If on a Winter’s Night

If on a winter’s night, a traveler…no, no…that’s Italo Calvino’s latest book.

Let me start again.

If on a winter’s day, a professor…ah, yes, this one is me.

If on a winter’s day, a professor skids on ice past snowy partially covered gold domes to the wide and windy portico, passes the stone-faced security guards, ignores the need for coffee, and arrives in her office feeling confident that perhaps, the day will hold few surprises, clearly, she is out of touch with reality.

She knows better.

Her gut told her, but she did not listen.

She was too busy taking care of organizational phantom needs to take care of herself.

At 11:00 a.m. she heard Murat in the hallway calling “The tenge has just been devaluated!” An email arrived announcing the same. Money was transferred but it was too late. Twenty digit thousand dollars too late for her.

Ah, if on a winter’s day, she had taken care of herself.

But she did not. Now she and thousands like her pay the extra price.

With one swoop, Kazakhstan National Bank changed monetary history in the country, making expats lose thousands in savings, lowering by thousands the salaries each month, and increasing prices throughout the country.

ABCD, the multinational but incompetently and diabolically controlled and locally owned bank not only of course, participated in the devaluation but also…