China’s construction craze has delivered buildings with some rather distinctive shapes. Perhaps the most famous is the Beijing headquarters of broadcaster CCTV, which is known locally as ‘the underpants’. But it may have been supplanted in public notoriety by a building in the North China University of Water Conservancy and Electric Power in Henan (see photo).
“Yep, it’s a toilet,” confirmed one of about a million netizens responding to an article on Sina with photos of the structure. “I laughed so hard I peed my pants”, was a common refrain, although more creative interpretations of what the architect intended came from a netizen who thought it might deter alien invasions (a scenario depicted in the recent sequel to the movie Independence Day, see WiC331). “If alien invaders come to Earth and see this, they’ll flee immediately,” the wag wrote. “They’ll think the humans here have 20-metre wide asses.”
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