Manshons and Mansions

~Greetings again, loyal readers. In an effort to improve both my own Japanese language skills (or lack thereof) and your understanding of Japan, I will now be adding a 'Word of the Day' feature. Actually, that is not true; it'll be more like a 'Word of the Post'. At any rate, today's word of the day holds a special place in my heart, because it is where I live: manshon. Yes, I am amazed to discover that I have unknowingly been living not in a small non-centrally heated apartment, but in a mansion!


^Okay, that's obviously a lie. The truth is that"manshon" is Japanese for "apartment". Although the apartment is small, I do like it a lot. When I was hired for this job, I was told that I might be in a single small room, perhaps 10 x 10 feet. Fortunately, that is not the case:

^ My apartment has four rooms, a balcony overlooking a park, and more than enough space for me (luckily, I don't take up much space and I didn't bring much stuff to Japan). One curious aspect of the rooms here is that the main room is a multipurpose living room/bedroom. There is no bed--instead, I sleep on a futon,although probably not the kind of futon you're thinking of. Japanese futons are flat mattresses that one can roll up and stuff into the closet during the day (although I have to air it out on the balcony once a week or so). This gives me extra space in the room during the day:


^So my apartment is nice and roomy...but it could be better. Here is a real mansion under construction in a certain desert city on the other side of the planet:


^ Look upon my works, ye mighty, and despair! The massive construction site you see above is in central Baghdad, Iraq, on a piece of prime real estate along the Tigris River. What could it possibly be? I'll give you a hint: the soon-to-be finished complex of buildings is known locally as "George W's Palace". The truth is that this is the future sight of the new U.S. embassy to Iraq...and it will be far and away the largest embassy operated by the State Department. Here are a few fascinating facts about the new embassy, courtesy of this report:

• Projected cost: $592 million, down from an original estimate of $1 billion+. I wonder how much the end bill will be...
• Number of buildings: 21
• Area: 104 acres, roughly equal to the area of the Vatican (or six times larger than the United Nations Headquarters, or almost six times the area of the White House and its grounds). The architects claim that the embassy will be visible from space, along with the Great Pyramid of Giza and the Great Wall of China.
• Perimeter wall thickness: 15 feet of concrete (that's the thickness, not the height!)
  
• Number of staff members: 8,000+, working in two massive office buildings
• Number of embassy marines: unknown, but presumably enough to take over a small country...or a large city
• Amenities: the largest swimming pool in Iraq, country club, tennis courts, restaurants, gymnasium, cinema, etc etc etc
  
• Independent power plant and water system
  

~Impressive, isn't it? Apparently, some whiners in Baghdad are irritated that this edifice is being built while they only get electricity and water for a few hours a day and that there are a few minor delays in the reconstruction and the occasional act of violence. One can only imagine why they're so annoyed; don't they realize that every day, they'll be able to see evidence of our benevolent presence dominating the Baghdad skyline?
The embassy may seem a bit excessive, but remember that despite what you may have heard, Iraq is still a dangerous place; up until now, our diplomats have had to rough it in Saddam's much-smaller palaces. The Iraqi federal government, as well as other foreign workers, are currently holed up in a heavily-fortified area of Baghdad known as the 'Green Zone', where suicide bombers only occasionally slip through. Since soldiers presumably don't want to keep an entire sector of the city sealed off permanently, this embassy will become the new place from which Iraq is ruled, no wait, I mean, the new place from which the ambassador works.

~Despite the size of the embassy, I am sure we can all believe our leaders when they say that we have no plans to permanently occupy the country. ~Oyasumi.