Location Mayangone township Price K250 million, (sale) Contact Daw Ni Ni Nyunt Phone : 660 844 095 044 850

THE idea behind Roman pillars, presumably, is to imbue grandeur. But what happens when everyone has the same idea?

Other than a colossal waste of building materials, the end result of so many houses featuring “grand” Roman pillars is a distinct feeling of monotony.

Which brings us to this three-bedroom house in Mayangone township. In short, it does nothing to set itself apart from the glut of other such homes in Yangon. Both inside and out, it’s a carbon copy of hundreds, perhaps thousands of homes in Myanmar’s largest city.

There are numerous pillars, crisp white walls, reflective windows, several balconies, an over-the-top, two-storey portico and the ever present rolls of razor wire – it just screams “home”. Not.

With so much space taken up by the portico, there’s precious little room for Mother Nature. In fact, every effort has been made to suppress greenery – aside from a tiny patch of lawn – from the site through the judicious use of concrete and slate.

The lounge area is decorated with highly ornate and heavy wooden furniture that does not come with the sale, there’s a teak parquet floor and the lighting is provided by dramatic fittings set into a complicated recessed ceiling.

There’s a common bathroom, a dry kitchen with built-in cupboards and a dining room that in no way matches the lofty levels of ornamentation set by the living room next door.

There’s also a wet kitchen at the back of the dining room and a store room under the staircase,

An ensuite master bedroom takes up the rear section of the upstairs area and there is also an ensuite single and ordinary double bedroom upstairs.

The house comes with a 60-year lease; it’s fed by mains water and has two electricity meters. There are also five air-conditioners and one telephone line.