Random Facts about Romania

16 days and counting! As the trip gets closer, I will be blogging more frequently, so stay tuned for updates!

Today I decided to give some of the facts about the country that I have picked up in my own research, in case you, like me, know or knew little about this country. (I knew it was in Eastern Europe, and I knew it was part of the former USSR, hidden behind the Iron Curtain.) So here we go!

disclaimer: I don't feel like citing each individual fact, so I'll just tell you that I got all of these from either wikipedia or the CIA world factbook, and all the pictures will be public domain stuff found on google images.

 Here is an enlarged view of Europe. Romania is the dark green blob.

>Border countries:  Bulgaria, Moldova, The Black Sea, Hungary, Serbia, and the Ukraine
>It is slightly smaller than the state of Oregon.

>Romania first became a country in 1862, after the principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia (not to be confused with Moldova) united. This happened a few years after the principilaties were freed from the Ottoman Empire. (To avoid a history lesson tapping into my limited knowlodge of the Ottomans [thank you AP Euro], if you don't know what this is, look it up!)
>During WWI, Romania fought on the side of the Allied Powers, and gained new territory which included Transylvania (Welcome to the country, Dracula).
>In 1940, a few years before WWII crossed into our soil, Romania joined the Axis Powers and helped Germany invade the USSR.
>In 1947, Romania became a Soviet entity.
>The communists were finally swept from power in 1996 and the country became a Republic, joining NATO in 2004 and the European Union in 2007.

>The Offical language is Romanian. The Alphabet looks like this:

>There is a 97% literacy rate in the country, when literacy is defined as people over the age of 15 able to read and write the language.

>Romania has four seasons, with a climate similar to ours. Which means I better pack my mittens and scarf!
>The landscape is varried with the Transylvanian Basin in the middle, surrounded by the Eastern Carpathian Mountains (to the East, incase you couldn't put that together) and the Transylvanian Alps in the South. Here is the topographical look:


Here's the Carpathian Mountains (anyone else think Left Behind everytime they read that name?)


And the Transylvanian Alps:


>There is an est. 21 million people living in the Country, with around 2 million living in the capital city of Bucharest.
 This is the Parliment Palace in the capital city.

>89% of the population are ethnically Romanian
>70% are between the ages of 15-75
>They are 7 hours ahead of EST (hello, jet lag! although after the reversal of my days and nights due to the 11 hour difference in Cambodia, I say bring it on.)

>The flag is three equal stipes of (starting on the hoist side) Blue, Yellow, and Red, which merged the colors of Wallachia (red and yellow) and Moldavia (Blue and red). It looks like this:


So there you go. All kinds of information about the country which I will be traveling to in a few short weeks!

Learning something new every day,
Ali