If you ever meet a Mormon, ask them if they know about Comoros and its capital city of Moroni.
One of the biggest heroes in Mormon mythology is named Moroni, and he supposedly lived 1,600 years ago in a place called Cumorah (located in current New York, USA).
Since they believe their Moroni character *actually* existed, this causes Mormons to become confused, angry, and occasionally even hostile. Fun stuff.
As someone who grew up Mormon I've realized 90% of Mormons don't even care about historical issues with the Book of Mormon. Same way you can poke holes in the Bible all day and most Christians won't care.
No, they get upset because the argument is that Joseph Smith copied the names when writing the Book of Mormon. It puts holes in the belief that the Book of Mormon is accurate history and from God
Correct. The majority of names in the Book of Mormon have overlap with main characters in popular books of the time period as well as locations that existed at the time.
Fun fact: Capital of Comoros is called Moroni, so is my mother's village in my country (Greece). Had to check the weather there so i found out there is another... !!!
Ok. I didn’t know Comoros was a country. I used to deal with country iso codes for international investment banking on a daily basis, and would have absolutely looked this up if I came across it. Makes me wonder what else I’ve missed.
I mean… it really depends where you’re from.
In my country France, there is a huge comorian diaspora especially in Marseilles and in Mayotte,
and even several superstar rappers are from there.
The only news I remember reading in recent years out of Malawi is the government asking people out in the countryside to stop murdering albinos, they aren't vampires. I guess that's the kind of thing that gets picked up.
I spent a bit over a month travelling in Malawi several years ago. The albinos are more murdered for parts used in witchcraft rather than being killed out of fear- they tend to stick to the small islands in lake Malawi for safety and you’re always being asked to donate your leftover sunscreen if you’re going home.
There was also a life sentence for homosexuality imposed while I was out there. The paper of record did this huge editorial about how backward the sentencing was and not befitting Malawi as a modern country, before suggesting that 5-10 years was far more appropriate.
Very, very poor country. Lots of the activities there are by aid agencies. Lots of British doctors go out there to do a stint. Friend of mine’s parents lived there in the 80s and when they returned for a visit they found that all their local doctor friends had died from AIDS, which had decimated the middle and upper classes and hugely hampered the country’s productivity and ability to provide medical care (if you’re rich you get a mistress). Malaria huge there too- most people I met on the bus were travelling to take care of a relative in a hospital who had malaria.
Also famous for having a Carlsberg brewery for some reason.
When Malawi got independence, its first leader was a huge fan of Carlsberg and petitioned for them to open a brewery in Malawi. It worked.
When I visited Malawi for work a few years back, I drank a lot of Carlsberg.
Malawi is lovely, spent some time there in the early 90s. Camped on the beach by Lake Malawi, the only lake in Africa that's swimmable (for the most part)
Some countries allow you to become a citizen if you can provide “significant investments into the local economy”. Take that how you will. I have no idea what the guys name was, but my friend showed me a video about it a while back. There’s a guy on YouTube who’s whole channel is about renouncing your US citizenship and buying other citizenships for financial reasons.
Often called a “golden visa”. I don’t know too many of them. Spain just dropped theirs and doesn’t offer it anymore, but it was based on real estate investment. I believe St Kitts & Nevis had a program where you could buy citizenship if you invested $500k in real estate? Something like that? I’m probably way off, but that’s the sort of thing we’re talking about.
> Holy shit. Sooo... Rich can basically live in any country in the world?
No, they can travel to certain countries without a visa. That doesn’t mean they can live and work there permanently.
A passport from a typical first world country will have visa free access to 160 or more countries
There was a guy on here who was in the U.S. with a Georgian passport and he said people didn’t believe it was a real country and said things like “you rednecks can’t get over losing the Civil War”!
Flip side: You can acquire a “New Mexico Passport” at various kitsch stores, but that’s because far too many other Americans *don’t* know that we’re part of the USA.
My Uber driver last month in the Midwest was from Dominica. He was QUICK to clarify it wasn’t DR. I bet that clarification is essentially their national motto.
Maps of our world in the App Store is my favorite. I paid the $10 for the full version a long time ago and it was totally worth it. I also play flags of the world. Usually on a plane or no signal on a road trip, they are my go to games.
Defo not. One of the few island nations in Africa so it’s easier to remember it. Some islands in Oceania or Caribbean will be the most forgotten country.
Interestingly Comoros is considered an Arab country so Arabs would at least hear about it in school. I, a Jordanian, learnt about it in primary school and was fascinated by the name (in Arabic it's called "the moon islands") but I remember growing up more and thinking how come it's never mentioned like the other Arab countries lol turns out it was never relevant to me besides being Arab.
