Residence Permits

Mike displaying his new Romanian residence permit

Last Friday we received our Romanian residence permits.  We are rejoicing and praising God.  Here is why:
On March 13, after three hectic days of getting papers together and paying fees, we turned in every document needed to the immigration office in Cluj.  During those three hectic days and many other days before those, we relied on the help of many people including Mery, Gabi, Pastor Simi and Pastor Teo to help us collect all the papers we needed.  We were very relieved to have everything turned in on March 13. The official who took our documents told us that we should expect our permits to arrive in thirty days and to come back then to see if they were in.  Our only concern was that foreign visitors can legally remain in Romania for only ninety days at a time and our ninety days were expiring on April 8, only twenty-six days after we turned in our documents.
When we told our Romanian friends about the situation, they said not to expect the permits to arrive in less than thirty days since government offices move very slowly.  They were not worried for us, but did not want us to get our hopes up.
In spite of being told to wait thirty days, we decided to check at the immigration office last Friday, the twenty-third day of our wait.  When we did, the clerk calmly looked through the file of permits and pulled out our two cards.  In just a couple of minutes, we had our permits.  Praise God.  He can even make slow government offices move quickly.