Over the years, Polish blocks of flats have developed a specific infrastructure of carpet hangers, dilapidated playgrounds, mud puddles so deep they could gobble down a car, infamous dumpsters, and thickets, in which many of us smoked our first cigarettes and experienced our first kisses. The architectural landscape of such blocks, with their variety of subcultures depending on the location of the buildings, their size, the neighbourhood, year of construction and many other factors, has also created less obvious, sociologically niche phenomena that many of us do not know existed.  

Not all tower blocks were inhabited, so to speak, with the conventional one family per flat. There existed residential buildings that belonged entirely to institutions that rented them to their employees. One such block of flats, owned by the University of Łódż, was the 11-floor high rise building in the Widzew district. It was called the ‘Assistant Professors’ Hostel’. Contrary to the name, suggesting a temporary nature of accommodation, my mother and I lived there for six years. Those six years shifted between being entire normal and surreal to the extent that they felt as if they belonged in another universe.

The eerie space unfolded right on the