AT THE MOVIES

Saturday night and what do we decide to do but go to the movies. Italians love the cinema and there are many theaters all over town but for some weird reason, most movies, no matter what the original language, are dubbed into Italian. Fortunately, we find one that is showing “Charlie Wilson’s War” in English with Italian subtitles. The movie is fun but I am more interested in seeing how the very colorful and idiomatic language of the film is translated into Italian. Don’t think I’ll be trying out those words with Nicoletta.

We might as well be back in Philly at the Ritz Theater. Cost is the same, crowd looks the same and yes, you can buy popcorn and soda as well as gelati, liquor and some tasty looking pastries.
Afterwards, we walk home. The night is perfectly clear and the streets are surprisingly uncrowded. We walk down the Via del Corso, a major shopping street, past the buildings of Parliament and somehow wind up at the Pantheon which looks especially mysterious and awesome at night with no crowds of tourists surrounding it, just birds wheeling above the dome.

Back in Trastevere, it looks like Saturday night. The streets are thronged with young people. The bars and restaurants are full. A new hostaria has just opened and there’s a celebration going on inside that spills out into the street. The owners, two short balding men, stand in front jostled by well wishers while music blares from inside. Someone is handing out paper cups of wine to guests and random passers by. Every morning on the way to the gym, I’ve watched the progress of the renovations. Now we’ll have to see how the pasta and pizza measure up.

Not wanting the evening to end, we decide to stop off and have a glass of wine at a wine bar around the corner from our house. We are clearly the oldest people in the joint but what the hell, we feel young.