…Really Big Shoe!

Dubya gets a statue after all…
Many Iraqis considered it poetic justice when a journalist tossed his shoes at President George W. Bush last month.
Now the bizarre attack has spawned a real life work of art. A sofa-sized statue of the shoe was unveiled Thursday in Tikrit, the hometown of the former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.
Baghdad-based artist Laith al-Amari described the fiberglass-and-copper work as a tribute to the pride of the Iraqi people.
The statue is inscribed with a poem honoring Muntadhar al-Zeidi, the Iraqi journalist who stunned the world when he whipped off his loafers and hurled them at Bush during a press conference on December 14, 2008.
In the Arab world, even showing someone the sole of a shoe is considered a sign of disrespect.
more HERE

Related:
‘Shoe monument’ in Iraq taken down one day after it was unveiled

U.S. Embassy Baghdad: Bigger than the Vatican

After much delay the United States opened its new $700 million embassy in Iraq on Monday, inaugurating the largest — and most expensive — embassy ever built.
The 104-acre compound, bigger than the Vatican and about the size of 80 football fields, boasts 21 buildings, a commissary, cinema, retail and shopping areas, restaurants, schools, a fire station, power and water treatment plants, as well as telecommunications and wastewater treatment facilities.
The compound is six times larger than the United Nations compound in New York, and two-thirds the size of the National Mall in Washington.
It has space for 1,000 employees with six apartment blocks and is 10 times larger than any other U.S. embassy.
more HERE