It's O-S-C-A-R...my Bologna has a second name...

Chris and I have already began to discuss things that we miss from home (it has been over 2 weeks since we pet our puppy) and things that we will not miss from here. As beautiful as many of our locations have been, I have to admit that we will not miss all the cigarettes. I never realized how spoiled we were in America, with our smokers confining themselves to stoops outside of restaurants and to clusters usually on the outsides of crowds. Rarely will we witness smokers inside restaurants or simply sitting themselves next to non-smokers. It's like there is a code. They know that we value our lungs. They have heard of the dangers of second-hand smoke. They know that other people will judge them if they smoke around babies.
Here, it is a smoker's free-for-all. We just came back from the Piazza Maggiore, where we went to the sotto le stelle del cinema (more on that in a minute) and after settling in, we were quickly ensconced in a thick cloud of smoke. We actually had to stop, drop, and roll and then crawl out of our seats. It was just gross.
Now, onto the movie.
Tonight's movie was I Gioielli di Madame De...
It's some french film from 1953.
Here is our interpretation. We left a little early (we kept coughing).
Girl has earrings. She is a countessa. She sells earrings to a pawn shop. The guy there did not want to buy them at first, but she fainted and he felt badly. She, however, was snooty and could not handle the money. Then, she goes to an opera and convinces a general that she has lost her earrings. We think the general is married (there was a scene with him in one room and a woman in the other. We think he told her that he and the countess were just friends). General buys countess earrings from pawn shop to make up for her lost ones. Countess goes to Monte Carlo and gambles. With the earrings. Which go on sale in a new pawn shop and are picked up by a new guy. Who happens to follow the countess and fall in love with her. Or at least they dance a lot.
Not like American in Paris dancing. More like they twirl around a lot. I got a little dizzy. It was a twirling montage. Even that was better than the final ballet in American in Paris. I love Gene Kelly, but that movie lasted half of my life and almost turned me off of my new goal of becoming a tap-dancer. Or at least owning tap shoes. With Chris and Sara. So we could tap during classic movie club.
It almost ruined that dream.
Almost.
I mean, I had to convince Chris that Paris would be nothing like that movie; otherwise, we were not going. No how. No way. If he sees one big-toothed girl or one quirky American painter begin to dance, I think he will head the Notre Dame and starting ringing the bell for sanctuary. All Quasimodo style.
But, this movie was not about that. And it didn't have Gene Kelly.
Actually, the french movie was about as french as An American in Paris. Which as we all know has like 1 Parisian and like a billion Americans.
This film was dubbed in Italian.
We still don't really know if the earring girl was married, evil or what. We just know that in the movie it mentioned Bastille Day and today is July 14 so it was appropriate.
Viva le France.

We will be posting from Switzerland tomorrow and hope to have all of our Germany videos and blogs up then. What we can tell you is that the top three reasons to visit Germany are Jenny, Monika and Norbert. They are incredible!