Life in a Block Apartment

Much of the housing in Bucharest is in block apartment buildings and many of them are left over from the Communist era. We chose to live in one - on a street, in a neighborhood made up of block apartments. Ours was built during Communism and it has some funny quirks. For one thing they did not put any electrical outlets in bathrooms. Luckily my hairdryer has a long cord so I use the outlet in hallway. Another unusual thing is the hot water. It periodically doesn't exist. It seems the hot water to many of the block buildings comes from a central location and is piped to the building. We have plenty of it - when it works. But it never gets scalding hot and the kitchen sink has yet to have hot water. (We boil water in the microwave when washing dishes by hand.) One of the nice things is the heat. We have yet to turn our radiators on. Heat rises and since we are on the 6th floor of 7, we get other people's heat. So far we've been comfortable. We are also thankful for the elevator. It works most of the time. Life is good!