Gagauzian days

In southern Moldova there is a semi-autonomous region called Gagauzia. The three member raions voted to be part of this unit after the fall of the Soviet Union. There are a lot of politics involved (the photo below is the corner of LENIN and MARX streets), but even without developing an opinion, Gagauzia's mere existence makes for an interesting study. 

What is different in Gaguzia? Here are my observations from ONE short visit and the answers I got from my colleague:

[+] The Gaguzian people are Turkish descendants and have had their own language for a very long time. In Moldova, they represent a very specific ethnic minority.

[+] On the bus out of Chisinau, Romanian ceases to exist, while Russian, Gagauzian, and Turkish take over.

[+] Russian is used predominately in Gagauzia for business and government, but it's not uncommon to find personal life conducted in Gagauzian. Everything was done in Gagauzian until the Soviets entered the story. 

[+] Unless people happen to be studying it in school, no one speaks Romanian, despite the fact that the rest of the country considers it the official language of Moldova.

[+] Since everything is written in the Cyrillic alphabet, which I am only just beginning to read, I found myself walking down the street sounding out words like a second grader. 

[+] In most parts of Moldova, you say hello immediately after walking into a room, even if you feel like you are being rude and interrupting another conversation. At ONE office in Gagauzia, I observed the practice to be quite the opposite. I stood in a room while another conversation carried on for several minutes before anyone even made eye-contact with me. In this case, it would have been rude for me to interrupt. 

[+] In most of Moldova, the main street in town is named after Stephen the Great. In Gagauzia, it's Lenin.

This photo is my colleague standing in front of the new information board that was installed outside his city hall (as a result of his work with the mayor and vice-mayor). Since this was all written in Russian, he kindly read the bulletins to me. I was pleasantly surprised to see the board being used to inform people about safe migration practices, and how to avoid human trafficking. Even listing the hotline numbers for some of our partner organizations in Chisinau. Woot!