An evening woman burst from an elevator. The little crowd gathered in a basement corridor of the Parliament of New Zealand retired nervously.
His guide, with a white dress, smiled sweetly. “You are welcome to take the elevator,” he said. No one did.
The mysterious deaths, the inexplicable noises and the night appearances are not the usual fodder of the daily tours offered in the buildings of Parliament in Wellington. However, after Thursday, the guides put on the outfit of the Victorian era to give visitors with the least tasty history of the enclosure, mostly factual stories of the real world tragedy and paranormal tradition that have been established among political employees through decades of color.
The history of the Majestic Gothic Library of Parliament is particularly rich in affirmation. Built at the end of the 19th century and feared by some of the security guards and cleaners of the Night Shift of Parliament, it has survived two fires, one flood and being invaded by wild cats.
“This is his last chance to go back,” said the Lisa brand, his face with false blood, to the group that had reached Thursday’s tour, a recent initiative and a hugged by the staff of the visitors center with pleasure.
Walking through a cavernous parliamentary atrium, the guide let out a cry for the Pilso that resonated in the open windows of the offices of the legislators. He explained why the so -called spooky tours are reserved for weeks when the Parliament is not in session.
A Gothic and colorful past
The Parliament Library is a gloomy and adorned building where windows of stained glass and glass lamps reveal wrought iron bannysisers and Venetian decoration. Designed by Thomas Turnbull and completed in 1899, it remains in use by personnel who seek information or some slightly mysterious peace and tranquility.
When the visitors arrived on Thursday, they were received by spectral figures that leaned while sliding down the stairs under the portraits of the former main librarians and the Prime Ministers of New Zealand. The tour guides told a silent audience that the library was in danger from a wild storm that hit Wellington in 1968, sinking a passenger ferry in the port with the death of 53 people.
The storm also hit the Parliament, tearing out and leading the librarians to climb to the roof while trying to protect the books, according to a guide that looked Victorian and dark shadows under their eyes.
“For mysterious and unknown reasons, they did this in underwear,” he told visitors. “There seems to be a story of people who lose their pants here in this Parliament.”
The guide added, with flavor: “I have not even started with politicians.”
A tragic death and a stolen skull
Finally, the tour also became politicians. Known in New Zealand is the story of William Larkoch, a politician who in 1898 was found dead in a room of the Parliament with a revolver in his hands while experiencing financial and family conflicts.
Lark’s ghost, some claim, remains in the building. However, his skull was stolen, and in 1972 he was rediscovered in a university student’s room.
Another informed spirit to Linger is that of the first full -time librarian, Ewen McColl, whose death was partly attributed by some official sources at excess of work.
Shout from the basement
As the tour descended to the basement of the building, the roofs were reduced and the narrow corridors. Frenetic blows resonated from an apparently closed room.
Underground floors house a file that contains the historical and esoteric. It is also the site of some of the strangest events in the building, tourist guides said.
The urban legends transmitted by the staff include stories of hands that extend from the batteries, songs that emanate from empty baths, the appearance of a ghostly woman in a mirror and closed doors that open. More earthly horrors included a cat and subsequent flea infestation in 1977.
After a last scare, visitors emerged slightly shaken in the almost empty lobby of Parliament when darkness fell. The tour was “a little more spooky than I expected,” said Holly Masters, who had last visited Parliament when he was a child. “There were enough deaths here that I didn’t expect to find out.”
Another visitor, Sally Giles, said she was fascinated in learning the stories of those who worked and died in the enclosure “and what they have left behind and how that arises from time to time.”
The tour guides would return to their regular and authorized scripts on Friday’s tours, but some said that the spooky side of the building was never far away.
“I always open the route of the morning,” said Brand, the team leader. “It always feels a little anthill when you are one of the first people walking.”
