Before you read my note below from November 2013 I should add that I've grown to like German men, in particular their liberal minds and grundlichkeit (and for getting me out of problematic situations in South Sudan more than once).
// Bor, Jonglei, South Sudan, November 13, 2013: Big, red-headed, German bloke greets me at the lunch table at the World Food Programme tukul, sits down at my table, and starts to offload:
'I'm in charge here. Fortunately only for a week. It's not stressing me but I really don't understand their* level of communication. I tell them to write emails, they say yes, but instead they use their phone!'
I squeeze in a comment about 'verbal communication just appears to be more preferred here', and he goes:
'Yes, but couldn't there be more intercultural exchange OUR way? More institutionalised organisation rather than based on personality?'
At this point I lied and said I had a meeting to attend a little bit further down the road.
*) South Sudanese