Ramblings...Bank Day

My hands are still shaking.  Thirty minutes ago I was stabbed dozens of times.  It happened at the local bank.

 “Going to the Bank Day” happens once a month for our family and I always seem to wake up grumpy that day.  But my 14 years of banking in La Paz didn’t prepare me for what happened today. 

 I walked  to 16 de Septembre  to exchange dollars for pesos.  When I approached the bank, the line was snaking out the door.  Holy cow.  I’d forgotten that Monday and Tuesday were bank holidays and now everyone was playing catch up.  What was I thinking?  But we NEEDED to pay the masons who were working at our house so I saw no escape. 

Before we left for the summer our bank gave us a Preferred Client card which means that instead of waiting in a long line with the crowd, we’re granted speedy service by a special teller.  I was excited about using this card for the first time today but things went very wrong. 

I stood at the door of the bank and scanned the room for the Preferred Client line but couldn’t see it so I walked by all the waiting people.  And that’s when I felt it.  The first stab.

I could feel her eyes pierce my spine.  Other eyes joined in. I looked at the floor and kept walking but I couldn’t find the Preferred Client sign!  I turned and hurried toward the exit.  Was it my imagination or were people gloating? 

I stood at the end of the line for five minutes and calculated that it would be a two hour wait. I took a deep breath and again walked past the waiting crowd.  I finally found the Preferred line.  Only one man in line ahead of me.  But instead of relief, my stomach felt like I’d eaten a bad taco.

The teller told me that in order to exchange dollars into pesos, I’d have to deposit the dollars and then I could immediately withdraw pesos.  I’m sure there’s a perfectly logical explanation for banking procedures in Mexico but they make no sense to this older American woman.

 I handed the teller my bank card, he looked at the computer, then at the card, and finally at me.  He said, “I’m sorry but your card has been frozen”. 

Greeks don’t blush – we don’t have the needed pigmentation - but I could feel something akin to a hot flash wash over my face. 

“Por que?”  I whispered.  He pointed to the manager’s office.  I walked up seven steps and met a gentleman who was texting on his cell phone.  His office had a view of the entire line of waiting clients.  I felt like we were living a Greek tragedy. 

He took my card and looked at the computer.  He went downstairs and came back with a new ATM card.  He disappeared again and this time he returned with a big shiny box containing three Teflon cooking pots.  He handed the box to me and said, “This is for you.”  For the second time in five minutes I said, “Por que?”

He answered, “For the deposit you just made”.  Not only had I skipped to the front of the line, now everyone knew I’d made a deposit worthy of a gift.

He reached for my hand, thanked me and, as I stood at the top of the stairs, I felt the crowd demanding my blood. How many people in that long line would be thrilled to have this box?  I felt like confessing, “Honest, I just deposited the money for 15 seconds then I withdrew it.  I didn’t do anything special.” Do they know that I don’t need nor want three new pots and that I will give them to the woman who cleans my house?  I swallowed a cocktail of guilt and shame and felt each set of eyes take a stab at the Preferred status I know I don’t deserve. 

I carried the damn box fifteen blocks and with each step it felt heavier.  I staggered through our front door and told Alex that I’m never going to the bank again.  Ever!  I’m afraid.  I imagine a paranoid future where I imagine people are staring at me and I’ll assume they were in the bank that day and I’ll feel  their anger pierce my thinly coated Teflon heart.

I visited a friend and whined that I have two women who help me in the house.  Which one should I give the gift to?  She asked me to wait a minute, left the room and returned carrying an armful of black fabric.  She said, “Next month when you go to the bank wear this.”  I unfolded a burka.  

So, if you happen to go to the bank and see a short woman covered head to foot in black, and if she’s walking away from the Preferred Client line, and happens to have a box-like shape, it’s just this older American woman carrying away another box of Teflon pots.

Returning to La Paz

Every October it’s the same.  I try.  Really, I do.  I force myself to stay in my seat with my seatbelt securely fastened until we come to a full and complete stop but then I’m infected with group hysteria.   I jump up, hit my head on the overhead compartment and the jolt reminds me that pushing won’t help.  I see a few passengers still seated.  They look so relaxed but I’m positive they’re so self- medicated that they couldn’t bolt if they wanted to.  But for the rest of us – we want OFF now. 

I adore deplaning in La Paz.  I love standing at the exit door at the top of the stairs and taking my first breath of Mexican air. …a combination of jet fuel, dust and a few particles of solar magic.   I’ve never fallen down the stairs but I worry about it any way.  Until recently I was concerned about bruising my ego but now I don’t want to break anything - like an arm or the perfect set of espresso cups I stashed in my carry-on.

Every year I say to Alex, “Let’s not unpack; let’s just go walk on the Malecon”.  And every year he says, “Okay”.  But, even though he agrees, we find ourselves unpacking until there’s stuff covering every surface in the house and we’re too tired to decide where one more thing needs to go and then he says, “I’m hungry…… Rancho Viejo”?  I say, “Let’s walk.” And he looks like I’ve stabbed him with his own dinner fork but he knows how much I need to stroll the Malecon so we pull on our tennis shoes.

Saturday is a perfect evening to return to L a Paz.  Parents, children,  lovers with Super Glued lips, and older couples holding hands  compete for sidewalk space with joggers, bicyclists, in-line skaters and both street and pure-bred dogs.  Great blue herons observe the action from pogo stick legs.

