People

“The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen.”
Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

People are a country’s most valuable resource. And looking from this point of view, Romania is not short on valuables at all. As a Romanian saying goes, “the man honors the place”.

Romanians, who are a Latin, Balkan and Orthodox, take pride in national character features that are a bit of a paradox.

Traditional, yet modern

Romanians are known for their traditionalism and their slight anachronism. They don’t give up their customs easily. They respect them and try not to alter them and lose their authenticity. On the other hand, they are also open minded and welcome modernism and technology innovations. For example, we rank 3 for 4G usage in the world. Romania is home to both modest people, who take care of their parents until old age, and people who are successful at their jobs with corporations. Or put another way, the same highly educated Romanian can have traditionalistic marriage conceptions regarding their children.

The love for Romania

The Romanian people generally loves its country and stands united. The wars they have accomplished miracles in prove this national solidarity. Also, this solidarity can be observed easily in the support Romanian athletes enjoy, especially the National soccer team. It is true that success unites them, but failure tears them apart. A bit more tempered, Latin spirited, they easily get fired up and just as fast they settle their differences. Even if sometimes Romanians leave the country in search for a better life, education or just for the experience, they all crave to return to their homeland. They are patriots almost instinctively, sometimes without understanding patriotism.

Welcoming foreigners

In Romania, foreigners are sympathized. That’s probably because in the communist era foreigners were rarely seen and they symbolized windows of access to the western democracies. Free circulation of Romanians wasn’t possible in those times. But the hospitability is a national characteristic; Romanians invite you into their homes and always invite you to taste their cooking. They enjoy helping a foreigner who doesn’t speak the language; often there are cases when a Romanian tries to explain something to a foreigner, but he doesn’t quite get there. And in a few seconds, 4-5 other Romanians gather around the needy non-Romanian speaking individual.

They love dispute, but avoid conflict

Romanians like to debate, talk and share advice. They have humor and a native intelligence, and they like to argue. But they do not like conflicts. They tend to be conciliating in authority related issues. Generally, Romanians are a peaceful and tolerant people even if they love to tease and sometimes quarrel over trifles. The Latin spirit makes them be conflictual over small change, but also gets them back together as fast as the conflict initiated.

Passion

In this country everything is made with passion, from job to hobby, from sports to work. Romanians are very passionate about everything they do. The general consensus is that they are appreciated by foreign employers for their devotion in the line of work. As a weakness, they have difficulties in meeting deadlines and they generally don’t like being a tight schedule. If you proof of the Romanians’ passion you can watch them during a national team soccer match or dancing at a wedding.

Deep spirituality

Most of the Romanians are Christians and believe in God’s existence. Many go to church on a regular basis, fast and do charity work. It is one of the few peoples with a large number of individuals living in monasteries. Aside to that, Romanians are superstitious. They believe in blessings and curses, in omens and fatal numbers and sometimes in magic. Most of them believe in the eternal soul and in life after death.

Non-conventional thinking and creative mind

It is said that creativity is the art of knowing how to make mistakes and which of them to hold with you. Romanians are intelligent and known for their ability to find un-orthodox solutions to every problem. This is why they usually win international exact sciences contests. They are spectacular in their reasoning. Microsoft and Google are aware of that aspect and as a result they hired a lot of Romanians. It is said that among Bill Gates’ employees Romanian is a second language.

Statistics

19,500,000 people live in Romania; almost 2 million work abroad.

89% Romanians, 7, 5% Magyar, 1, 9% Roma, Saxon, Armenian, Serbian, Turkish.

45% Romanians live in the rural area, 55% of Romanians live in the urban area.