Alright class, please take your seats.
Who here knows anything about Romania? That’s about what I expected. Well, here’s a thirty second crash course on some interesting facts that you can bring up the next time you invite a Romanian over for dinner. Keep your score and leave me a comment of how you did at the end? Only scroll enough to see the question (in bold). No doing research or scrolling! Cheaters will be flogged.
Question 1:
Can anyway guess the name of the language here and where it comes from?
Ok, that one was a softball–Romanian (1 pt.)! Congrats to those of you that guessed Romanian and deduced…Roman….Romance language! If you did, give yourself an extra 3 pts. When eavesdropping on a conversation, one could easily mistake Romanian for Spanish, Italian, or French–the other romance languages.
Question 2:
What borders Romania? (Hint: at least one thing isn’t a country)
Question 3:
Describe the Romanian Flag
Question 4:
Name the second largest ethnic group after Romanian.
I bet some of you guessed gypsies, but the answer is actually Hungarians 6% (2 points)
Question 5:
What is the most popular tourism spot in Romania?
Brahm Stoker, an Irish novelist, put Romania on the map with his creation of Count Dracula based on legends of Romanian Prince Vlad Tepes. As a result of the legend, Brahm’s castle in Transylvania is Romania’s hottest tourist site. (1 pt for Transylvania, 1 pt for Dracula, and 1 more pt if you knew it was Bran’s castle).
Question 6:
What is the staple meat in Romanian food.
In a lot of ways, the Romanian diet is a blend of Mediterranean and German. Lots of salads and pickled things, but also plenty of sweets like struedels. Mamagliga (left), a cornmeal porridge is considered the staple, and the most popular meat happens to be Pork. (3 pts).
Question 7:
What happened to Romania during WWII and in what decade was independence achieved?
Romania was taken over by the Soviets and communism ensued all the way until the Romanian revolution of 1989. In 2004, Romania joined the European Union, but has yet to adopt the Euro as its main currency. (3 points each, you can have a pity point if you guessed 1990’s).
Question 8:
Name as many famous Romanians as you can.
Sorry guys, that was a hard one. Give yourself 3 points for each one you came up with that made this list Famous Romanians. The only ones I would have guessed were olympic gymnasts Nadia Comaneci (Rom) and Dominique Moceanu (US).
Question 9:
Whats the primary religion in Romania and what percentage of the population is it?
86% of the population is Romanian Orthodox. Roman Catholics make up 5% Protestants make up a little less than 5 percent. Give yourself 3 points if you mentioned “Orthodox” and 3 points if you guessed within 76-96%.
Question 10:
Ok, last question. Time for redemption. What is the name of the capital city, what Romanian city is my team living in and what is the name of the ministry we are working for (5 points each)?
The answer to the first two questions are both Bucharest (not to be confused with Hungary’s capital Budapest). The ministry we are working in is called Casa Shalom (though I will accept Jubilee–the women orphanage we frequent).
Well, how’d you do? Take some time to tally up the points. Go ahead and be generous if you were pretty close. If you got at least 10 points, you should pat yourself on the back. Be sure to leave your score as a comment. Prizes will be awarded to the top tier.
As is custom here in Romania (no joke), bribing your teacher is one of the best ways to get a good grade, so I will leave “Teacher appreciation box” at the back of the room.
Class dismissed.