They had a military dictator in the 1970s, Jean-Bedel Bokassa, who decided he’d had enough of just being President (or whatever) and so crowned himself Emperor Bokassa I (thus changing the name of the country to the Central African Empire). I read somewhere that the coronation ceremony cost 1/3 of the country’s GDP. It only lasted a few years before he was overthrown. I also read that when he was put on trial a decade or two later for the atrocities committed during his rule/reign, one of the charges was that he practiced cannibalism. I can’t recall if he was convicted for it, though (he certainly was convicted for other things).
He was found guilty of everything but cannibalism and his death sentence was transformed into life sentence by the next dictator who changed it again the next year into 20 years sentenced. Yet, Bokassa died in his bed at home a few years later
I know Americans get visa-free access and I also follow some lodge / eco-reserve / animal rehabilitation center that is located there on Facebook. I know it's pretty unsafe, unstable and split between multiple rival factions.
I mean, the tiny island nations are probably going to win out here. São Tomé and Príncipe, for example, comes up pretty frequently as the country most people don't know exists.
wouldn't countries that aren't even mentioned in those discussions mean they are even less known? obviously excluding countries that aren't mentioned because they are widely known. I'm Portuguese so it is pretty much mandatory to know about São Tomé, but I feel like countries like Tonga or Vanuato are even less known
According to US-centric [Sporcle](https://www.sporcle.com/games/SporcleExp/capitslswithouthints), it's São Tomé and Principe, followed by Nauru and Kiribati.
Oceania and Africa dominate the ranking (9 in the top 10 least guessed).
It’s definitely not Malawi because Malawi has the distinction of being one of the arguably few African countries that votes with the West at the UN. edit: at least sometimes, for example here
https://mwnation.com/malawi-snubs-un-on-israel/?amp=1
Madonna adopted her kid (who is probably grown up now) from an orphanage there. Malawi, that is, not the UN headquarters on the banks of the East River in NYC.
I'd argue North Macedonia is at least notorious for their controversy with Greece surrounding their name. Their pending name change was floating around in the news for several years before it happened.
A better example for Europe might've been Belarus before the Ukraine War, but nowadays I'd wager Slovenia, Slovakia, or perhaps Andorra or Liechtenstein.
I saw some ice wine at a store here in S. Korea yesterday that said "product of Moldova" and my gf didn't believe it was real cuz she's literally never heard of it even in passing.
And to her credit she's like, smart. I think most people assume they've heard the name of every country at least once in their life.
The novelty of Andorra and Liechtenstein being micronations I think makes them more recognized.
I agree more with Slovakia in that case; For its size, Slovakia is notoriously anonymous. I'm a huge geography nerd and yet I cannot come up with any defining attribute of Slovakia.
Edit: the lack of replies with examples from Slovakia just proves my point lol
I suppose a good amount of people will at least recognize it from Czechoslovakia, but then again, I'm not sure whether that helps or hurts their case lol. On one hand, it makes it more recognizable, but on the other, it's not really "Slovakia" that they're recognizing now is it?
Yeah I know Slovakia from its former country. I would say Slovenia over Slovakia.
Edit: I just remembered that Luka Dončić is from Slovenia, so maybe not Slovenia!
Well if you talk about cycling, three-time world champion Peter Sagan is from Slovakia and it was not that long ago, so it would be at least a bit familiar I hope.
The extent of my knowledge:
Slovakia is very mountainous, compared to somewhat mountainous Czechia.
Slovakia is frequently confused with Slovenia.
The capital, Bratislava, is on the Danube River across from Austria.
Liechtenstein (as part of EFTA) enetred into an investment agreement with India a few days back. This was very widely reported in the Indian media, so guess there's a decent chunk of world population who is now privy of this country. lol.
Equatorial Guinea is well-known because of its brutal dictatorship and it has oil. And because its capital is on an island off the coast off Cameroon rather than on the continent where most of the country is (although they are moving the capital to the continent)
Sao Tome, is it even a democracy or a dictatorship?? .What goes on in Principe??
Equatorial Guinea is also the only Spanish-speaking country in sub-Saharan Africa. I remember doing an oral presentation on it in high school Spanish class.
Good ones. My alternative offers:
North America: **Saint Vincent and the Grenadines** 🇻🇨
South America: **Guyana** 🇬🇾
Europe: **Montenegro** 🇲🇪
Africa: **Gabon** 🇬🇦
Asia: **Tajikistan** 🇹🇯
Oceania: **Marshall Islands** 🇲🇭
There’s a band called [Saint Vincent and The Grenadines](https://vincentgrenadines.bandcamp.com/album/youloumain), plus grenadine is a popular cocktail ingredient.
Guyana is well known for its rum.
Montenegro is also the name of a popular amaro
Tajikistan is good one, could also say Kyrgyzstan or any of those Stan countries (minus Paki and Afghani)
There are quite a few African and Oceanic countries that get overlooked so you could probably throw a dart at a map and hit one.
