On these pages you can learn about our "Chain Letter" taking form.

We documented the seven months that passed between creating the website and completing the whole work for you the following way:

From the development of the website to the completion of the last Love-Link

The Cussedness of Consignment: A drama in four acts

A small chronological overview for those who like it short and sweet

At this point we would like to thank all the people who were involved in the realisation of the Love-Linked project.
It was so much fun working with you!

After the idea of Love-Linked (which is specified on the Project page) had been conceived we were confronted with the task of putting it into action. We knew we would have to make use of the most recent means of communication to establish contact with fans from all over the world. So we ended up creating this website.


The Website

It took us over three months to build the website. After all we had to draw more than 80 graphics (33 of which were needed for the instructions alone) and to write many lines of brilliant text... ;-)  And since we were stupid enough to make it trilingual we really kept ourselves busy for a while.


Recruiting our Participants

Since we didn't want to rely on our luck and wait for anybody to stumble across our website by chance, we decided to send out personal invitations to potential candidates. We found our victims on the Alan Rickman Fanlisting, The Alan Rickman Forum und in the guestbook of The Alan Rickman Download Haven. Luckily for us people didn't resent us for our advertising. At least we didn't receive any threatening letters, but a whole lot of great Love-Links.


The Making of the Chain

Between September 2005 and February 2006 we received 27 links from just as many countries (read more about it under The Results). The participants were asked to draw the front side and the back side of their links on two different sheets. We cut them out one by one, stabilised them with Bristol paper and hooked them together. Only then we could stick both sides together without any visible glue lines. (We placed the cut we had to make on every second link in a way that it was covered by the adjoining link.) After what was about one week the chain was finished. But we still had to make a list with the names and origin of the participants. After all we wanted our favourite actor to know where all those beautiful links came from. The fact that said list turned into a 16-page booklet containing a preface, certain translations of some of the foreign-language birthday wishes and further remarks concerning the links could only displease the Swiss Federal Office of Social Security on whose colour laser printer the whole thing was printed at the expense of the State.

A nice accompanying letter to Melanie Parker (Mr Rickman's assistant) later, our work was ready to be sent on the 4th of March, a little behind schedule. This was it. No more work to do, no more stress to come... At least we were naïve enough to think so. As you'll see in Part Two of the Love-Linked Genesis, we were so wrong about the latter...

back

Aka "The Cussedness Of Consignment"

The main characters in this four-act drama are:


The City of Berne
Has the status of a cosmopolitan city, which is reflected in facts like the "city" centre consisting of less than a dozen alleys and the shops closing at 4 PM on Sundays not to reopen before Monday morning.

Special Agent Nadine
Commissioned by 27 foreign clients she is to arrange for a rare jewel of incredible value to arrive savely at its destination in London.

Opponent No. 1: The Swiss Post
Works with shopping hours and an unconventional scale of charges: A domestic letter must not be larger than 35 x 25 x 2 cm. Otherwise it is considered a parcel for which you have to pay higher rates. On the other hand an item sent abroad is only considered a parcel if the sum of its length, width and height exceed 90 cm. (?!)

Opponent No. 2: The Swiss Government
It is involved in a national conspiracy. In order to help the Swiss post with their dirty work the government gives them the exclusive right to deliver letters and small parcels. Thus, our Special Agent was forced by the highest authority of the country to lay her precious freight in the hands of a malicious gang of villains.

The Love-Linked Chain
Including the documentation it measures exactly 32.5 x 23 x 3.5 cm. Since it is sent abroad it passes as a letter.



Act One: And Loud It Was

Very loud. Just as loud as it gets when two dozen brass bands are marching through Berne's too narrow alleys (yeah, that's right, real cosmopolitan cities don't need streets).
Special Agent Nadine started her mission on the 4th of March 2006, at 13.40 CET. It was a Saturday - but not a Saturday like any others, as Nadine had to learn ten minutes later, when at the main station some hundred carnival-obsessed twits tried to block her way towards the city centre. Nadine was ready to fight, but her enemies were even readier. They had somehow managed to get the City Government on their side. Due to the carnival procession the latter had decided to barricade the most important alleys even for the pedestrians. Hence it took Nadine more than twenty instead of the usual five minutes to get to the stationery shop where she intended to get a suitable package for her precious freight. There she had to learn that the biggest stationery store in the Swiss capitol wouldn't sell any envelopes or other packages corresponding to the letter formats of the Swiss Post.
The keyword "Post" gave our protagonist the idea to go to a Post shop to look for a suitable envelope. How convenient that on this very Saturday the building which accommodates Berne's only Post shop was barricaded from two sides and sieged by a horde of imbecile drunks in silly costumes from the other. Against all odds Nadine was holding a package of bubble padded envelopes (measuring 35 x 25 x 5 cm) in her hands half an hour later. After doing her groceries she returned to the same building, where at 15.30 she was standing at one of the packing tables in the main hall, wondering why a 3.5 cm thick object wouldn't fit into a 5 cm thick envelope. When after the removal of the entire padding the envelope was still too small, astonishment turned into panic. A short glance at the clock revealed that there were no more than twenty minutes left to post the chain before the service counters would be closed for the weekend.
Two years of Shotokan Karate experience allowed Nadine to put her elbows to good use and to stand at the cash desk of the nearest warehouse seven minutes later to buy some surgical instruments. Among a crowd of witch hat, clown nose and pirate hat wearers, and pressed for time, our agent finally performed the life-saving emergency surgery. With the help of the newly purchased duct tape and the mint pair of scissors she managed to add the few missing milimeters to the envelope. Six minutes before closing time, a breathless Nadine placed the safely wrapped Love-Linked chain on one of the counters in the Post office Bern-Bärenplatz, and thus stole a fair-haired apprentice a few minutes of her free time. The amount of forms the apprentice had to deal with for the requested return receipt would even impress an administration worker like Nadine. The mistreated apprentice immediately took revenge for her overtime work by having Nadine pay an exorbitant thirty franks for postage. In return, the Swiss Post offers their customers an online tracking service within Switzerland (which means you inevitably lose track of your letter or parcel after it's left the country). But this wasn't the only way that blasted service managed to ruin Nadine's weekend, since it allowed her to witness how the Love-Linked letter was ignored by the Swiss Post until the next Sunday evening and only left the country at around four o'clock on Monday morning. At least we know now that we can safe the costs for addidional "Priority" fee the next time.


