Frustration at the Kino

Today is a national holiday in Germany -- the religious feast day Corpus Christi. Stores are closed and there is no school. One thing you can do today, however, is go to the movie theater. Today is a perfect day to see a movie because stores at the mall where our local movie theater is located are closed. That means we can find a parking spot!

Parking at our mall is a big issue. I discovered our first year here that if I arrived at the mall at 9:15 (stores open at 9:30), I would have my choice of parking spots. When I would leave the store less than an hour later, people would be following me in their cars to take my parking spot. It seems that most shoppers will arrive right at or soon after 9:30 (Germans are known for their punctuality) and do a good job at filling up all the parking lots. If the kids need something at the mall on a Saturday ( the worst day of the week to go shopping), and it's already past 10:00, David will take them because I get too frustrated driving around trying to find a spot. On some weekends and during Christmastime, people end up parking all down the ramps and on the highway. 

One day  I thought I'd take the kids to see a movie on a Sunday, thinking we would have no problems as the mall is closed on Sundays. Except for a few Sundays a year when it is open due to a national holiday closure earlier in the week.  It was one of those Sundays.  I circled the mall 3 times and just gave up and returned home.

And so, we take advantage of Sundays and holidays. I've wanted for a while now to see How to Train Your Dragon and was looking forward to seeing it in 3D today -- even if it was going to be auf Deutsch. At the ticket counter, I asked for 1 adult ticket and 4 children's tickets. The cashier asked the ages of the kids and I told her, thinking the younger ones might get a discount. Was I wrong!

The cashier shook her head and said, "This movie is only for kids 6 and older. Your youngest child is too little for the movie." My heart sank and I remembered hearing about this exact situation from other people. Our friend Dina just reminded me on Facebook about how she took her kids to see one of the new Star Wars films several years ago. It was rated for kids 12 years and older, so her then 10- and 11-year olds were not allowed in. Can you imagine? An 11-year old not being allowed in to see a Star Wars film?  The guidelines changed and today, a child older than 6 can see moves with that rating if they are accompanied by a grownup.

I knew it was hopeless, but tried with a "But I'm the mother and can I not make these decisions for my child?" And then I even gave the cashier a sly smile and said, "Wait, I was mistaken. My youngest is 6." She wasn't buying it. Then I asked what other movies were playing and none that Becca could see interested the others.  It was the Dragon, or nothing.

In the end, I bought tickets for the Micaela, James and Emilie to see How to Train Your Dragon and Becca and me tickets for The Frog and the Princess. As I got Becca settled in her seat -- right next to the only two other people in the entire theater because you get an assigned seat and they squish the audience together-- I fumed silently, "Great. I'm paying to watch a movie that we already have at home on DVD!"

The older kids loved How to Train Your Dragon and David has gone on record, via Facebook, as saying that once we're all back in Atlanta, he'll take me to see it.  In English.