Becoming Jane

No Dad, not Plain Jane. I took the kids to see the movie about Jane Austen. Normally we visit the cinema at Macau Tower but now that Macau has a half decent English language newspaper, we get the local cinema advertisements so we get to see what's on there. Since I was going to be out conducting my seminar on Service Quality at the Institute for Tourism Studies when they arrived home and they've been really bad at doing their homework when I've been out, I suggested that if they managed to get it all done and we managed to get dinner over and done with by 7pm that I'd take them out. Wow, bribery actually worked this time, so off we went.

There was absolutely no English at the ticket booth but the lady, although she didn't speak any English (apart from the ticket price) was obviously used to communicating with non-Chinese speakers and we worked out what we were going to see and could choose our seats. And then we climbed up, and up, and up yet more stairs. Surprisingly, this is a very clean cinema. We were in the small theatre with plush velvetine seats. And now I'm into Austen-ese. I end up speaking in long qualified sentences and acting ever so ' the accomplished Victorian lady'. I think the kids enjoyed it. It least it'll open their eyes to some beautiful landscapes, refined behaviour and some questions about history and accomplished people.

We'd parked at the same time as and next to a young couple. When we returned to our car, our meters were flashing the expired sign. I dropped a pataca into their meter as we got into our car but then I noticed the man run up to add coins. He got to his meter as I was backing out, looked at it, checked his watched, scratched his head and walked away. I was tempted to try to say something to him but decided 'what the heck' to let him wonder a little. I giggled. As I drove past him, I smiled and waved and he waved back. I wonder if he'd worked it out.

Movies can make you feel good.