Sir, – Derek Scally tells us there is no equivalent for the English-language term “German efficiency” as he bemoans waiting in a supermarket queue in Berlin for a second till to open (“Germans don’t like what Euro 2024 has exposed about their country”, World, July 13th).
As someone who has regularly shopped in Aldi since it first opened in Ireland, I find the opposite to be the case.
Indeed, such is the “German efficiency” of my local Aldi with regards to opening tills when even the slightest queue develops, I often wonder why this type of customer excellence can’t apply in all customer-facing organisations.
Perhaps it’s time for Germany to go back to basics and bring back to its own country a key strength that it has exported with great success to small markets like Ireland. – Is mise,
Bodies by Christine Anne Foley: a slippery, shape-shifting story about the indignities of modern dating
Trump shooting suspect: FBI finds few red flags on would-be assassin
Do you often tell people how busy you are? Here’s why you should stop
Ireland v South Africa: ‘When you get a win like that it makes your summer. It’s not an exaggeration’
TOM McELLIGOTT,
Listowel,
Co Kerry.
A chara, – I enjoyed Derek Scally’s well-informed and slightly sad assessment of Berlin.
However, whoever wrote the caption to one of the photographs accompanying the article seems to think that “Hauptbahnhof” is the name of a railway station; no, it simply means main station.
Curiously, the Russian word for railway station (vokzal) derives from a group of Russian visitors’ misunderstanding the name of a London station (Vauxhall). – Is mise,
TERRY WALSH,
Cartagena,
Murcia,
Spain.