Maya Talks

I finally got my German driver’s license (Führerschein). not that it was so complicated, I was just lazy at doing it.

So, how do you get your Führerschein? 

If you have a driver’s license that was issued by a European Union country it’s valid in Germany. If it was issued by a country outside the EU (Israel for example…) , you can only use it for six months from your arrival. You can also get a six-month extension to use your license. After a year you must obtain a German driver’s license .In some cases it’s just a matter of exchanging the license for a German one. In others you’ll need to take an exam or a driving test.

We went to the ADAC (Allgemeiner Deutscher Automobil-Club e.V.) ) which is kind of the Ministry of  Transportation combined with MEMSI…  we gave them our licenses and got it back translated to German after two weeks. With our translated licenses we went to the city council (RATHOUS). Three weeks after (and some amount of Euro’s…) we were the proud holders of a German drivers license.

It sounds fast and simple but at first it didn’t look like that. We were told at the city council that we will have to take an exam. Only after insisting we managed to convince the nice lady that we just need to replace our licenses. Then we were sent to ADAC for the translation of our license. At ADAC we were told that we have to translate our license by ourselves from Hebrew to German. Again we had to insist and explain that this license is in an international format and written both in Hebrew and English. After further negotiations and clarifying  the actual format they agreed to translate our license. when we got our license back, translated, we were able to replace it for a German one. 

I always thought that in Germany you don’t argue or insist or try to negotiate. But I guess I was wrong. And come to think of that, why shouldn’t you insist if you think something is not reasonable? Doesn’t it sound crazy that I’ll take an international license written in English and translate it? then what’s the point of having an international license? Or taking an exam after driving for 16 years just for issuing the exact same license I already have??

And all that just because people do exactly what they were told to do. I can’t say anything bad about the people at the ‘Amt’ (the state office) because they do their jobs. But there are times I feel like they are not meant to think, or go out of the box.

I guess sometimes you just have to be an Israeli.

This is not me, it's a man with a spagetti colander on his head

I have a new Hebrew blog!! You are more than welcome to register and read, it’s all new so only one post but there are more to come. Hope to meet you there.

Don’t worry, I’m keeping this one as well

www.fraumaya.com

So we went to buy a sofa. We decided that enough is enough, our TV is getting lonely in the empty living room and is looking for a partner for life.

You would think that this should be pretty simple, just go to the store, pick a sofa and swipe your credit card. But you are wrong. At least for the first part. Yes, we did go to the store and find a nice sofa, But you can’t just give your credit card and forget all about it.

 We are used to the system of paying installments, when you divide the total amount into equal monthly payments, just by using your credit card. Here it’s not the same. In Germany, the concept of buying with a credit card almost doesn’t exist. People here rarely use their credit card, if they even have one. Most of the people use debit card or cash. If you do want to purchase something and not pay everything at once, usually when you buy furniture, electrical appliances, etc, you use a method that is called “Finanzierung” which is similar to monthly payments, except that the store you bought from provides you the ability to pay in installments directly through your bank account. Before the store approves this financing for the purchase they check against “Schufa” which is the german credit system http://www.toytowngermany.com/wiki/SCHUFA . Schufa is the credit rating system which tracks your entire financial conduct. If you apply for credit, the store checks your Schufa and if your Schufa number is appropriate they approve your purchase. The Shcufa ”rate” is determined based on your continuous financial conduct.

So far it sounds quite simple, but it was exactly the opposite… The guy in the store was asking for all kind of details – where do we live, where do we work, what was our address back in Israel, it was almost as if we are going to buy a house and not a sofa. It took him about half an hour to fill out all the forms, like there are no computers in the world. He had to take a copy of my identity card and Asaf’s passport, his boss had to approve and sign the forms and send it to their Bank, and the whole process started to feel like this is going to be a long-term relationship with this store.

Eventually we went home, with all the papers and with a promise that we are now the happy owners of a new sofa which will arrive to our home in a month and a half. 

Lesson learned   – Germans are thorough, they take their time, but things are getting done.