This week is a wrapping up of the craziness that is Spring Trips. Today, I offered to run over to Happy Valley and take pictures for insurance and was met with more Global Center-like frustration because, after almost an hour of broken discussions, being passed on over and over to another slightly more highly qualified worker until I finally found myself in a back room, drinking warm water, and having a translator run back and forth from my room to her boss' room, I discovered that I did in fact have to pay the 200 RMB entrance fee even though I was in and out within 10 minutes.
I had to fight strongly the urge not to say, "Well then to HELL with it! We WON'T bring our 100+ kids here next week!" but I knew I couldn't, because 100+ kids and over a dozen adults would be pretty pissed at me.
The next urge was to slam my ticket down on the counter on my way out, but I couldn't do that either because I needed that ticket so I could be reimbursed. So instead, I ordered a McDonalds coffee and sat until the sweat left my brow and my heart calmed down a bit.
Afterwards, I could laugh at the sign above and draw another line on the "Good Story" scoreboard.