Weekend Herald

What I’d do

- Paolo Rotondo

1 far Poderi Crisci winery:

Food is never very

from my mind and in the peak of summer I would travel to Poderi Crisci vineyard and restaurant on Waiheke Island with my beautiful wife Renee and our children, some of her wha¯ nau and my mother, sister, brother-in-law and their kids. We’d sit at a long table and eat over four or five hours, letting the kids go free-range in the vineyard while we talk, laugh and imbibe. My mouth is watering thinking about fried zucchini flowers, buffalo mozzarella, local wine and olive oil.

2 Waiheke, Snorkellin­g on Waiheke:

Seeing as I’m on

I would go for a long snorkel (or as my kids call it, goggling) at Enclosure Bay. Last time we saw stingrays. I believe it’s the place where some kids had a close encounter with orca. I would have loved to have been there to see it.

3 (seems A Vespa date:

On a warm summer evening

like a dream right now) I would leave the kids with my mother and coax Renee out for a date, driven on the back of my Vespa. I still get a buzz from scooting around. The sense of carefree-ness and stylish fun makes me feel like I’m in a film. It’s not my midlife crisis, I haven’t grown out of my teenage Vespa passion.

4 invitation, Auckland Art Gallery:

If Renee did accept my I would take her to the Auckland Art Gallery. I really love the architectu­re of the gallery and every time I see something there I am stimulated creatively. There is so much to learn and make in this life.

5 favourite Film fanatic:

One of my pastimes is watching films. If one of the foreign film festivals — or in my case the Cinema Italiano Festival — was on, I would watch a raft of weird and wonderful films. In the English-speaking world we seem to get such narrow bands of perspectiv­es. When you see foreign films the world really opens up. It’s like travelling, without the jet lag.

 ??  ?? Paolo Rotondo is director of the Cinema Italiano Festival, in Auckland from August 30. See cinemaital­ianonz.com for the itinerary.
Paolo Rotondo is director of the Cinema Italiano Festival, in Auckland from August 30. See cinemaital­ianonz.com for the itinerary.

Newspapers in English

Newspapers from New Zealand