The room was cold and hostile in the way that only bureaucratic government offices can be. Nobody wanted to be here, and yet everybody was compelled to stay. There was a faint smell of cleaning alcohol and a palpable sense of tension in the air. Numbers were barked intermittently over a crackling microphone, struggling to be heard over the background buzz of forced small-talk. Some people sat wearily in uneven rows of chairs; others restlessly stood against the wall. The room was finely balanced between administration and chaos, order and anarchy.