keptmathilda: Oh my fucking god… today is a great day! Completely unexpectedly we achieved a
keptmathilda: Oh my fucking god… today is a great day! Completely unexpectedly we achieved a major breakthrough in our fight against the almighty German bureaucracy. We were at the foreigners office this morning to sort out some visa related things and the guy at the counter just gave us an appointment for January 15. I told him that it’s not possible for us to come back in January because my man has to leave Europe for 3 months in December. And then he said… okay, well… then your appointment is right now, just wait another 15 minutes and go to room 0.024. So we wait and go to room 0.024 in order to hopefully get more information about what other papers we need for His visa and how long exactly it will take etc. And while we are talking to the lady in room 0.024 she suddenly pulls this greenredish passportlike looking paper out of her drawer, puts it in the printer and it came out with His name on it and the date May 19 2018 and she said “This is His temporary residence permit for the next six months. Just mail the necessary papers to me within this time.” And that was it. We fight for eight weeks against this fucking German bureaucracy and suddenly it’s just waiting 15 minutes, going to room 0.024 and then a “Here’s your residence permit”?! I’m completely done, in a happy way of course…. That paper looks familiar. I think we had two or three of them before finally getting married.This might be a bit of a rant, but: German bureaucracy is highly inefficient and process-obsessed. It took a lot of trial and error for me to learn that the officials aren’t obligated to give out advice. In some cases (tax or law related) they’ll even actively avoid it. So the “trick” is to relax, show up well prepared and know the terms, be super friendly and eager, and actively ask them about the process. If they get the vibe that you’re willing to play the game while staying friendly and undemanding, things get surprisingly easy and sometimes even fast. *rant end* -- source link