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What’s In A Name?

The day started with a simple statement, “Let’s run by the bank on the way to the bus stop and pay our rent and electricity.”  Simple enough, right?

Yes, we pay all our bills at the bank.  Bac Bamer is it’s name.  Before we could pay our bills we had to pull some money out of our U.S. based checking account.  In order to do that the teller wanted to see my passport and ATM card.  We can use our ATM to pull $300 per day, but, we needed more.

“Sir, we can not perform this transaction for you, because, the names on the passport and ATM card are different.”, said the nice guy behind the glass.  One says Mike Pettengill and the other says Michael Pettengill.  For the record, my name in Honduras is Miguel, Mike and Michael don’t exist here.

“Of course,” I said with a big grin, “you see, Mike and Michael are the same name.”  “No sir,” said the nice man, “they are different names, and we can not complete your transaction.”

“Yeah, but….uh…well….gracias."  Try explaining that one in your second language.

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