waiting for the golden ticket

One of the most difficult things about living in China is this: things that were simple, easily accomplished tasks in the States become great big, pain-in-the-butt chores, partly because of the language gap, but also partly because things operate differently here. For example, today I went to the internet place to pay my monthly internet fee. This is a task I wouldn't even go somewhere to do, were I in the States. I would just punch a couple buttons on my online bank account, and then: click. bill paid. done.

But there is no automatic online paying here, so, bill payment must take place in person, a task made all the more difficult by my lacking language abilities. Anyway, when I got to the internet service office today, I realized I didn't have my account number with me, and I wasn't going to be able to pay the bill without it. Then I realized, I had absolutely no idea what or where my account number was! I assumed it was on one of the many receipts we collected in the first few days we were here. So I came home, took out all the receipts we had saved from those first few crazy days, and spent about 20 minutes trying to figure out which one was the one from the internet service.

Now, here I am, half an hour later, thinking I've figured out which receipt is the right one, but I'm not entirely sure. None of the receipts say anything remotely resembling "internet" in bold print across the top, and I'm tempted to just sit down, eat a couple of Oreos, and put off paying this thing for a couple more days, in the hopes that the magical receipt with the magical account number will magically appear.