The bank is lots of fun.
I walked through the shiny glass double doors, glad to be free from the oppressive heat of the sun. I made my way leftwards, parking myself behind the yellowtape line on the floor. Three feet ahead of me, an elderly gentleman stood in a slightly-hunched stance, thoroughly engrossed in his affairs. He must have been there for a good ten minutes, intently looking at the teller screen. I was in no hurry, though. Even at nine in the morning, the bank was buzzing with activity. Various men and women, serious expressions on their faces, shuffled around the various corners of the high-ceilinged hall, conducting their Very Important Transcations.
The elderly gentleman stepped aside, signifying that it was my turn. The clunky metal buttons were loads of fun. Wheever I pressed down on them, they would click into place in a very satisfying way. Capital letters and dollar amounts flashed upon the frame. And then, like a magical tablet in an ancient labyrinth, the trapdoor slid open, revealing a pair of plastic teeth. In between these teeth sat twenty pale blue bills, perfectly straightened and perfectly stacked. With relish, I plucked the stack out of those polystyrene jaws, which offered just the right amount of resistance to make me feel like the contents therein would be well-earned. I snatched my card, retraced my steps. The gray-haired security guard, donned in his faded blue uniform, gestured me forward. "Number one", he declared, in impeccable English.
I shoved my ID forward, and the teller snapped it up. She brushed aside her mug of tea to make room for an official document. She scribbled some circles upon the page, and passed it to me. In my typical inelegant fashion, I filled out the circled fields, and signed my name. The teller took the paper excitedly, proceeding to adorn it with a series of stamps. She stamped with great force, so that the red ink would appear crisp on the page. She corralled my bundle of blue bills and fed them into a small machine. Like a wise sage, the machine spit out the bills in rapid succession, displaying with utmost accuracy the amount of money I had given her. Then, in a surprising twist, the teller peeled back my signed document to reveal not one, not two, but three identical pages beneath. One blue, one red, one yellow.
The teller handed me a small ticket, as well as the yellow-colored page, and directed me to a foggy glass booth to the left, behind which sat an older, slightly plump gentleman. I laid down my ticket. He examined it closely. Then, he stood up and sauntered backwards, stopping just short of the massive steel door of the vault. He extracted a small plastic tub from the third shelf of a file cabinet. He pulled out a thick orange stack of bills, counted out precisely five, and handed them to me.
I pocketed my precious orange bills, and, just like that, it was time to be on my way. The bank had been lots of fun.