done in this situation? We got in. We were led to a restaurant in the back. There sat all the other Russians and greeted us joyfully. First a glass of wine, then the round of introductions. I started and explained my role, my company, what we do and who is who. Oleg greeted us on behalf of his team. They work in the company Energia. They build rockets and yes, their team is responsible for all the testing facilities for these rockets. This includes the control tower, the test equipment for the subsystems, but also the entire control system for the rockets, right up to the flight controller. I was speechless and perplexed. We were dealing with leading scientists from Russia! To explain, I told him that our company was currently 15 people strong and that we had 3 engineers among them. How many engineers did he have in his team? Oleg looked deep into my eyes, laughed briefly and said dryly, "All of Russia", ...How? Elena explained that they were really attached to the military and so they had access to all the scientists in all of Russia. They had brilliant technologies and through the field of rehab they were also allowed to make them available to the West, as they were dependent on foreign currency. The rest of the evening was very nice and informative. We learned a lot about how they worked and what technologies they were about to sell in the rehab sector. These were: A special plastic material that can be processed very easily and is absolutely unbreakable, wheel hub drives with a sensationally high efficiency and just the super capacitors that could do many more cycles than all battery technologies known so far. I was of course interested in all these technologies. I suggested that we should draw up a plan for future cooperation. Elena corrected me: first it was a political issue, then came the strategy, and only then came the plan.
I wonder what she meant by that. I understood nothing. What would James Bond have done in that situation? Drink his martini... we toasted each other with a glass of wine.
The Russians had a very practical request for us: they had brought an electrically driven wheelchair. It was made of indestructible plastic and had to be transported to the TÜV in Cologne. Of course, one helps friends and we agreed to make our Mercedes 310 available. Lukas wanted to go along as the driver. The beautiful Elena wanted to discuss the project with the TÜV officials to get the wheelchair approved. From the Russian group an older gentleman, well-fed and with a round face, who looked exactly as I had imagined a Russian general, stirred. Obviously, he also wanted to go to the TÜV. I asked him what his speciality was. A lengthy discussion started in the Russian camp. Obviously, it was a bit difficult to explain his exact role to us Westerners. After a few more Russian words, he turned to me with a broad grin and said in broken English and with an exaggeratedly polite bow: He oversaw security. With another glass of wine, we toasted to the safety of us all.
The next day, the three of them set off for the TÜV. The wheelchair was lashed down in the hold. All three squeezed into the narrow cab and off they went. Lukas knew approximately where the TÜV was and Elena spread out the road map to find out the exact route. The inevitable happened: Lukas missed an exit. Elena was furious and wanted to grab Lukas' steering wheel to turn the bus around. Lukas vehemently resisted this intervention and tried to keep the car under control. Elena started screaming and demanded that Lukas drive back to the last entrance on the hard shoulder, which Lukas categorically refused. Fortunately, the general in charge of security was there: he did his job, talked soothingly to Elena and thus tried to calm her down. This gave Lukas time to take the next exit and steer the bus back towards their destination. Elena's face brightened. When they reached the TÜV before the appointed time, she was completely satisfied.

Oh, what a shock: when we opened the cargo area, it was revealed that the wheelchair had broken loose due to the violent steering movements and the unbreakable plastic had cracked smoothly: a side armrest was defective. Lukas got out his toolbox and in no time at all the crack was repaired with western epoxy. The TÜV appointment could take place.
The three of them came back overjoyed. Lukas, who had yet to come to terms with all the emotions that had flooded in on him, the general who had successfully completed his mission and Elena, who was able to keep the TÜV appointment on time. As a thank you, she hugged Lukas dearly. Since Elena was already a good 1.80 tall without shoes and grew to almost 2 m with her stilettos, Lukas buried his face directly in her breasts. Lukas was visibly struggling to get his seven senses together again after all he had experienced.
That evening we were happy to go out for dinner in our little group. Especially Lukas had to process what he had experienced and told us in detail about his condition.

The trade show ended, and we had become best friends with the Russian team. Lukas and I visited them at their stand, and they happily handed us a bag with special, very fatty fish, plenty of caviar and a bottle of vodka each. We thanked them politely, left a box of chocolates each and were about to leave when Oleg stopped us: First we must toast together... And that's how it was: first we drank to me because I couldn't say no. Then to Oleg, just because. Then to Oleg, who couldn't say no either, then to Elena, who had translated so well, and so it went on. I was worried because I actually only process alcohol moderately well. Lukas enlightened me: Drinking rituals are very important for Russians and I just have to go through with it. He gave me one last rule: never laugh, no matter what. He also reassured me: he was completely used to drinking and had everything under control. I could let myself go, and he would take care of the rest, including the dismantling of the stand.

All right, I'll have to go through with it. The only rule in my head: don't laugh. We drank and toasted until we were both completely drunk and headed back with our CLASSIC. We clung to the seat together and tried to find our way back to our stand. My head was spinning. When I arrived at the stand, I lay on the floor: it was too much. Lukas said he was fine and was now going to get the bus and the trailer. I fell asleep and was woken up again by his voice an indeterminate amount of time later. But what had happened? Lukas came back, he could hardly walk and was swaying so badly that he kept threatening to fall over. He slurred something like: He drove the bus right through the door... and already he collapsed and was lying on the floor on our stand. He was no longer responsive. What now? I got up, everything was spinning for me too, but at least I could walk again. I tried to shake Lukas, unsuccessfully. He was fast asleep. After I had collected myself to some extent, I went in search of our bus: the key was in it and the bus had indeed been manoeuvred backwards through the door. The trailer and the bus were in the exhibition hall!
I started loading the individual vehicles onto the trailer and lashing everything down tightly. I left the stand for the time being, taking only the expensive things with me, which I stowed in the bus. As I was not the fastest in my condition, this work went on until deep into the night. What now? Was I fit to drive? I called Tina at home and asked her how I seemed. She said I was okay. We hatched the plan that I would now load Lukas, who was still fast asleep, into the car and then try to drive a few laps in the now empty car park. I wanted to follow exactly one line and see how well I could manage it. The tests went quite well, and so I decided to take the bus and trailer to our hotel, which was about 30 km away in the countryside. It was the middle of the night and there were very few other vehicles on the road. That made things easier. To be on the safe side, I drove slowly. Lukas woke up, he felt very sick: he had to throw up. It was no longer enough to stop the bus. Lukas, however, rolled down his window at lightning speed and threw up out the window. Then he rolled it back up and went back to sleep. Once at the hotel, he was at least able to walk back to the hotel room on his own. I looked for a flashlight and wanted to take a quick look at the condition of the loaded vehicles. Lukas had thrown up all over the side of the bus. Parts of it also landed on the exhibition vehicles. No!!! I had no choice but to fetch a kettle of water from our bathroom and clean both the car and the exhibition vehicles. Due to the tight budget, we slept in the same room at the time. Lukas complained loudly that he had a headache and that I shouldn't clean the floor in the middle of the night.
The next morning, Lukas was still in bed with a hangover. Surprisingly, I felt quite well and went back to the fair and dismantled the rest of the stand. When I returned to the hotel in the early afternoon, Lukas had rediscovered his spirits. He had lunch, and we were able to make our way back. We had a lot to talk about! What was going to happen with the Russians?

I learned from it:

• Russians can be very nice, even if they develop war material.
• You must know where your own limits are
• Too much vodka harms my well-being