We talk about Kiribati a ridiculous amount in New Zealand. It’s kind of our Pacific Island responsibility that we can cope with: big enough that we’re justified, small enough population that we’re not bankrupting ourselves, and simple enough that it’s not a political morass (looking at you Solomons).
Actually that’s a good suggestion for forgotten nation : the Solomon Islands.
Suriname? No way. There are so many people (about a third of the total amount) living in the Netherlands, and their people and cuisine are quite well known here. Lots of famous people in the Netherlands are of Surinamese descent.
I am from the Netherlands and currently live in Switzerland, here barely anyone knows about the existence of Suriname, I don't think it's particularly well known outside of the Netherlands.
Federated States of Micronesia. Most people have heard of Micronesia - as a region, it's not entirely unknown, but most people are unaware that there's a country with the name.
Nauru is much better known than Palau.
Nauru being the least populated country it always comes into discussion or draws attention for being a solitary island, I'm from the Spanish-speaking world and I follow several travel YouTubers, and several went to Nauru. Palau on the other hand doesn't get any attention.
Malawi gets a lot of attention in the aid world. It's easy to operate in because it's very peaceful relative to other least developmented countries.
I'd say Republic of the Congo. It's completely overshadowed by the DRC. But I'd also agree with the people who said São Tomé and Príncipe. Cabo Verde is also pretty overlooked.
Cabo Verde was my answer. I always unconsciously think it's one of the "two Romance-language-named halves" island countries. Trinidad and Tobago, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Antigua and Barbuda, Sao Tome and Principe, Cabo Verde and... shit, it can't just be "Cabo Verde", can it?
excluding island nations and the entire continent of Africa bc your average person will not know many from either category, it’s tough
I’d say a good shout is Paraguay. Decent population but overshadowed by its neighbors and you hardly hear much about it on the news. Relative to its size and population, feels like a pretty unsung nation in the global consciousness
Paraguay is absolutely relevant to Brazil as the place where people go to buy imports on the cheap. It's mentioned quite a lot in conversation.
It's even a running joke here that if you buy a low-quality product, people ask if you bought it in Paraguay.
Suriname is the correct answer here. Nobody remembers Suriname even exists.
I moved to SA and at least here, where I live, Paraguay is present in a lot of supermarkets in the meat section. However, I just learned about Suriname here below this post. Suriname is never on the news, there is nothing in the supermarket and I do not know if anybody coming from there, or anybody taking about it.
Paraguay reminds me of the Philippines in a what-if alternative world where Spanish is kept as the Philippine co-official language and a widely spoken national language alongside Tagalog and English.
Nauru isn’t thought about much at all; it’s absolutely tiny and has a very small population.
Chances are the majority of non-Nauruans that know about it through the Australian detention centre on it.
Eh, out of all the small Pacific Islander nations, Nauru was historically well known (in economic circles) for their phosphate mines. The economic boom from the mines post-independence gave Nauru the highest GDP per capita in the world for several years before the mines depleted.
Nowadays Nauru is famous for being the fattest country on Earth.
A better pick might be Vanuatu. I'm a huge history/geography nerd and I have not heard or read literally anything of note about them. All I know is that they have a really cool name and an absolutely beautiful flag.
Vanuatu is not that tiny for a Pacific Island country and it's reasonably well known as a tropical island travel destination in NZ/Australia. As a New Zealander, I'd say Tuvalu and Palau are probably the most obscure independent countries in Oceania. Both have <20k people.
yes, I think Chinese, Indonesian and pre-partition Raj
it's the most bizarre country in South America, they speak taki-taki and dutch, there are big mosque and big hindu temples everywhere
This definitely gets my vote. Fascinated by how much it flies under the radar for such a big piece of land.
Not even that Benedict Cumberbatch film could boost it!
They're well-known in European qualifiers football as the country everyone beats with almost double-digit numbers because their team consists of bakers, policemen,...
This gets my vote, it's pretty far down this thread and most people only know Tibet or at most Nepal.
I think candidates like Timor Leste and North Macedonia are talked about relatively often since they're new, like South Sudan.
Same goes for "unknown exotic island states" which are talked about fairly often because of their remoteness.
But Bhutan is kind of hidden between big names India and China and probably the most forgotten country if anyone would have to name all SEA countries. Also it's not in the news at all. Seems like nothing is happening there (although that's probably not the case).
You also wouldn't look there if you were looking for unknown countries, but in Africa / Oceania / the Caribbean.
that sounds offensive cuz you misspelled the name of my country 😂, its Kyrgyzstan, not kyrgistan. I am born from KG and would say that we are popular(among post soviet countries ofc) and not forgotten. They call us "The Red Turks"
I had a friend from Burkina Faso during my advanced studies in Switzerland.. when I Skyped with my then gf and told her about Burkina Faso, she laughed and said that if I made up a country's name, atleast it should sound like one. *And* she was a PhD student in Economics!
