Location: Southeastern Europe, at the border of Black Sea, between Bulgaria and Ukraine. See map.
Population: 22,246,862 (July 2008 est.)
Official language: Romanian
Climate: four seasons; the winters are cold, snowy and foggy, and the summers are sunny and hot (>30 degrees Celsius).
Ethnic groups: Romanian 89.5%, Hungarian 6.6%, Roma 2.5%, Ukrainian 0.3%, German 0.3%, Russian 0.2%, Turkish 0.2%, other 0.4% (2002).
Religions: Eastern Orthodox 86.8%, Protestant 7.5%, Roman Catholic 4.7%, other 1% (2002)
Languages: Romanian 91% (official), Hungarian 6.7%, Romany (Gypsy) 1.1%, other 1.2%
Government type: republic
Capital: Bucharest
National holiday: Unification Day (of Romania and Transylvania), 1 December (1918)
Constitution: 8 December 1991; revision effective 29 October 2003
Independence: 9 May 1877 – proclaimed from the Ottoman Empire but recognized on 13 July 1878 by the Treaty of Berlin; 30 December 1947 (republic proclaimed).
2007, January 1st – EU membership accepted and formalized.
Interesting to know that…
– 5 million Romanians speak fluently English, 4.5 million speak French, and German, Italian and Spanish is spoken each by 1-2 million Romanians.
– Bucharest, the capital of Romania, is the 6th biggest capital in the EU.
– the University "Alexandru Ioan Cuza" (1860) from Iasi is the first university in Romania
– at Babes-Bolyai University in Cluj-Napoca, a major Romanian institution of higher education, classes are taught in four languages: out of 105 courses, 98 are in Romanian, 52 in Magyar, 14 in German and 4 in English.
– the Black Church in Brasov is the biggest gothic church in the Southeastern Europe. It is 90 meters long and 37 meters high, and the tour of the cross is 65 meters.