Language can be a funny thing. The turn of a phrase can have subtle but subconscious ways of manipulating how we experience and perceive reality. This isn't news, of course, but the true power of words was recently brought home to me in a rather odd way.
A month ago, I put my bank card into an ATM and was briefly distracted before entering my P.I.N. number. And, as they are supposed to do when a card is left sitting inactive, the good bank machine ate my card. I guess I'd never really thought too hard about what this means. As someone who has done this on more than one occasion, I suppose that without giving it explicit thought, I just sort of pictured the machine swallowing and then digesting the card, possibly through a shredder of some sort, deep in it's metal bowels. The card is gone. RIP.
I've always just gone to the bank and got a new one.
For all I know, in Canada, when bank machines eat your card, they may in fact do this. It turns out that in China, they don't. Being the complete procrastinator that I am, and, to be honest, a little scared at how hard it would be to get a new card, I put off the process and simply used my Canadian account for awhile. However, the fees are astronomical and eventually, I had to accept that I would need a new Chinese card. My first step was to get a Chinese friend to write out exactly what was wrong. Then, after psyching myself up for what would most likely be a very trying day, I set off for the main branch. In my head, I had pictured an endless array of questions posed in Chinese, poorly translated or completely misunderstood by me, leading to person after person after person trying to help me before ultimately being chastised for losing the card and being given a new one.
Imagine my surprise when, after showing the written explanation to a guard, I was taken over to a man who read the note, spoke to someone on the phone and then had a fluent English speaker come over to explain that they had my card. It was being held at a different branch. Getting the instructions to the bank written down, I hopped in a cab, went to the next bank, spoke to the person I was instructed to speak to, and was handed back the original card.
I don't know why it is, but I still can't seem to wrap my head around the fact that my card, rather than being digested and carried off to card heaven, in fact lives, alive and well in my wallet.
