International Bureaucracy
I seem to be fighting bureaucracy on two fronts: get my visa registered in Mexico and get my voter registration cleared up in Germany. Both fronts hold some surprises. Mexican bureaucracy is absolutely crazy — I never thought it would be so hard. Just to register your visa — I have to stress this again: I already have a visa, I just want to register it with local authorities — you need 12 different documents. These include things as diverse as a utility bill, a copy of your landlord’s ID, a proof of economical support (already needed for acquiring the visa) and a form in which you have to describe your physical appearence, including form of nose and chin, thickness of your eyebrows and form of mouth. Honestly, some days I think Kafka was actually Mexican.
On the other front, I am fighting to get into one — any — voter registry after recently having changed residence and therefore leaving my registration status with German authorities unclear. I honestly did not think that I would manage to get this cleared up in time — after all, elections will be held September 18th and I am currently in Mexico. I still tried and it was almost as easy as a breeze. I called the registration office at 07:30 German time — when I called again at 09:00 I had my registration cleared. Then I called the election office and asked just how fast they could get my absentee ballot to my parents’ house. Answer: “Tomorrow is no problem, just send an email requesting the ballot stating you need it urgently until then and we will send a courier.” Wow. I am still astonished. What happened to German bureaucracy and why does Kafka live in Mexico nowadays?