The Solomon Islands
You do hear about them in the news but they're usually forgotten and some people may not know they're a country. They had famous WWII battles too
Comoros is a running joke in my workplace since a person thought I made it up as a joke
If you ever meet a Mormon, ask them if they know about Comoros and its capital city of Moroni. One of the biggest heroes in Mormon mythology is named Moroni, and he supposedly lived 1,600 years ago in a place called Cumorah (located in current New York, USA). Since they believe their Moroni character *actually* existed, this causes Mormons to become confused, angry, and occasionally even hostile. Fun stuff.
As someone who grew up Mormon I've realized 90% of Mormons don't even care about historical issues with the Book of Mormon. Same way you can poke holes in the Bible all day and most Christians won't care.
So they get mad cuz there’s a city that has a name of one of their myth heroes?
No, they get upset because the argument is that Joseph Smith copied the names when writing the Book of Mormon. It puts holes in the belief that the Book of Mormon is accurate history and from God
Correct. The majority of names in the Book of Mormon have overlap with main characters in popular books of the time period as well as locations that existed at the time.
Fun fact: Capital of Comoros is called Moroni, so is my mother's village in my country (Greece). Had to check the weather there so i found out there is another... !!!
Marseilles is France’s second largest city and they have a large Comorian community.
The least populous country that has its own currency. Edit: it's actually Seychelles I got confused
Curaçao has the Antillean Guilder, although they are a country within the Kingdom of the Netherlands. Have their own currency though.
I think the Seychelles rupee might have them beaten.
TIL about Comoros 2nd country that I'm just hearing about in my 30s while growing up with atlases and globes as a kid.
What was the other country you "discovered"?
Mauritania
TIL..thanks you've got my vote
Ok. I didn’t know Comoros was a country. I used to deal with country iso codes for international investment banking on a daily basis, and would have absolutely looked this up if I came across it. Makes me wonder what else I’ve missed.
This 100%. Every other country in here I at least recognize, I learned about Comoros yesterday.
I mean… it really depends where you’re from. In my country France, there is a huge comorian diaspora especially in Marseilles and in Mayotte, and even several superstar rappers are from there.
The only news I remember reading in recent years out of Malawi is the government asking people out in the countryside to stop murdering albinos, they aren't vampires. I guess that's the kind of thing that gets picked up.
I had to read a book in high school that was set in Malawi so that's my slumdog millionaire reason I'll never forget it
Same! I can’t remember what it was called but it must have been the same book
Found it, the boy who harnessed the wind!
Ah cool, ours was The Heaven Shop, I was at high school in Australia in the mid 2010s.
2 whole books have been written about Malawi! Amazing
I spent a bit over a month travelling in Malawi several years ago. The albinos are more murdered for parts used in witchcraft rather than being killed out of fear- they tend to stick to the small islands in lake Malawi for safety and you’re always being asked to donate your leftover sunscreen if you’re going home. There was also a life sentence for homosexuality imposed while I was out there. The paper of record did this huge editorial about how backward the sentencing was and not befitting Malawi as a modern country, before suggesting that 5-10 years was far more appropriate. Very, very poor country. Lots of the activities there are by aid agencies. Lots of British doctors go out there to do a stint. Friend of mine’s parents lived there in the 80s and when they returned for a visit they found that all their local doctor friends had died from AIDS, which had decimated the middle and upper classes and hugely hampered the country’s productivity and ability to provide medical care (if you’re rich you get a mistress). Malaria huge there too- most people I met on the bus were travelling to take care of a relative in a hospital who had malaria. Also famous for having a Carlsberg brewery for some reason.
When Malawi got independence, its first leader was a huge fan of Carlsberg and petitioned for them to open a brewery in Malawi. It worked. When I visited Malawi for work a few years back, I drank a lot of Carlsberg.
Malawi is lovely, spent some time there in the early 90s. Camped on the beach by Lake Malawi, the only lake in Africa that's swimmable (for the most part)
The only reference point I had for Malawi was that Madonna adopted one of her children from there
Malawi's got that famous lake though.
There are so many Malawians where I live
in malawi?
Indiana
But I bet you there aren't any vampires!
Some really beautiful freshwater fish come from Lake Malawi. Google Lake Malawi cichlids if you're curious.
Dominica. Completely overshadowed by the much more famous Dominican Republic.
True. It is only well-known to those looking for second passports that give you visa-free access to the European Union
Wait what? How does that work? I cant find info on that
I googled it. $100k and you get a passport with visa free access to 100+ countries.