Act Two: And Silent It Was

Very silent. Just as silent as it gets when the Swiss Post, promising on their website to send back a return receipt to the sender as quickly as possible, is once again demonstrating their competence. After two weeks of numerous inspections of Nadine's mailbox (nope, no hole in the bottom) and the neighbourhood (nope, Mrs Mayer's dog wouldn't eat any return receipts) the atmosphere grew more and more tense. All kinds of horror scenarios developed in the utterly creative heads of the poor Love-Linked Team (confiscated by Swiss customs, confiscated by British customs, confiscated by I.C.M., confiscated by MI5...) and caused a few sleepless nights (which were of course made good use of providing round-the-clock observation of a certain mailbox). Only the Swiss Post apparently didn't burn the midnight oil since they remained silent for yet another two weeks.


Act Three: And Louder It Became

But not very loud. Just as loud as it gets when Nadine is still but hardly able to control herself. At the beginning of April the upper-mentioned marched into the Post office Berne Bärenplatz and mourned the loss of the return receipt to an over-rouged clerk who promptly asked her to pay fifteen franks for the desired inquiry. It took all of Nadine's power of persuasion and the intervention of the lady's boss to convince the latter she wasn't allowed to do so. (Never tangle with a hysteric almost-lawyer who's actually read through the terms and conditions, missy!) After that the clerk finally filled in the necessary form, but not without complaining about the missing post code on the receipt Nadine had received a month before when posting the links. But since the receipt contained name, street and even the specific house I.C.M. have their seat in, Nadine couldn't quite see the problem, and neither could the over-rouged lady who told Nadine not to worry about that. And Nadine didn't worry, at least not to the point where she was told that it could take up to four (!) weeks for the Post to find out whether the chain had actually reached its destination.


Act Four: And Loud It Was Again

Very loud. Perhaps not as loud as two dozen brass bands, but just as loud as it gets when Nadine isn't able to control herself any longer. But we'll get to that. After the shocking news about the one-month waiting period Nadine sought distraction in the completion of her Ralph Fiennes movie collection (as to her Alan Rickman collection there hasn't been much to complete for quite a while), which didn't change much about the situation and the agonising uncertainty but, given the circumstances, bordered on treason. Things seemed to move along when after only ten days a Swiss Post envelope found its way to Nadine's still well-guarded mailbox. But instead of bringing us the hoped-for relief the cursed letter only provoked a burst of temper by asking our enervated protagonist to fill in the missing postal code on the enclosed form. (Yep, Swiss Post employees do indeed seem to be too stupid to look it up themselves. It takes less than two minutes to find it on royalmail.com...) One week later Nadine was presented with another Swiss Post letter. This time the envelope contained a confirmation of the inquiry together with the note that it would take one to two months (!?!!) to complete the inquiry...
Nadine's movie collection continued to grow overproportionally, which was a good thing, because as long Nadine was sitting in front of her telly she wouldn't be blowing up Swiss Post offices.
Sandwiched between a fashion catalogue and a bank statement the so longed-for (and we daresay well-deserved) relief was brought to us around the end of April, but not, as we had expected, by the missing return receipt. The light yellow envelope plastered with no less than three miniature portraits of Queen Elizabeth in the upper right corner could only lead to another, much more welcome, conclusion. And after learning that Mrs Parker has indeed passed our Chain Letter on to the most handsome of actors (sorry, Ralph!), all was right with the world again. Well, maybe not for the Swiss Post. Their office at the Bärenplatz may still be standing, but they're quite busy chasing after a certain return receipt. We're not even thinking about withdrawing our inquiry application. Revenge can be so relaxing... At this point we would like to express our deepest thanks to Professor Snape for providing us with such wisdom...


Epilogue:

In the meantime we've received - guess what... Another letter from the Swiss Post! And what a surprise, this one didn't contain a return receipt either. They only wrote they were glad to tell us that our letter was delivered. No further proof. Huzzah. We're almost lucky this was the last message we received from that bunch of blithering idiots...

back

back