Bali Revisited

With DJ Shuriken and his girlfriend, Miss Moxy I went to see a Balinese dance and music performance at the Palace of Arts (Budapest, Hungary) last night. The ticket was a birthday present from my reclusive sister. A very nice present indeed. The performing musicians and dancers were not as good as those I've heard and seen on the islands of Bali and Java, yet they've brought back the memories of my travels to the magical islands of Indonesia, back in the 1990s. The music (gong kebiar), dance and wonderful costumes helped me forget - at least for a few hours - this Balkan bazaar/madhouse of a country I am presently wrestling with. About a year ago I started to translate my South East Asian travel journals into a book ('Malay Book' - the second volume of my 'The Southern Cross' trilogy) which seems to interest the Katalizator Publishers. If we can get some grant money they will publish the first volume of the trilogy - 'Caribean Book' - sometimes this year and hopefully the 'Malay Book' will follow it next year. The results of our grant application are due to come out in March, 2008. After some parts of it were very succesful on some popular internet portals (bahia.hu, korridor. hu - both of them has been shut down since) I've been trying to publish the 'Caribean Book' for many years. After much deliberations and stupid lying the manuscript was refused by a number of publishers (Enciklopédia, Magvető, Kalligram, Ulpius, Nyitott Könyvműhely, Index, Golyós Toll, etc.) so far. I hope that the book (and the whole trilogy - the third volume of it is titled 'The Book of Americas', it contains my experiences on the roads of the Americas) will eventually be published. Unfortunatelly these books are just too long and complex to be released in audio book format.

Karl-Heinz Koala

It's been over two weeks now since I've heard from Zsolt Prieger last time. After he let me down by not writing his part to the Yippie! book we still have one unfinished business: the 'Karl-Heinz Koala' audio book. It was about a year ago that we started to collaborate on this project. The idea was that Zsolt and his band the Anima Sound System will write music to my novel. Originally we planned to release the audio book through the publishing house of Mr. Gabor Pados and Zsolt Prieger, at the end of May, 2007 but the musicians could not complete the music by that time. Zsolt kept putting me off for months, always saying that the music is almost done, they just have to put a few more touches to it. Finally he gave me two CDs last September, saying that it is the finalized product. The stuff sounded wonderful. I was sure that our joint effort would be a big hit. I started to advertise the audio book right away. By that time Zsolt and Mr. Pados broke up, Zsolt left the label. I've also heard - not from Zsolt - that he broke up his great band too. Mr. Pados refused to fulfill his promise of publishing the audio book. No problem, said Zsolt (who did not want to deal with Mr. Pados either), he knows many record companies who'd be happy to release our work. He'll find a good deal in no time, he said. Months passed by without any results. At the end of last year I accidentally read an interview Zsolt gave to some publication. He is planning to give the audio book to one of the largest commercial news portal in the country, who will make it free to download, he said in the interview. I called him up right away, saying that I don't want to give away my work for free. He told me that they wouldn't ask any money for themselves from the portal (which wanted to use the audio book for their own promotion), but they will make it sure that they pay me some. He named a miniscule amount which I certainly wouldn't accept as a fair price for all my time and energy which went into the project. I forbade him to give away the stuff. We agreed that since he couldn't find a label which would pay a fair price and release the audio book I will try to find a publisher for it myself. A few weeks later a newly formed German portal (dedicated to popularize contemporary Hungarian culture worldwide) looked me up and offered to publish the audio book in a downloadable format. It took me a while bargaining for a fair share of the profit, but by last month I succeeded in cutting a reasonable (non exclusive) deal with them. I immediatelly contacted Zsolt and told him the good news. He wasn't too happy with it. He'd rather release the audio book through a Hungarian portal, he said. The Germans kept on asking me to sign the contract. Some weeks later I called Zsolt and asked him to make up his mind fast, otherwise this good deal would fall through. I also sent him an e-mail detailing the possibilities. In his answer he said that they still want to work more on the audio book, but they don't have the time to do so. But he's found a great Hungarian portal, who'd release the product and will give us the best deal possible. He'll send me their contract proposal right away. Because he did not send it I looked up the portal on the Net and wrote to them, asking for the contract proposal. They zapped it to me within an hour. They offered a good, non exlusive deal, which made it possible to sell the stuff on other portals, like the new German one too. I wrote to Zsolt and forwarded the contract proposal to him. I proposed to give the audio book to both portals right away. He must run now, but we'll talk about the matter soon, answered Zsolt. That was on the 6th of February, over two weeks ago. I haven't heard from him since. Bored of the stupid situation I have decided to redo the audio book with some musician friends myself, so I don't have to deal with Zsolt again. By yesterday I completed the recording of the text and hope that my friends will complete the music to it in a reasonable time. I also recorded the words of an other audio book, 'Balkan Nights', and started to work on the third one, 'DJ NoMore'. I am completly fed up with timesick, unreliable people. It says a lot about this time and place that I, at the age of 62 can work ten times faster than people many decades younger than I am. Also, I am always doing my best to keep my word, making it sure that I'd not miss deadlines.

Looking for a Co-Publisher

I've been looking for a co-publisher who'd share the publishing costs of the Yippie book with the original publisher, Mr. Gábor Pados and his Golyós Toll company. I did found such a collaborator, in the person of Mr. László Moldován, owner of the Katalizator Publishers. Yet it seems Mr. Pados is not too keen on making a deal with Mr. Moldován, he keeps on postponing a meeting, on which they could agree upon the conditions of their collaboration. I am rather sure that the reason of Mr. Pados's refusal to publish the book is not financial, but purely political. Just as he has mentioned to me on several occasions: he is simply afraid to publish a book on civil disobedience. He is in close contacts with the troubled ruling Socialist Party. He is afraid to state this reason openly, that's why first he came up with his financial difficulties (an obvious lie), and that's why he is now refusing to meet with a potential business partner. I can't do anything in this stupid situation. Even though I have a signed contract with Mr. Pados, which he is refusing to fulfill, I can't take him to court, because I don't have money to fill a claim and hire a lawyer.

Chaos Management

Just as Gabriella Schuller (my writer collaborator), Gaspar Baksa (the book's designer and printing editor) and I finished correcting the 'Yippie!' book's manuscript and we were about giving it to the printer we were told by the publisher, Mr. Gabor Pados that he doesn't have the money to publish the book. Mr. Pados is a rather wealthy man by Hungarian standards and the printing wouldn't cost that much, so I suspect something fishy's going on. Perhaps Mr. Pados is afraid to publish such honest and sincere book for political reasons, a definitelly not uncommon occurance in present day Hungary. I have a signed publishing contract with Mr. Pados, so I could sue him for breaching our agreement if I'd have the money to hire a lawyer. But I am poor as a church mouse and Mr. Pados knows it all too well. So presently I am trying to find another publisher, which is not an easy job anywhere, especially in this politically charged country. The Yippie! book is a far too independent minded project, equally offending to both two political sides. Just a few weeks ago my Caribbean travel journal and my techno novel 'DJ NoMore' was refused by the Kalligram publishers, after many months of cat and mouse games. Both writings are just as strongly independent as the Yippie! book is. So I decided to create only audio books in the future, which I'll be publishing in a downloadable format, via the Internet.