Italians, do you feel closer to Slovenes or to Romanians?

[Cernunnos]

Romanian language (Romance) was kept by the ellites (The Royal family + nobility) who conserved the locals latin dialects, the conservative Orthodox Church did the rest of the work.

In general you can't distinguish that well Romanians from Ukrainians, all Balkanian lowlands were permeable to incursions and attacks from Euroasiatic peoples.

They are in essence Eastern Europeans and Slavs and don't have much to do with any other latin Europeans. They just speak a Romance language, but that doesn't mean that much, I personaly can't understand a shit out of what they say. I know what I'm talking about because there are many Romanians here (probably more than 120 000 if you include Moldavians).

[Tommie]

I think many Romanians imagine themselves closer to Italians and other Latins than they really are. Also probably Romanians like Italians and imagine them closer than Italians like Romanians or feel them close at all. Romanians are closer in every way to Slavs and even to Greeks and Albanians, before other Latins. Romanians are indoctrinated in schools to feel very proud and special of being Latin, but only the language is of Latin origin.

Romanians, despite the "walls" created throughout history between them and the rest of Latins, have always felt close to them, it's not something recent.

[Tommie]

Romanian language (Romance) was kept by the ellites (The Royal family + nobility) who conserved the locals latin dialects, the conservative Orthodox Church did the rest of the work.

In general you can't distinguish that well Romanians from Ukrainians, all Balkanian lowlands were permeable to incursions and attacks from Euroasiatic peoples.

They are in essence Eastern Europeans and Slavs and don't have much to do with any other latin Europeans. They just speak a Romance language, but that doesn't mean that much, I personaly can't understand a shit out of what they say. I know what I'm talking about because there are many Romanians here (probably more than 120 000 if you include Moldavians).

"Eastern European" and "Slavic" are extremely broad terms.
Albanians are often considered "Eastern European", yet they're genetically closer to Italians than Ukrainians. Same thing for Romanians. Just because they have some (South) Slavic influence doesn't mean they're Latin-speaking Slavs. South Slavs themselves, namely Bulgarians, are genetically a world apart from Russians, also.
You have probably met a lot Moldovans from Republic of Moldova.

[Enr1989]

As a whole definetely to Romanians, considering also many Romanians living in Italy in last decades made us closer.
I live very close to Slovenia so personally I feel close to Slovenia too.

[Cernunnos]

"Eastern European" and "Slavic" are extremely broad terms.
Albanians are often considered "Eastern European", yet they're genetically closer to Italians than Ukrainians. Same thing for Romanians. Just because they have some (South) Slavic influence doesn't mean they're Latin-speaking Slavs. South Slavs themselves, namely Bulgarians, are a world apart from Russians-genetically, also.
You have probably met a lot Moldovans from Republic of Moldova.

I've met both moldovans, ukrainians and romanians. They all have a considerable community in Portugal, especialy Ukrainians and Romanians, but Moldovans also have their sizeable community.

They all look Slavic/Eastern Europeans, some of them (More so the Moldovans) are able to speak Russian. I had them in my school classes, living near my street, even on villages. They all look more or less the same.

They have a different lifestyle from us, they don't attend Catholic masses, they seem to be very conservative and into themselves, a few have a drinking problem and can be sometimes problematic. I don't know if there are any considerable Regional patterns but those who live in the village are from a city called Suceava in the historical region of Moldova.

A Romanian friend who attend School with me for two years and still lives here was from Borsa, Mamures.

[ixulescu]

They are in essence Eastern Europeans and Slavs and don't have much to do with any other latin Europeans. They just speak a Romance language, but that doesn't mean that much, I personaly can't understand a shit out of what they say. I know what I'm talking about because there are many Romanians here (probably more than 120 000 if you include Moldavians).

Man, Portuguese is much farther away from Romanian than Italian. Italian is really easy to understand for Romanians without any formal learning - Portuguese on the other hand is incomprehensible.