Suddenly appeared and also disappeared: the mysterious story of a man from a non-existent country
He is known as a man from Taured. And this story has more questions than answers.
It all happened in 1954. On a normal, no different day, a plane landed at the Tokyo airport. Passengers, as usual, went to the customs inspection. But one person stood out from the crowd — a middle-aged man with a beard, who was overly neatly dressed and looked around.
When the turn came to the stranger, he said that he had flown to Japan for work and this was his third business trip in a year.
He could have gone further, if not for the oddities in the documents, which drew the attention of the airport staff. For example, in the column «Country of residence» was indicated a place called Taured.
In response to the surprised faces of the customs officers, the man said that he really lives in Taureda, and showed the country’s location on the map — between France and Spain, where the small state of Andorra is now located.
Seeing that Taured was not on the world map, the stranger decided that he was being played. According to him, this state has existed for about 1000 years.
And, the strangest thing, there were documents to confirm his words: a passport of a non-existent country with visa stamps from other countries, a driver’s license of a citizen of Taured and European banknotes.
The man spoke several languages, including French and Japanese. But he had no other evidence.
He assured the airport staff that he was late for a meeting at one of the Japanese companies. And there really was such a company.
There was no record of his identity in the local hotel where he allegedly booked a room. The last hope for personal identification — a checkbook — also failed: the bank turned out to be non-existent.
They decided to detain a citizen of an unknown country and locked him in a hotel, which was located near the airport. The man was in the room under the supervision of immigration officials.
When they decided to check it in the morning and entered the room, they did not find either the passenger or his belongings in the room. He disappeared as suddenly as he appeared.
All that is left of him is a passport photo circulating on the net, the authenticity of which has never been confirmed by anyone.
