Voces del Prado

A very different museum

Luis Lapausa Arango, General Operations Service Technician (Carpenter), 1960-2008

When I first came to the Museum, when I was at Neptuno, I asked a man who was passing by, "Where is the Prado Museum?" He told me, "Right there." I had it right there in front of me! I climbed the stairs and there the concierge called the other elevator operators and told me: "These are your colleagues from now on. Follow their instructions …" I spent about a month in my own clothes, until a month or a little later they made my uniform. So I learned what they showed me: "Take the lever, pull out the lever, lower the lever, here is the first floor, the second floor, the ground floor." Not much to it.
My wages for the morning shift amounted to 550 pesetas and 400 for the afternoon shift. Altogether it was 950 pesetas a month. With tips I would get an extra 100 or even 50 more.
There comes a time when you realize you're at the best picture gallery in the world. Then it was much different to how it is today. The walls were dirty, the floors were made of wood. Once in the central hall, with the Museum open, a rat came out and the concierge said to me, "Boy, a rat!" I was afraid of rats, and I went one way and the rat went the other way. "Boy, that rat!" He was the one who ended up pushing it towards the elevator. We had our laughs and nobody found out other than the concierge and myself. It could have been an outrage. Luckily it went under the elevator by the Velázquez entrance.