whilst airbrushing T-shirts at the Hamburg Boat Show in 1995, amongst the requests for sharks chasing surfers and octopus chasing divers, a German who was emigrating to Australia, requested a diamond shaped crossing sign on the back of a t-shirt. Wanting to make more of a cartoon scene, Cookie airbrushed how he imagined the sign might assist the kangaroos rather than the vehicles. Strangely, for a boat show, this became his best seller. Though he had to airbrush it freehand, over and over again. There was another airbrush artist from Hamburg at the show, he mainly worked with stencils and was having a quiet time due to being stuck at the back of the hall. Though he and Cookie spoke none of another's language, a deal was done where Cookie airbrushed the outline and Erik added the colour. After some cartoon tuition, Erik went on to airbrush kangaroos crossing at several shows across Germany and bought Cookie a Weissbier the following year.