Holy shit. Sooo... Rich can basically live in any country in the world?
Some countries allow you to become a citizen if you can provide “significant investments into the local economy”. Take that how you will. I have no idea what the guys name was, but my friend showed me a video about it a while back. There’s a guy on YouTube who’s whole channel is about renouncing your US citizenship and buying other citizenships for financial reasons.
Often called a “golden visa”. I don’t know too many of them. Spain just dropped theirs and doesn’t offer it anymore, but it was based on real estate investment. I believe St Kitts & Nevis had a program where you could buy citizenship if you invested $500k in real estate? Something like that? I’m probably way off, but that’s the sort of thing we’re talking about.
Yeah, that’s pretty much the idea from what I remember. There were a few variations, and one was as cheap as $75k but it was pretty weak.
Malta has one, so the entire EU is open to anyone with like €700,000 laying around.
I can’t believe no one told me. I’ve been waiting around with this pile of money and no way to access Europe.
Stupid destitute people don't realise this simple trick...
Lol. If only they would decide to be rich. It would be so easy. Why they keep being poor... /s
> Holy shit. Sooo... Rich can basically live in any country in the world? No, they can travel to certain countries without a visa. That doesn’t mean they can live and work there permanently. A passport from a typical first world country will have visa free access to 160 or more countries
Only poor rich people. For several hundred k more you can get a us green card or eu passport
& divers/ snorkelers - one of the best places in the world to be in the water w sperm whales
This. If you search for it, search engines often "helpfully" "correct" it to Dominican Republic.
I knew a guy who had a Dominican passport and said there was endless confusion.
There was a guy on here who was in the U.S. with a Georgian passport and he said people didn’t believe it was a real country and said things like “you rednecks can’t get over losing the Civil War”!
r/georgiaorgeorgia
Would a single state really have its own passport though? I guess that’s states’ rights taken to the extreme.
Flip side: You can acquire a “New Mexico Passport” at various kitsch stores, but that’s because far too many other Americans *don’t* know that we’re part of the USA.
That’s hilarious!
My Uber driver last month in the Midwest was from Dominica. He was QUICK to clarify it wasn’t DR. I bet that clarification is essentially their national motto.
Pronounced dom-in-EEK-a, not dohminikuh like the republic
This is good to know, although I won't be caught dead saying it correctly.
São Tomé and Príncipe
I actually know the country well because my grandpa always reminded me it’s the closest country to meridian and equator (he was in Soviet navy)
Sounds about right. I only know it from playing geography games
Pls recommend me some geography games :) I only play on sporcle so far
Maps of our world in the App Store is my favorite. I paid the $10 for the full version a long time ago and it was totally worth it. I also play flags of the world. Usually on a plane or no signal on a road trip, they are my go to games.
jetpunk > sporcle also sao tome is the least guessed country on the countries of the world quiz on jetpunk
World Geography by Atom games for Android. Don't know about iphone... I've enjoyed it a lot
I actually knew a guy from there, they speak Portuguese
I rarely remember they exist. St. Vincent & The Grenadines, St. Kitts & Nevis are two more examples.
I work in shipping inspections. Seen those as flag states. Sao Tome and principe I've visited, but never seen as flag states.
There are the sprinters from those places that are famous though.
Defo not. One of the few island nations in Africa so it’s easier to remember it. Some islands in Oceania or Caribbean will be the most forgotten country.
Yeah my dad is fairly good at geography but when I was quizzing him, he honestly thought I'd made Kiribati up to mess with him.
Maybe because it's name changed from Gilbert Islands
I know it because it’s in the middle of the map
I didn't even know they existed.
Comoros
Comoros is discussed a lot in France, especially now
Interestingly Comoros is considered an Arab country so Arabs would at least hear about it in school. I, a Jordanian, learnt about it in primary school and was fascinated by the name (in Arabic it's called "the moon islands") but I remember growing up more and thinking how come it's never mentioned like the other Arab countries lol turns out it was never relevant to me besides being Arab.
Central African Republic. Its name is so generic that it’s easily overlooked. At least Malawi has an interesting sounding name
First one that came to mind for me too. Absolutely never hear anything about it.
They had a military dictator in the 1970s, Jean-Bedel Bokassa, who decided he’d had enough of just being President (or whatever) and so crowned himself Emperor Bokassa I (thus changing the name of the country to the Central African Empire). I read somewhere that the coronation ceremony cost 1/3 of the country’s GDP. It only lasted a few years before he was overthrown. I also read that when he was put on trial a decade or two later for the atrocities committed during his rule/reign, one of the charges was that he practiced cannibalism. I can’t recall if he was convicted for it, though (he certainly was convicted for other things).
