Li'l Excitements

I have a pretty major translation deadline for tomorrow (some freelance work I do whilst being a perfect li'l bum) and this inevitably means my urge to procrastinate goes up ten-fold, hence the blogging...

I was invited along by MaTuVu and a very excitable, very cute 10-year old, to an afternoon showing of "Crusade in Jeans" at the local cinema. I'd read the book several times over as a child so was keen to go see it, despite it being predominantly aimed at a younger audience. There's something extremely endearing about watching a film with li'l uns. They are so genuine in their reactions to the film, regardless of how many people are sitting around them. And when they figure out the next sequence of the plot before it happens, you can see them getting all excited. I could almost feel myself slip back into that mindset.

I remember a particularly entertaining cinema visit when I was living in Stoke. Harry Potter's Chamber of Secrets had just come out and I'd gone to see it with a friend. At 2 p.m. on a weekday, we were - of course - surrounded by kids and stay-at-home mums. It became apparent that most of these kids had read the book from front to back several times over. They had clearly memorised all the spells, incantations and dialogues and were reciting them along with the movie. At one point, a clearly frustrated mother turned to her son and said: "Seriously Jack, why do you insist on me taking you to see this film when you know it all by heart already?!?". The kid turned to his mum, waved his hand as if waving a wand and said: "Silencio!". He then turned his full attention back to the screen as if the matter was now dealt with entirely.

The magic is still alive for them and I guess that is why I find is so invigorating.