A brush with the Ordnung
Order is very important to Germans. They’d be lost without it, headless chickens in a perpetual state of panic and confusion. “Ordnung muss sein,” they say. There has to be order.
It’s also why they follow orders blindly without ever questioning who’s giving them. It’s their perfect excuse. “I’m just following orders.”
Ordnungsamt officials, by definition, are petty-minded fuckers there to make sure everything is in order. They go around checking the grass, making sure it’s within the permitted height restrictions, they make sure dog shit is lined up in neat little rows on the pavements, they put parking tickets on carelessly parked cars, they round up stray cats and have them shot. They keep order.
Your wan, the power-hungry oul’ bat, started addressing me, saying I didn’t have a kid on the back of the bike anymore. Well, I didn’t slow down. I had two features to write and hadn’t time for her crap. So I kept going.
“Absteigen! Absteigen!” she barked.
Fuck that. I pedaled on. I’d also seen that her Ordnungsamt vehicle was hemmed in by two huge trucks and a digger all stuck where they were because they were too big to maneuver past each other. Her Ordnungsamt buddies further up the road were stranded too.
I made it to the office, got my features written, but now I’ve to go into hiding or change my identity. Your wan will be looking out for me now. I’ll have to grow a beard, get a fake nose and sunshades. I’m a fugitive on the run from the long arm of the Ordnung. At times like this I wish I’d moved to Spain.
Getting bitched at by an Ordnungsamt weenie is a rite of passage. Well done!
ReplyDeleteI love watching the Ordnungsamt at work outside my gym window. The street in front of the gym has a bus lane that should be car free from 7a until 6p, but people cannot seem to read the signs. I adore watching people panic as the Ordnungsamt officials (or BVG officials) come along and ticket cars. It's even more fun when they come with their amazing tow-truck that pulls up along side illegally parked cars and picks them up in less than a minute.
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