BERLIN — A Chinese tourist who tried to report a stolen wallet during a visit to Germany unwittingly signed an asylum application that got him stranded as a refugee for two weeks in the country's burgeoning asylum bureaucracy. 
 
 The well-dressed 31-year-old, known as Mr L., spoke only Mandarin. German authorities only discovered their mistake after turning in desperation to a local Chinese restaurant to interpret for them, a Red Cross official said on Monday. 
 
 "He didn't speak any German or English — only Mandarin," Christoph Schluetermann, head of a Red Cross refugee center in the northern town of Duelmen, told Reuters after the man from Beijing was released to resume his tour of Europe. 
 
 "He spent 12 days trapped in our bureaucratic jungle because we couldn't communicate," he said. "Germany is unfortunately an extremely bureaucratic country. Especially during the refugee crisis I've seen how much red tape we have." 
 
 After being robbed in the tourist town of Heidelberg, the man went to city hall, which he thought was a police station, where he signed an asylum application. He was then taken 220 miles to a refugee shelter in Duelmen and given food and spending money like other refugees. 
 
 More than one million refugees have arrived in Germany in the last year, fleeing war and poverty in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere. There has been only a tiny number of Chinese asylum seekers over the years, Schluetermann said. 
 
 The man was fingerprinted and given a medical exam, but drew the attention of staff partly because he was well-dressed. 
 
 "But he (also) acted so differently to other refugees," said Schluetermann. "He kept trying to talk to people to tell his story but no one could understand him. He kept asking to get his passport back, which is the opposite of what most refugees do." 
 
 Red Cross staff tried to get translation help from on-line apps but only learned the truth when they finally turned to a local Chinese restaurant. 
 
 "It was an extraordinary moment for us all. He said Europe was not what he had expected," said Schluetermann, adding that the man was happy to leave but not upset. 
 
 "What would you expect if you had come to Europe as a tourist and spent 12 days sleeping on a camping bed in a refugee center?" ||||| A Chinese tourist who tried to report a stolen wallet during a visit to Germany unwittingly signed an application that got him stranded as a refugee for two weeks in the country’s burgeoning asylum bureaucracy. 
 
 The 31-year-old, known as Mr L, spoke only Mandarin. German authorities discovered their mistake after turning in desperation to a local Chinese restaurant to interpret for them, a Red Cross official said on Monday. 
 
 Christoph Schlütermann, an official with the German Red Cross, which runs the home, told DPA news on Monday that the man “set machinery in motion that he couldn’t get out of”. 
 
 “He spent 12 days trapped in our bureaucratic jungle because we couldn’t communicate,” he said. “Germany is unfortunately an extremely bureaucratic country. Especially during the refugee crisis I’ve seen how much red tape we have.” 
 
 
 
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 According to Schlütermann, the man said he had been robbed upon arriving in Stuttgart. 
 
 
 
 A spokesperson on refugee issues at the Karlsruhe regional council said that on the afternoon of 4 July, the man arrived at the gates of the refugee reception centre in Karlsruhe as part of a group of seven Chinese people. Two days later, he signed an asylum application at the Patrick Henry Village processing camp outside Heidelberg, where it appears his passport was taken from him. 
 
 She said he filed his papers in the presence of a Mandarin interpreter, and should therefore have been aware of the steps he was taking. He then travelled 220 miles (360km) to a refugee shelter in Dülmen, where he was given food and spending money like other refugees. 
 
 More than one million refugees have arrived in Germany in the last year, fleeing war and poverty in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere. There has been only a tiny number of Chinese asylum seekers over the years, Schlütermann said. 
 
 
 
 The man was fingerprinted and given a medical exam, but drew the attention of staff partly because he was well dressed. “But he [also] acted so differently to other refugees,” said Schlütermann. “He kept trying to talk to people to tell his story but no one could understand him. He kept asking to get his passport back, which is the opposite of what most refugees do.” 
 
 With help from a translation app and then from a translator at a Chinese restaurant, it became clear that the man wanted to travel on to France and Italy, not seek asylum. It took German officials 12 days to put the story together and send him on his way, Schlütermann said. 
 
 “It was an extraordinary moment for us all. He said Europe was not what he had expected,” said Schlütermann, adding that the man was happy to leave but not upset. “What would you expect if you had come to Europe as a tourist and spent 12 days sleeping on a camping bed in a refugee centre?” 
 
 • This article was amended on 9 August 2016. An earlier version said that the Chinese man had been robbed in Heidelberg, where he then erroneously signed an asylum application at the town hall. The city council of Heidelberg has since issued a statement clarifying that there is no record with the police of the man having been robbed in the city. It is also impossible to apply for asylum at Heidelberg town hall.
– A well-dressed tourist visiting Germany from China was robbed in Heidelberg, but he filled out the wrong set of paperwork in an attempt to report the crime. Known only as Mr. L and fluent only in Mandarin, he went to the town hall instead of the police station, signed an asylum application instead of a missing item report, handed over his passport, had his fingerprints taken, and was bused 220 miles away to a refugee shelter in Duelmen. All the while he did his best at charades to communicate that he just wanted his passport so he could visit Italy and France, reports the Local. But the 31-year-old had become entangled in the German asylum system, which has processed 1 million refugees in the last year alone, reports the Guardian. Most have fled Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan; very few have sought asylum from China. "He spent 12 days trapped in our bureaucratic jungle because we couldn't communicate," the head of a Red Cross refugee center tells Reuters. The well-dressed man from Beijing stood out as it was, and he also clearly had a story to tell. But it wasn't until someone went to a local Chinese restaurant for help that it was suggested Red Cross workers use a smartphone app to translate, which did the trick. After more paperwork, which was further delayed by paperwork mishandled when Mr. L first entered the country, the tourist was sent on his way south. The entire ordeal took 12 days, and yet he walked away politely and without anger. "He said Europe was not what he had expected," the Red Cross official says. (Read about another tourist mishap.)