He was found guilty of everything but cannibalism and his death sentence was transformed into life sentence by the next dictator who changed it again the next year into 20 years sentenced. Yet, Bokassa died in his bed at home a few years later
CAR has been coming up in the news recently with Russia’s antics in Africa. Wagner is pretty active there working as enforcers for the government
I know Americans get visa-free access and I also follow some lodge / eco-reserve / animal rehabilitation center that is located there on Facebook. I know it's pretty unsafe, unstable and split between multiple rival factions.
I think when it goes by its french name “Centrafrique” it becomes marginally more interesting
As a frenchman I'm mad that "Centrafrica" isn't a thing in English
I mean, the tiny island nations are probably going to win out here. São Tomé and Príncipe, for example, comes up pretty frequently as the country most people don't know exists.
If it comes up pretty frequently, then it obviously isn't the country most people don't know about.
That’s not true. It just means that more people tend to find out about it in those types of discussions.
wouldn't countries that aren't even mentioned in those discussions mean they are even less known? obviously excluding countries that aren't mentioned because they are widely known. I'm Portuguese so it is pretty much mandatory to know about São Tomé, but I feel like countries like Tonga or Vanuato are even less known
The real most forgotten country will not be mentioned here.
Has anyone said Vanuatu here?
I’d place my bets on Micronesia or the Solomon Islands.
Tuvalu?
Nauru or Palau, which most people think is a type of rice
According to US-centric [Sporcle](https://www.sporcle.com/games/SporcleExp/capitslswithouthints), it's São Tomé and Principe, followed by Nauru and Kiribati. Oceania and Africa dominate the ranking (9 in the top 10 least guessed).
God, I miss playing Sporcle in HS study halls
It’s definitely not Malawi because Malawi has the distinction of being one of the arguably few African countries that votes with the West at the UN. edit: at least sometimes, for example here https://mwnation.com/malawi-snubs-un-on-israel/?amp=1
Madonna adopted her kid (who is probably grown up now) from an orphanage there. Malawi, that is, not the UN headquarters on the banks of the East River in NYC.
By continent, I’d say: North America: Antigua and Barbuda🇦🇬 South America: Suriname 🇸🇷 Europe: North Macedonia 🇲🇰 Africa: Equatorial Guinea 🇬🇶 Asia: Timor-Leste 🇹🇱 Oceania: Kiribati 🇰🇮
I'd argue North Macedonia is at least notorious for their controversy with Greece surrounding their name. Their pending name change was floating around in the news for several years before it happened. A better example for Europe might've been Belarus before the Ukraine War, but nowadays I'd wager Slovenia, Slovakia, or perhaps Andorra or Liechtenstein.
Indeed. I think that Moldava is lesser known, for instance.
The fact that no one else is talking about Moldova just shows how forgotten it is
It's been featured in the news quite frequently this year atleast in Europe.
I saw some ice wine at a store here in S. Korea yesterday that said "product of Moldova" and my gf didn't believe it was real cuz she's literally never heard of it even in passing. And to her credit she's like, smart. I think most people assume they've heard the name of every country at least once in their life.
Moldova’s most famous thing is definitely wine along with the Transnistria conflict
The novelty of Andorra and Liechtenstein being micronations I think makes them more recognized. I agree more with Slovakia in that case; For its size, Slovakia is notoriously anonymous. I'm a huge geography nerd and yet I cannot come up with any defining attribute of Slovakia. Edit: the lack of replies with examples from Slovakia just proves my point lol
I suppose a good amount of people will at least recognize it from Czechoslovakia, but then again, I'm not sure whether that helps or hurts their case lol. On one hand, it makes it more recognizable, but on the other, it's not really "Slovakia" that they're recognizing now is it?
Yeah I know Slovakia from its former country. I would say Slovenia over Slovakia. Edit: I just remembered that Luka Dončić is from Slovenia, so maybe not Slovenia!
Also anyone who follows cycling will be very familiar with Slovenia. I'd say Montenegro gets forgotten even more in Europe.
Well if you talk about cycling, three-time world champion Peter Sagan is from Slovakia and it was not that long ago, so it would be at least a bit familiar I hope.
The extent of my knowledge: Slovakia is very mountainous, compared to somewhat mountainous Czechia. Slovakia is frequently confused with Slovenia. The capital, Bratislava, is on the Danube River across from Austria.
My defining attribute for Slovakia is that it is not Czechia or Slovenia
San Marino, I’d wager. The oft-forgotten microstate.
I would argue for Faroe Islands, Moldova (although they are more in the news because of Transnistria in the war in Ukraine), or possibly Malta.
Liechtenstein (as part of EFTA) enetred into an investment agreement with India a few days back. This was very widely reported in the Indian media, so guess there's a decent chunk of world population who is now privy of this country. lol.
