I took the subway (Northern Line) to Nine Elms. Then, with Google Maps in hand, I walked among some really cool houses, passed under a railway line, and arrived in front of the American embassy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What an interesting\nbuilding! I went inside to ask if it really was the embassy because it seemed\nso different from what we have in Bucharest. “Yes, yes, this is the US\nembassy”, confirmed a policewoman from inside.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As I turned around, I\nlaid eyes on the pool that I had been searching for all this way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Wow! How cool! <\/p>\n\n\n\n I think it’s amazing\nto swim in a transparent pool through the bottom of which you can see your\nneighbors walking their children or pets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I stood there like a\nfool, admiring, measuring, and analyzing it, and then I started a flurry of\nphotos and videos (the people from the embassy surely had all their cameras on\nme…).<\/p>\n\n\n\n I tried to find out\nas much as I could about it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n It’s a pool located\n35 meters above the ground! <\/p>\n\n\n\n It connects two\nresidential buildings. Luxury buildings, I\u2019d say. I found apartments for sale\nin the two buildings: a two-bedroom apartment costs over 1 million pounds!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Hold on, don’t rush,\nthey have plenty!<\/p>\n\n\n\n The pool is built\nfrom transparent acrylic. Its side walls are 180 mm thick, and the maximum\ndepth is 3.2 meters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It’s a semi-Olympic\npool \u2013 it’s 25 meters long, with 14 meters being suspended, providing a\nthrilling experience. The remaining part is integrated into the roofs of the\ntwo residential blocks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I picture the\nresidents having conversations like, “Hey neighbor from across the pool,\nI’m swimming over to you, could you give me some flour? My wife ran out and\nwants to make doughnuts”. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Or maybe, “Hey\nRaj’s mom, will you let Raj swim over to me so we can play Minecraft?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n But then, my\nimagination is shattered by reality: there’s a walkway parallel to the pool (as\nseen in the photo), so you can walk over to your neighbors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I read an interesting\ndetail: residents of the two buildings want to close the pool during winter\nbecause heating it is too costly (reportedly 450 pounds per day!), and it\ndoesn’t reach a comfortable swimming temperature. One resident even joked to\nThe Sun, “Basically, we’re heating up the sky” haha.<\/p>\n\n\n\n An official mentioned\nthat they maintain a constant water temperature of 30 degrees, which I think is\npretty boiled\u2026 And I believe I would have seen some steam coming out of it,\nconsidering how cold it was outside.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While I was there, on\na day in February with temperatures around 10 degrees Celsius, no\nresidents-enthusiastic-swimmers showed up. I’ll try again in the summer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Until then, you can\nsee the place filmed by me with enthusiasm and with a neck pain:<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.danamladin.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/us-embassy-london.jpg\")
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