In my “Oslo Journal” yesterday, I wrote that the U.S. embassy is the ugliest building in the Norwegian capital. Bruce Bawer, the American writer long resident in that country, wrote in to correct me. Our embassy is the third-ugliest building. The ugliest is Labor Party HQ (how appropriate, say I). And the second-ugliest is the bus terminal.
My journal continues today. I note that some people were missing from the Freedom Forum. One was rude enough to have been murdered. Some are rude enough to be imprisoned (this fellow, for example). Maybe next year . . .
P.S. I am too hard on our embassy. It’s by Saarinen, and it’s an example of sleek midcentury modernism, and I’m sometimes curmudgeonly about that style.