Around 3:30 p.m. I arrived at Wien Westbahnhof. I took a taxi to hotel König von Ungarn. The taxi driver couldn’t change fifty euros so he escorted me to the front desk manager.
The manager said to the taxi driver: “You are obliged to accept fifty euros, you know that don’t you?”
“I know,” the driver. “I’m sorry. This will never happen again.”
The taxi driver left and then the front desk manager whispered: “Fifty euros is nothing anymore. What can you do with fifty euros? In the early days you could make a woman happy with fifty euros but nowadays?”
I decided the best thing to do was to remain silent. This was not a man in need of encouragement – this was a man in need of obedient guests.