Thursday, April 27, 2006

Vent 3

B"H


Jon Stewart once said, “Insomnia is my greatest inspiration.” What that has to do with the rest of what I want to say.. I’m not sure. Last night, or more hourly correct, this morning at round about 4, I thought I would do my deed of good for the day by placing the key for Wits’ very own red light district (the photographic darkroom) in an undisclosed location within the John Moffit building. A relatively simple task, I imagined.

Ready to go home after I had hidden the key, I walked down to the double glass barrier that awaited my card to be faced with quite a predicament. The predicament was as follows. My card had been swiped. I was in the superfluous cubicle to be met by a second glass door that had now jammed. Remembering that it was 4 in the morning, I wasn’t expecting too many people to be paying the JM any rescue visits. I roamed the studio to look for another way out. Now here is the nitty grtty that I want to raise. How on earth does anybody get out of that building if the electronic lock jam (which they have been rumoured to do!). That building is a fortress if things don’t go well. In the case of fires, general emergencies, anything, how do we get out? After about half an hour of roaming the building and considering pretty much every possible solution, I resorted to either taking a door off the hinges or kicking the glass out to get out. Now here is the second issue of discussion. If I broke the glass door to get out, purely because of Wits’ apathy to fixing anything, am I responsible for payment? Perhaps the legal eagles in the class could comment?

I think it’s about time that somebody starts voicing the student body’s disgust in the Wits’ facilities, both lack and lethargy towards repair and maintenance. We aren’t allowed to design deconstruction like shapes, but if one trys to draw a line on any drawing board in our faculty, u can’t get anything but a curve. Printers don’t work when they are supposed to, and doors jam at 4 in the morning! We pay R22 000 to be there and we are in a poo hole of a building with no decent facilities. Down to something simple. Studio Culture – assuming that we all stayed in the studio to work. Where do we sit? there are not enough chairs. On what do we draw? There aren’t enough drafting board! Ah, the classic argument. Use a table. WE ARE IN A SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE!!!!! GET ME A BOARD, OR DROP THE COMPUTER ISSUE!!! What institute of architecture that has been around for as long as Wits has, doesn’t have boards?!

The end of the story is that the door miraculously opened, when I went down to kick it out.. Chuck Norris can’t even do that.

Please comment and maybe we can start something to get facilities, mended or replaced.



4 comments:

Feige said...

Hehe. I laugh because the very same thing happened to me today. I was waiting for my photo's to finish the wash cycle, when I decided to quicly go to the cadlabs to get the construction lectures. This 5 minute outing turned into a half an hour escape attempt when at 7pm or whatever time it was I couldnt get out. I tried kicking the door, swiping my card 50 times. Eventually Preshanta, a 6th yr rep joined in the attempts-We tried to disable the damn thing by climbing up to look for some emergenc disabling button (which by the way does not exist) Finally by some miracle the door decided to open, had it not we would have been stranded in the hell hole which has become quite like a really ugly prison.

I dont know what will be done, but I can assure you that it will be brought up at the rep meeting and if nothing is done after that, I will personally go to Alan Mabin and tell him to get rid of that damn monstrosity.

Richard said...

hey hey hey, the story is really to familiar, .... sometimes when that happens to me, i just pull up any available object and break into the box on top of the machine (double glass doors) and what do you know chuck norris is hiding up there ...and even i, yes i , cant persuede him to open the door for me, ...

Justin Otten said...

the problem... ladies and gentlemen is that chuck owns the double door system. he monitors it closely and chooses who to lock in and who to let out.

obviously wits can't overpower chuck and get the doors replaced with a single door that works.

Why do we need two doors? Maybe it's to improve our co-ordination when we balance our models, bags, art folders and student card, while pushing doors open with our feet.

This double door system is normally used in bank teller areas, controlling the influx of people, and trapping them if necessary. Is that the design aim of our studio entrance?

Surely one door is just as effective as two glass panels at securing the studio.

Any way...
Enjoy.
J.

Feige said...

richard what box above the door? That is such a usefull thing to note...