Margaret Street, North Sydney on Monday, 28 September 2020

This street looks like a walkway in a park, going uphill between trees and bushes. First, there are some sandstone houses, a small art deco block of flats and a car mechanic workshop hidden away in a recess. Then steps are going up high to the next level. Halfway is a small lawn with a bench under trees and on the other side a sprawling building with walls and towers like a fortress. Some renovation work is in progress. They are putting in shiny corrugated aluminium roofs that clash with the medieval theme. A man working on the site asks me if I got lost. In turn, I ask him if he is the owner of this building, seeing that he looks a bit older than the average construction worker.

“No, I wished”, he answers. “You wished? It’s rather weird.” “Yeah, it is a bit. It has been here for 40 years.”