Monfoo eats more greasy chinese food than she should.

This week in our History of Italian Cinema class we finished discussing the movie "The Bicycle Thief," a neo-realist film on post WWII unemployment issues.  Someone in the class brought up how the film actually reminded her very much of the recent American film "The Pursuit of Happiness," except without the happy ending.  The ensuing side by side comparison of these two movies led a discussion of whether or not "The Pursuit of Happiness" would have been made in America were it not for the resolved conclusion (despite the fact that the movie was based on a true story).  Our teacher revealed to us that there is actually no real word for "pursuit" in Italian; when the film came out in Italy, the title was translated as "the search for happiness."  I found this interesting, these subtle differences between the Italian and English languages.  A search implies that the item of desire or the goal may or may not be found, may or may not exist; while a pursuit suggests the existence of desired goal and the eventual reward for those who pursue properly.  The classroom topic quickly escalated to a discussion of communism and capitalism, European and American ideals, naturally.  This made me consider the manmade nature of language - how the written, spoken, and understood word is actually just as much a convention of humanity as religion or political movement.  Considering my anti-establishment / anti-manmade streak in my mind mapping and art of the semester so far, I will not talk for the rest of my life.  Just kidding.  But conceptually, that sounds like a good idea. 

Also, I eat way too much greasy Chinese food here.

MOOOONICA foote

and for some reason I'm having the usual problem of not being able to upload all my pictures but a few were added.