Heidelberg

I think I’m going to design a statue in honour of shininess. It doesn’t have to be too realistic or anything; really – I mean who would ever dream of scratching an actual wild boar on the nose. The thing about the statue is, none of these old fashioned folk ever really thought about how silly their work would look in a few decades time. For instance, the lions guarding Munich’s Residence are all old and dull, with miniature heads gleaming below them (and people don’t even rub these for a particular reason). My statue will give the “rubber” certain qualities depending on where the statue is rubbed. Let’s go with the pig idea – rub the nose for good luck, rub the stomach to find a good lunch, rub the backside for good bowel movements, rub the head to remember where you left your keys, and run your credit card through the swiper being held by the pig for, er, good fortune? Just imagine how shiny my statue will be in 100 years time; I might get into the Guinness Book or something.

There’s a monkey in Heidelberg that’s on the right track – shiny fingers and disc in hand; but still his mice friends next door are shinier than his hollow face because rubbing them means you’ll have lots of children. The terms and conditions, however, state that the children will in fact look like mice themselves and chew through all the electrical cables in your home. Still, the Germany doesn’t ask for your hard earned pennies to fall from the mouth of a pig into a drain. As if anyone exchanges a coin to rub the snout of their next ham sandwich.


The Bridge Monkey in Heidelberg, Germany


Porcellino in Florence, Italy