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.