German (Organization)s are very well organized - a MYTH?

While living in Taiwan one thing I often heard about the Germans being very well organized, very efficient, and always on time. On the other hand I often heard Germans complaining about the inefficiency of Taiwanese companies.
And after almost one year in Germany I can say - it is a myth.
First - governmental organizations
STORY A: a little bit more than a year ago I applied for my son's passport through the German office in Taipei. My son got his passport, and is apparently registered as a German citizen, so far so good. Then just before Christmas I got an email from the German office in Taipei saying there is an application for some kind of German birth certificate for my son waiting in my former hometown in Germany. When I  called the city government there they told me that "sorry, the application has been here since March, but I just couldn't find the time to work on it. There are a couple of questions, but since you live in another city now, we will transfer the application to that city".
So a couple days later i get in touch with the city government here, and they have no clue. OK it is just before Christmas and everybody is in Christmas mode and mood. So I tell them, I will get back to them later. To give them some time I call them again in the second week of January, and "yes, there is something, but we haven't looked at it yet.Please give us a couple of days, we get back to you." So i give them two weeks, I call them again and "hm i can't find anything, please let me talk to my supervisor, who is in a meeting, and then we get back to you." And lo and behold, only two days later, they really call me: "I haven't looked at it carefully yet, but I noticed we still need  the original birth certificate from Taiwan." I complain that I provided all the documents the German office in Taipei requested, and her reply: "but that is how we do it here in Waiblingen. I don't know how other cities in Germany do it, but that is the way we have always done it here. And by the way - it will cost you 100 Euro." Hm, do I get a discount for having to wait a year?

There are tons of other examples - getting a kindergarten place takes forever. Or when they transferred my tax information (tax bracket,etc.) from one city to the other they made a mistake, and i had to show and prove to them that they made a mistake.
Of course we all know that governmental organizations are different than regular companies or organizations.

But how about the military - they should be efficient, right? There was a report recently that the German military is loosing 90 million Euros a year - because they are lending equipment to other organizations (for example research institutions), and then they forget who they gave it to.

I also have some observations from the Deutsche Bahn (the German Railway System), but these observations will go into a seperate blog entry.

How about the regular companies - so far my feeling is that everybody thinks German companies are well organized because they have so many rules. So they must be well organized, right? This is what i have experienced so far:
- I sent stuff to a big German bike company, and though we can track that the package has been received by their staff they cannot find the package.
- Then in another case I get a message from this company that I still owe them around 10 batteries (for e-bikes). I tell them that i send them these batteries like a couple of weeks ago, but they say, "no, these are different batteries." So I spend half a day to find these other batteries (or documentation), when the get back to me and say "oh, sorry. These 10 batteries were the batteries we were looking for."
- Recently anoter bike company sent me a bike from one of their dealers to check. Because I  had a question I contacted the bike dealer directly, and the dealer said that the had sent the bike to the bike company about half a year ago.

And there are tons of other examples. These examples are from the bike industry though, which has the image of being quite chaotic. So at the moment I am applying for jobs at big companies in other industries. If i get lucky and get a job in a big company outside the bike industry i will share my observations about their efficiency.

I don't mind being inefficient, because I know these are all humans. And not that it is better in Taiwan, but what I don't like though is the arrogance with which the Germans often blame the "Asians" if something goes wrong or not according to their plan. Or when they tell me "your fellow country men screwed up again".
So "Asians", take it with a grain of salt the next time someone is talking about Germans' efficiency.

Christmas

Christmas - a time for the family to get together. And so we did. It had been a couple of years since I and my siblings were in Germany to celebrate Christmas together. So it was a special feeling this year and the special feeling was emphasized by having two little kids running around the Christmas tree - our son and our niece (3.5 years). Our son has already fully grasped the spirit of Christmas. He was watching a cute cartoon with teddy bears and cute baby teddy bear got a ride in Santa Claus teddy bear's sleigh when our son noticed that the sleigh was empty and he asked: "Where are the presents?" I am so proud of him.

Here are some impressions of our Christmas - a nice Christmas tree, a lot of food and presents.

One could say -

before ...

...and after