The ugly American way

The ugly American way

How often have our monies (foreign notes) been refused in
Indonesian banks because they are not pristine and perfect? Last
year I traveled throughout Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam.
Not once did I receive the spoilt brat arrogance that I
constantly have to put up with here.

I try to use banks with a decent background and provenance. I
went to ANZ, I have an account in Australia with them -- maybe
not for much longer, depending on their reply, and I took US$ to
convert to A$ and to transfer to a Commonwealth Bank account in
Australia.

The bills were perfect except for a wallet fold in the middle.
They, of course, were refused -- the battle raged on for an hour.
Managers were all conveniently unavailable. Business behind me
came to a stand still. Eventually, I had to resort to "the ugly
American" method, obnoxious and loud insults. I let them know
that it stops right here, right now with me and I'm not leaving.
Finally, hypocritically, they would accept my "dirty" money only
if I converted from dollar to rupiah first and then to A$ at far
worse than the usual exorbitant bank rates. The birthday kid at
home ate the loss.

This arrogant attitude sickeningly pervades all levels of the
economic, judicial and government sectors of this nation. Ethics,
a foreign concept and all its strange global connotations, has no
meaning here. It must be force fed, as must be done with
recalcitrant children. How's about we all add five minutes of
grief towards those who try to enforce these bumptious policies.

BRIEN D.

Jakarta