More Art History (sans Pizza)

I actually forgot to post another funny story from my art history class yesterday.

Michelangelo was commissioned to do a larger than lifesize bronze statue of Pope Julius II to put on top of a church in Bologna, which had just been conquered by the Church. Now, this particular building was a great source of pride for the Bolognians, and they were understandably pissed off to have been defeated. When the huge bronze was put attop their beloved church, they tore it down within a matter of weeks, and melted down the bronze to build a cannon--which they named Julius and used to shoot at the soldiers from the Vatican.

I got a good chuckle out of that one when I heard it.

I am in Italy. I am surrounded by Italians. You would think that picking up the language would be pretty simple in this setting, and I have learned a lot about it. But you know you are doing poorly in a class when, after three weeks of struggling, you go to the teacher to ask for help and the first words out of her mouth are, "If you can, just drop it."

So yeah. I dropped Italian this morning. Even after studying for between 15 minutes and hour hour every day, I still cannot seem to wrap my head around the language. I think I'll stick to French. At least I can manage to get around with that one.

Ciao!