the cold house
the journal of Michael Werneburg
twenty-eight years and a million words
Kokubunji, 2022.01.18
It's not cold in Tokyo, but the houses sure are. I gave Mari and poncho thing for X'mas that plugs into her PC via USB to keep her warm. She uses that plus a heating pad I bought her the year before plus the air conditioner built into the ceiling of the room. Because you can't work for long in -1º or 5º, and our house is as cold as the outdoors. The windows are single panes of glass and the walls have literally zero insulation. In fact there are gaps between the floor and wall. We paid $10,000 in fees and so on to move in here. Japan's housing stock is lousy.