Real life stories

R.C. is a Moldovan citizen, born in the Republic of Moldova in October 1973. She is married to C.C., a Romanian citizen, since 1999.

The two have a boy and a girl. The boy is 21 years old and the girl is 9 years old. Both children are Romanian citizens. R.C. comes from a family with three sisters. Her father is a policeman and her mother, a physiotherapist, died in 2002. The two sisters of Mrs. R.C. live in the Republic of Moldova. One of them is married and takes care of the other sister who is seriously ill. Mrs. R.C. has completed 11 classes in the Republic of Moldova and she attended nursing school classes for one year. She abandoned these courses because her parents separated. In 1998 she met C.C. in Pitesti, while he was a soldier, and she was a salesman in the central square of the city. After they got married in 1999, the two spouses moved to the house of the husband's grandmother. Since 2007, they have lived with the husband's brother in a two-room apartment, inherited from her husband’s grandmother. Against the background of misunderstandings, in 2014, the two broke up. The former husband currently lives with another woman in the countryside, in a locality in Arges County and has three other children.

For a while, Mrs. R.C. lived as a host in her godmother’s home in Pitesti. The house was modest and had two rooms, a kitchen and a bathroom. In order to be able to live here, they have received, from neighbors, certain household items of strict necessity.

Currently, Mrs. R.C. is still legally married to C.C., although they have not been living together since 2014. Although she has good reasons to divorce, Mrs. R.C. has been unable to file for divorce. Until 2012, Mrs. R.C. did not have legal residence in Romania (residence permit).

Mrs. R.C. had lived in Romania until 2012 on the basis of the passport and the Moldovan identity card, without having a temporary residence permit.

Starting in 2012, until the date of taking over the case, she resided in Romania on the basis of a tolerated permit. From the talks with the head of the Immigration Inspectorate Argeş it was revealed that, under the laws in force, Mrs. R.C. could not extend her stay in Romania without the original identity documents that remained in the Republic of Moldova. The Immigration Service Argeş was in a big dilemma. Legally, she had to be forced to return to the Republic of Moldova, but it was not possible to apply the law in this case because she had two minor children, Romanian citizens, in her care.

The Argeş Immigration Service identified, as a solution, the voluntary return of Mrs. R.C. to the Republic of Moldova with the purpose of obtaining the identity documents in the original. The transport of Mrs. R.C. to the Republic of Moldova was carried out according to international procedures: from Bucharest to the border with the Republic of Moldova she was accompanied by a representative of the International Organization for Migration, and on the territory of the Republic of Moldova she was taken over by the staff of the International Organization for Migration of the Republic of Moldova. During her stay in the Republic of Moldova she recovered her documents and returned to Romania, through the same procedure.

Mrs. R.C. was issued a residence permit on 08.12.2016.

Another need, for Mrs. R.C., was to finding a job. In Romania, she no longer works and needs money to care for her family.

A new component of the integration process was the identification of a decent living space for Mrs. R.C. and her two children to ensure her autonomy. Following misunderstandings between Mrs. R.C. and her godmother, she decided to look for another home. Mrs. R.C. has appealed to one Association of Pitești, Argeș, to help her in finding a home. So, as of December 2017, Mrs. R.C. received a room with its own bathroom for living. The rented room was empty, with no furniture. So, before Christmas, the Association was able to fit the room with bedroom furniture, refrigerator, washing machine and electric hob.

Currently, she lives in this space and pays the monthly rent from the salary she earns.

It remains Mrs. R.C.'s desire to find a stable, full-time job that would guarantee her a decent living.