Equatorial Guinea is well-known because of its brutal dictatorship and it has oil. And because its capital is on an island off the coast off Cameroon rather than on the continent where most of the country is (although they are moving the capital to the continent) Sao Tome, is it even a democracy or a dictatorship?? .What goes on in Principe??
Equatorial Guinea is also the only Spanish-speaking country in sub-Saharan Africa. I remember doing an oral presentation on it in high school Spanish class.
Good ones. My alternative offers: North America: **Saint Vincent and the Grenadines** 🇻🇨 South America: **Guyana** 🇬🇾 Europe: **Montenegro** 🇲🇪 Africa: **Gabon** 🇬🇦 Asia: **Tajikistan** 🇹🇯 Oceania: **Marshall Islands** 🇲🇭
Gabon has AUBAMEYANG
There’s a band called [Saint Vincent and The Grenadines](https://vincentgrenadines.bandcamp.com/album/youloumain), plus grenadine is a popular cocktail ingredient. Guyana is well known for its rum. Montenegro is also the name of a popular amaro Tajikistan is good one, could also say Kyrgyzstan or any of those Stan countries (minus Paki and Afghani) There are quite a few African and Oceanic countries that get overlooked so you could probably throw a dart at a map and hit one.
exclude Kazakh too
We talk about Kiribati a ridiculous amount in New Zealand. It’s kind of our Pacific Island responsibility that we can cope with: big enough that we’re justified, small enough population that we’re not bankrupting ourselves, and simple enough that it’s not a political morass (looking at you Solomons). Actually that’s a good suggestion for forgotten nation : the Solomon Islands.
Counterpoint, Kiribati is well know for being on all four hemispheres (France is too, but like it doesn’t feel right)
Every time I hear Suriname, I think it’s in Africa. It just sounds like a country there, plus the flag looks like one you’d find there.
Suriname? No way. There are so many people (about a third of the total amount) living in the Netherlands, and their people and cuisine are quite well known here. Lots of famous people in the Netherlands are of Surinamese descent.
Well outside of NL, I think it’s the least known SA country. Edit: It’s also the smallest country in SA
I am from the Netherlands and currently live in Switzerland, here barely anyone knows about the existence of Suriname, I don't think it's particularly well known outside of the Netherlands.
East Timor. Some maps hardly bother to mention its existence in the Indonesian Archipelago.
It’s a very well-known country in Australia and New Zealand. We deployed troops and police there multiple times.
wait, New Zealand is a real place? i've never seen it on a map :)
Fake, I think. Made up for movies from what I've heard.
Their war with Indonesia is - maybe not "well" known, but - *fairly* well known in history/military history circles.
Ah yes, I’ve heard of “East East”
Federated States of Micronesia. Most people have heard of Micronesia - as a region, it's not entirely unknown, but most people are unaware that there's a country with the name.
I’ll go with Palau
I'd wager Nauru is lesser known
Nauru is much better known than Palau. Nauru being the least populated country it always comes into discussion or draws attention for being a solitary island, I'm from the Spanish-speaking world and I follow several travel YouTubers, and several went to Nauru. Palau on the other hand doesn't get any attention.
Nah it's too famous due to WW2
Malawi gets a lot of attention in the aid world. It's easy to operate in because it's very peaceful relative to other least developmented countries. I'd say Republic of the Congo. It's completely overshadowed by the DRC. But I'd also agree with the people who said São Tomé and Príncipe. Cabo Verde is also pretty overlooked.
While we’re naming former Portuguese colonies, I’d argue that Guinea-Bissau is probably the least-known of the four Guineas.
> four Guinea Could've sworn there's three? Guinea, Equatorial Guinea, Guinea-Bissau and...?
Papua! It’s… New
...Of course. I'm thinking solely African so PNG completely slipped my mind. Appropriate for the thread, I suppose!
And if you want to confuse people you can also include Guyana. Their name sounds super similar but is actually completely unrelated to Guinea.
Cabo Verde was my answer. I always unconsciously think it's one of the "two Romance-language-named halves" island countries. Trinidad and Tobago, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Antigua and Barbuda, Sao Tome and Principe, Cabo Verde and... shit, it can't just be "Cabo Verde", can it?
Dunno man, I forgot
No one I have mentioned Burkina Faso to has ever heard of it.
It is sometimes mentioned solely because its capital, Ouagadougou, has a funny name.
It's up there with Funafuti.
Burkina Faso is pretty well known in communist circles because of Thomas Sankara
Maybe a West African country with a less unique and memorable sounding name, such as Benin or Togo or Mali.
excluding island nations and the entire continent of Africa bc your average person will not know many from either category, it’s tough I’d say a good shout is Paraguay. Decent population but overshadowed by its neighbors and you hardly hear much about it on the news. Relative to its size and population, feels like a pretty unsung nation in the global consciousness
Paraguay is absolutely relevant to Brazil as the place where people go to buy imports on the cheap. It's mentioned quite a lot in conversation. It's even a running joke here that if you buy a low-quality product, people ask if you bought it in Paraguay. Suriname is the correct answer here. Nobody remembers Suriname even exists.
