May 13, 2004
Lost in the Palace (1)
Okay, not very lost. I just wandered up one of the big staircases when nobody seemed to be looking, then strolled down a hall. I didn't want to use an elevator -- they have attendants, and I was vaguely worried someone might ask me for ID -- but then I noticed an open door that led to a little, dimly lit spiral staircase.
I stepped inside. The stairs went down into obscurity, and up to a smudge of light -- a dirty skylight, many stories above. I stepped inside (making sure the door didn't lock behind me) and started to climb.
It was a long climb. The stairs were very narrow, and made of crumbling concrete, and the railing... wasn't really there, any more. After a couple of floors I paused, puffing a little, to pop my head out of the door.
To my surprise, I saw a floorspace that could have been in any US or Western European office building: a long hallway with faded carpet, punctuated by office doors. I could see people moving around behind frosted glass, and hear a faint murmur of conversation. The carpet was frayed and threadbare, but clean; a couple of artificial plants in black plastic pots stood in front of a door. I breathed deeply and smelled office smells: paper, people, dust. Somehere on the floor, someone was making coffee.
Well, apparently about one-third of the Palace is presently being used: by the Chamber of Deputies, by Romania's Constitutional Court, and as a convention center. Another third is mothballed but still usable. And about another third is going to need serious repair work before it can be used for anything. (If it ever is -- there are some inherent construction problems to be overcome, and then the demand for office space in the Palace may not ever be that great.)
But one-third of that huge building is still equivalent to one or two large Western office buildings. So there are hundreds of people working in the Palace... sitting at desks of varying degrees of antiquity, putting pictures of their grandchildren on the wall behind them, drinking coffee and setting artificial plants in the hall outside their office doors.
Of course, that's perfectly reasonable; but it was still a little... unexpected, somehow.
Anyhow, I popped back into the staircase and continued on up...
Posted by douglas at May 13, 2004 12:16 PM