Yesterday, I complained I was having a bad day, but today I learned the story of Constantin Reliu, a Rumanian cook who has been working in Turkey for the past twenty years. The Turks deported him back to Rumania for having expired papers in January 2018, but when he arrived, he learned he was officially dead. It seems Constantin and his wife separated over her infidelity. He went back to Turkey, and she had him declared dead. Sadly, when he returned to Rumania, he tried to have his death certificate reversed, but discovered the time for filing an appeal had expired. He was dead on a technicality.
Officials measured the distance between his pupils and compared it to his passport. It was a match. They took his fingerprints, and they too were a match, but it was all to no avail. Constantin was dead. They had the death certificate to prove it. NBC News reported:
He has since been living a legalistic nightmare of trying to prove to authorities that he is, in fact, alive. He faced a major setback Thursday when a court in the northeastern city of Vaslui refused to overturn his death certificate because his request was filed “too late.” The decision, the court said, is final.[1]
63-year-old Constantin is unable to work. (Who would hire a dead man?) He is unable to return to Turkey. (They won’t admit a dead person.) He is in legal limbo, and his ex-wife has disappeared somewhere in Italy, perhaps with her lover.
I suppose my bad day wasn’t nearly as bad as Constantin’s!
I will rejoice in the Lord;
I will take joy in the God of my salvation.
God, the Lord, is my strength;
he makes my feet like the deer’s;
he makes me tread on my high places (Habakkuk 3:18 – 19).
[1] Downloaded from https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/dead-man-balking-court-rejects-romanian-man-claim-he-fact-n857436