Official Name:Romania

Location: (Southeastern) Central Europe

Time Zone: Seven hours ahead of U.S. Eastern Standard Time (GMT + 2)

Area: 92,043 sq. miles (238,391 sq. km) - a little larger than the state of Minnesota

Flag of Romania: Three vertical stripes: blue, yellow and red.

Population: 19,334,000 (October 2016)

Largest cities: Bucharest (1,883,400), Iasi (322,000), Cluj Napoca (309,000), Timisoara (303,000), Constanta (298,000), Craiova (295,000), Galati (286,000), Brasov (275,000), Ploiesti (224,000), Braila (205,000), Oradea (196,400).
Romania's population lives in 320 cities and towns and 12,956 villages.

Main ethnic groups
Romanian 84%, Hungarian 6.1%, Gipsy 3.1%, German 0.2%, Ukrainian 0.2%

Religions:
Christian Orthodox 81%, Roman Catholic 4.3%, Reformed 3%, Greek-Catholic 0.7%, Unitarian 0.3%, Jewish, other.

Official Language: Romanian

Currency: Leu ( plural Lei --- pronunciation "lay" --- abbreviations: Lei or RON )

Climate: Temperate, four distinct seasons, similar to northeastern USA

Capital: Bucharest ( București --- pronunciation: boo koo re sh tea )

Form of State: Romania is a semi-presidential democracy based on a bicameral Parliament:
the Chamber of Representatives or "Chamber of Deputies" (Camera Deputatilor) and the Senate (Senat). 
All members of the legislature are directly elected from Romania's 41 counties.

Under the semi-presidential system, the president is responsible for foreign and defense policy and controls appointments of prosecutors and the judiciary.