Kino Bambino: Of Screaming Babies and Cosmopolitan Mummies

Since I came to live in Britain, I could only count the number of times I have been to the cinema and it was mostly with friends. Paying for TV licence and having a BBC iPlayer on our telly meant we have a good selection of TV films, documentaries and drama series that we even struggle to find time to watch. On the rare occasion that John would take me out on a movie date, we would head off to Sheffield's 'arty' cinema, the Showroom, located in cultural heart of the city, opposite the train station. 

When our little boy was a few weeks old, we watched a British-Filipino film, Metro Manila, with my mother there. He slept through most of the film and only had to be taken out once when he woke up for a feed, so we managed to enjoy the movie without disturbing the rest of the audience. But at seven months, I would be lucky to get him to sleep during the day for an hour thus taking him to the cinema would be rather rude. So finding out that the Showroom has a special screening for parents with babies under one year old was rather useful. Called Kino Bambino, the latest films are screened with lower sound levels and the room is brighter than normal. 

A friend from a baby group has told me about it, she regularly goes on Monday mornings. This week, when a movie I wanted to watch was being shown, we went out to see it. 

We were amongst the first to take our seats and for awhile there were only less than ten of us inside but by the time the lights dimmed, nearly fifty parents have turned up with either a sleeping or screaming baby. Before I became a mother, any whimper from a child in a public place would have got on my nerves, but after months of living with a seldom quiet child, one certainly learns how to block off the noises. And so despite a congregation of whining infants, I have truly enjoyed watching the film. 

But not only that, I have also met other mothers who have become weekly faces at the cinema and realised how cosmopolitan Sheffield truly is. In our table, I've had interesting conversations with a mother whose husband is from Argentina and a mummy who is a native of Spain, and it wasn't just about our babies! 

Although I'm certainly not going to be a weekly cinema-goer, I'm still looking forward to the next time we would be watching a film. 

Image from web.