For the first time in four months we run into friends.  They describe the stifling La Paz summer but they don’t know I’ve endured a friendless summer. I can’t let go of their hugs.

We hear more music (live and recorded) during our walk to Rancho Viejo than we’ve heard all summer:  Tailhunter, Bismark’s, Adrianna’s, Kiwi, the Kiosk, Jungle…you get the picture.   My steps match the beat and our “stroll” becomes an aerobic workout.    I feel justified to eat with gusto:  three greasy flour tortillas piled high with tender arranchera beef and a tall glass of  tangy jamica.  I wash my hands in the well worn shallow pink cement sink and try to remember what possessed us to fly north in June.

Our evening walk and our dinner has satiated us so we ignore our suitcases, take showers and stretch out on our own bed for the first time in months. I squish my pillow just right and close my eyes.  Can I be any happier?  

Then I hear it.  The music that made me smile an hour ago sounds like it’s right outside my window.  Cars are whizzing by.  Dogs are barking.  And car alarms are blaring.  There’s another sound, too.   I look over and, illuminated by the streetlight, I see that Alex’s eyes are closed and his mouth is open.   He’s snoring!   I try lying very still.  I turn.  I thrash.  I head for the medicine cabinet and remember the zoned out passengers on the plane.  I want one of their pills but I have nothing stronger than a Benadril.   I swallow one and wait for sleep.  The last time I look at the clock it’s 3:45.  

At 7:15 Trinidad, the newspaper hawker blares by.  And, as he invites me to buy the newspaper ahorita ahorita, I recall that, what seems like ages ago, I wrote a piece for the Baja Citizen complaining about the quiet in Escondido.  I grin, pull on a pair of shorts from my “give away pile”, take my cup of espresso to the patio and imagine that the sparrows are squawking about our return.  Ahorita, ahorita…my day has started.

A Novel Approach

She said I’d adore it. But I’m a person that loves to postpone gratification so I held off until I was tingling with excitement. I changed into something comfortable, poured myself a tiny glass of sherry, and began.  I was into it for about twenty minutes and… I hated it.  Was I being too hasty?  I’d give it a few more minutes.  Nope.  Absolutely detested it.  “How could she like this?” I asked myself.  I got up and paced.   I picked up the phone to call her but I didn’t want to hurt her feeling – this was the first time she’d steered me wrong.  When I’m frustrated chocolate always helps so I slammed the novel shut, threw it on the coffee table and headed for my secret chocolate stash.

I love to read but not this sentimental patriotic junk. But my mind kept whispering, “Aren’t you overacting just a teeny bit, Judy?  Put down the chocolate and let’s explore why you’re so angry”.

Brief storyline:  Young beautiful Iranian woman goes to The United States on a three month visa looking for a man to marry so she can remain in the country…and she falls in love with the American people and freedom they have. She meets the man of her dreams but there’s only one problem – he’s not Iranian.  After several misunderstandings rooted in cultural differences and fear of her parents’ reactions, she realizes that the handsome barista is her destiny.

Simple enough formula:  desire – obstacles – resolution.  No reason to feel so disgusted.

What didn’t seem fair (that four letter “F” word frequently used by the naive) was that the author described Iran as a terrible place and America as perfect.  I know.  I know.  Authors write for their readers and every writer hopes to publish so, in this case, she was trying to tempt English speakers to buy her book. But my gut told me that she was pandering to a blindly patriotic audience and I would have no part in it. 

Then I thought of my parents. They were born and grew up in Greece and, when they had the opportunity, they left.  My mother had seen American movies of leading ladies wearing gowns and furs and so, being a poor village girl, she used her small savings to have a satin apricot colored gown sewn for the dances she imagined she would attend aboard the ship. She didn’t know that even if she hadn’t been seasick the entire voyage, she wouldn’t have been allowed to join the first class passengers.  She might have had second thoughts about her dream when, once they arrived in New York, my father brought her to live on the lower East Side in a cold water, walk-up flat where they shared the toilet with three families. Although they recognized the positive and negatives of both countries, when they were financially able, they never returned to visit Greece; they vacationed in Hawaii instead.  Hmmm.

My husband and I left The States willingly.  We wanted a better and different life.  My husband isn’t naïve – he sees the problems of both countries. But I’m absolutely defensive about Mexico.  I don’t want to hear anything negative about it.  However, I often complain about the problems that exist in the country where I was born.

Click.  I sound amazingly like the protagonist of the novel that my friend loaned me.  I see everything right about Mexico. I love the freedom I have to walk the Malecon late at night and watch the families laugh and play with their children.  I enjoy the music of Mexico and the food.  I’m still amazed that we can sit in a restaurant for hours and not be handed the check until we ask for it.  I even love that when I’ve been stopped for a driving infraction I’m able to drive away with a warning and a five minute Spanish lesson instead of a ticket.  

If I can see the positives of my life in Mexico, why shouldn’t a fictional character love her adopted country?  Why am I allowed to see the negatives of my birth country but the novel’s heroin shouldn’t?  She and I are emotional twins who enjoy cultural change. 

It took me three days and six bars of Trader Joes 75% dark chocolate to finally find peace.  I opened the novel and started over and this time I laughed and empathized with the protagonist.  And when I finished the book, I called my friend and thanked her for loaning me the novel because it isn’t often that a simple story challenges us to wrestle with our beliefs and win.