So i have been trying to buy a dvd copy of the latest James Bond movie all along my trip. finally managed to score a decent copy with proper english sound in Shenzhen (china) yesterday. in total i bought 4 different discs which gives a nice little insight in the dynamics of movie piracy in asia:

25/11 Dubai, Karama market: got a 4-1 dvd with three other crap movies on it in a upstairs room behind one of the numerous fake brand clothing shops in the Karama Market Shopping Complex. Paid 20 Dirham, to the guy who claimed that he had seen it the other night and that image and sound quality were ‘good’. turned out to be really crappy image quality (blurry 320*240 pix) and the sound was distorted and out of sync. the seller claimed he got his DVDs supplied form Malaysia.

28/11 Delhi, Palika Bazaar: got the same 4-1 DVD with the same unwatchable video and audio files on it from one of the many stalls in the palika underground shopping complex for 200 rupees.

08/12 Temple Street Night Market, Hong Kong: got a single movie DVD from a market stall on the Temple Street Night Market. According to the cover it is a region-code less English language version with English, Chinese and simplified Chinese subtitles. The person i bought it form for 20 Hong Kong Dollars claimed that he had seen it the night before and that audio and video were fine. Turns out that audio and video are good quality, except that the audio is in russian (so is the DVD menu) and that there are no english subtitles. the disc also contains a muted and inaudible english sound track.

09/12 DVD shop near the Shenzhen railway station, China: Nobody claimed anything, because nobody spoke english. bought a single movie DVD for 10 yuan in a shop near the railway station. The back cover contains a senseless machine translation which seems to refer to the movie, plus the credits for the latest ‘harry potter’ movie. The disc label looks professional but there is the same russian language menu as before. however this time there is actually an audible english soundtrack which runs in sync with the images (except for 4 minutes in the second half where it runs out of sync).