Germans are generally quite precise, which can be both good and bad. It can mean that things are done correctly, but it can also mean that people waste endless

Germans are generally quite precise, which can be both good and bad. It can mean that things are done correctly, but it can also mean that people waste endless time obsessing over how to exactly implement every minute detail of a rule. Just to give you an example of the latter: a Vietnamese-German woman (a German citizen who speaks German natively) was recently in the news because the local authorities have refused to issue her baby a birth certificate for over 6 months.[0] When she went to get a birth certificate, the authorities told her that her last name, Le Nguyen - which already appears on all of her German documents - does not meet their standards. They refuse to issue a birth certificate for her baby until she changes her last name to something the German regulations allow. To make the situation even more absurd, the problem is that the German regulations state that double family names do not exist in Vietnamese (surprise: they do).[1] If the mother had a French double name, it would be no problem. The problem is not even the baby's last name - it has the father's last name. The problem is that the birth certificate has to list the mother and father, and the authorities refuse to write the mother's name. Instead of just giving the mother a bit of leeway and issuing a birth certificate, the authorities insist on inflexibly following some completely incomprehensible interpretation of the regulations. Suddenly, after thirty-something years of living in Germany, this lady has to suddenly change her last name, and until she does that, her baby - a German citizen - has no official documentation and cannot receive any government benefits. Repeat this daily across many aspects of daily life, and you can see how it would become a problem. 0. https://www.tagesschau.de/inland/regional/berlin/rbb-keine-geburtsurkunde-wegen-nachnamen-mutter-fuehlt-sich-diskriminiert-102.html https://www.tagesschau.de/inland/regional/berlin/rbb-keine-g... 1. https://www.rbb24.de/panorama/beitrag/2024/10/interview-berlinerin-vietnamesische-wurzeln-standesamt-geburtsurkunde.html https://www.rbb24.de/panorama/beitrag/2024/10/interview-berl...