Tajikistan
Updated: Sep 15, 2022
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Country Name
Tajikistan, or officially the Republic of Tajikistan.
Location
Tajikistan is a mountainous, landlocked country in Central Asia. It is bordered by Afghanistan to the south, Uzbekistan to the west, Kyrgyzstan to the north, and China to the east.
Capital
Dushanbe.
Reason for Naming the country
Tajikistan means the "Land of the Tajiks". The suffix "-stan" is Persian and stands for "place of" or "country" and Tajik is, most likely, the name of a pre-Islamic (before the seventh century A.D.) tribe.
Flag
The Flag of Tajikistan was adopted on 24 November 1992, and the first use of the current flag design was in 1992.
The flag of Tajikistan consists of three horizontal stripes of red, white, and green colors, with yellow and a crown surrounded by an arc of seven stars at the center.
The red represents the unity of the nation as well as victory and sunrise, it also represents the former Russian and Soviet eras, the workers, and the warriors sacrificed their lives to protect the land.
The white represents purity, morality, the snow and ice of the mountains, and cotton.
The green represents the lavish generosity of nature, fertile valleys, the religion of Islam, and the celebration of Novruz.
The crown represents the Tajik people, The flag of Tajikistan features seven stars due to the significance of the number seven in Tajik traditional legends, representing perfection and happiness.
*Flag Facts:
- The flag of Hungary and the flag of Tajikistan are very similar, both have the same colors and the same design the only difference is that the Tajikistan flag is charged with a crown surmounted by an arc of seven stars at the center.
Language
The Tajik language is the official language of Tajikistan. The language is used widely in government meaning administration, education, business, courts, and daily lives of the people of Tajikistan, the Tajik language is a variant of the Persian language or Farsi. The Russian language is recognized in Tajikistan. It was the official language under Soviet rule in the country but lost its official status after Tajikistan's independence in late 1991, The Constitution of Tajikistan does not mention Russian as an official language but mentions that this language can be used for communication between people belonging to different ethnic communities as a lingua franca. It is widely used for formal and informal communication in the country spoken by approximately 90% of the population. Other minority languages spoken in Tajikistan are Uzbek, Kyrgyz, Turkish, Persian, Arabic, Yaghnobi, Parya, Shughni, Wakhi, Armenian, Belarusian, Lithuanian, Romanian, Western Balochi, Korean, and Kazakh.
Religion
Islam is the religion of the majority in Tajikistan with a majority of Sunni Islam of the Hanafi school and a few members are Shia. Tajikistan considers itself a secular state with a Constitution providing for freedom of religion. Other minorities are followers of Russian Orthodoxy, Roman Catholicism, Hinduism, Zoroastrians, Jews, Baha’is Protestantism, and Buddhism. However, the number of followers of these groups sharply declined in the early independence period due to a wave of emigration.
Currency
Somoni (TJS).
Time Zone
+05:00 GMT.
Government Regime
Unitary dominant-party presidential constitutional secular republic.
Climate
In Tajikistan, the climate is arid continental, with cold winters and very hot sunny summers. Being that it's a mountainous country, both temperature and rainfall vary with altitude and slope exposure.
The best times to visit Tajikistan are spring and autumn in order to avoid the weather extremes, and in particular, the months of April and October. Of the two, October is preferable because it is less rainy, in these two months, it can sometimes be cold at night and hot during the day as well.
On the other hand, the summer is preferable for hiking at high altitudes, since it is the only season when the temperature exceeds freezing.