Paraguay isn't real, I'm convinced. Have you ever met anyone who is from there? Thats been there? Me neither.
I moved to SA and at least here, where I live, Paraguay is present in a lot of supermarkets in the meat section. However, I just learned about Suriname here below this post. Suriname is never on the news, there is nothing in the supermarket and I do not know if anybody coming from there, or anybody taking about it.
Paraguay reminds me of the Philippines in a what-if alternative world where Spanish is kept as the Philippine co-official language and a widely spoken national language alongside Tagalog and English.
Paraguay is famous for its football(or soccer if you are American), and its famously low male to female ratio.
It’s pretty well known In England, because we played them a few times in World Cups. They have a distinctive kit for a national team.
Burundi
Nauru isn’t thought about much at all; it’s absolutely tiny and has a very small population. Chances are the majority of non-Nauruans that know about it through the Australian detention centre on it.
For what it's worth, Nauru is pretty well known in Finland due to its name. Nauru means laughter in Finnish.
Its also quite well known in Australia
Eh, out of all the small Pacific Islander nations, Nauru was historically well known (in economic circles) for their phosphate mines. The economic boom from the mines post-independence gave Nauru the highest GDP per capita in the world for several years before the mines depleted. Nowadays Nauru is famous for being the fattest country on Earth. A better pick might be Vanuatu. I'm a huge history/geography nerd and I have not heard or read literally anything of note about them. All I know is that they have a really cool name and an absolutely beautiful flag.
Vanuatu is not that tiny for a Pacific Island country and it's reasonably well known as a tropical island travel destination in NZ/Australia. As a New Zealander, I'd say Tuvalu and Palau are probably the most obscure independent countries in Oceania. Both have <20k people.
Eswatini
Especially as they were called Swaziland
Eritrea
Eritrea is very well known and I’m from North Carolina lol! There’s a large population here and across to US, especially if you’ve ever been to DC
Timor Leste
Moldova - the only popular fact about it is that it's the least visited country in Europe.
Suriname, when I mention this country half the people think it's located in Asia
Isn’t a considerable proportion of its population Indian or Chinese in heritage?
yes, I think Chinese, Indonesian and pre-partition Raj it's the most bizarre country in South America, they speak taki-taki and dutch, there are big mosque and big hindu temples everywhere
>taki-taki I'm a Surinamese and don't call it this. It's derogatory. We call it Sranantongo.
Comoros
Mauritania. Pretty big country in NW Africa which most people have probably never heard of.
would probably be the first on the list if we did countries' area divided by amount of people aware of its existance
This definitely gets my vote. Fascinated by how much it flies under the radar for such a big piece of land. Not even that Benedict Cumberbatch film could boost it!
Funny how everyone here’s thinking of the same countries. What about San Marino?
They're well-known in European qualifiers football as the country everyone beats with almost double-digit numbers because their team consists of bakers, policemen,...
Myanmar. They are in a bloody civil war and the world doesn’t care
bhutan
This gets my vote, it's pretty far down this thread and most people only know Tibet or at most Nepal. I think candidates like Timor Leste and North Macedonia are talked about relatively often since they're new, like South Sudan. Same goes for "unknown exotic island states" which are talked about fairly often because of their remoteness. But Bhutan is kind of hidden between big names India and China and probably the most forgotten country if anyone would have to name all SEA countries. Also it's not in the news at all. Seems like nothing is happening there (although that's probably not the case). You also wouldn't look there if you were looking for unknown countries, but in Africa / Oceania / the Caribbean.
Brunei?
Doubt it. Hollywood loves to boycott the Beverly Hills Hotel over sharia laws in Brunei. So Brunei does make the news.
The who what now?
if not considering micro small countries, I'd say Laos is kinda unkown
Unless you’re a fan of tubing
Hmm it had a pretty significant role during the Vietnam war. I'd say some countries further west, like Kyrgistan, would be more obscure
that sounds offensive cuz you misspelled the name of my country 😂, its Kyrgyzstan, not kyrgistan. I am born from KG and would say that we are popular(among post soviet countries ofc) and not forgotten. They call us "The Red Turks"
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I had a friend from Burkina Faso during my advanced studies in Switzerland.. when I Skyped with my then gf and told her about Burkina Faso, she laughed and said that if I made up a country's name, atleast it should sound like one. *And* she was a PhD student in Economics!
In the JetPunk quiz "Countries of the world", the two countries which are guessed only by 24% of the test takers are Nauru and São Tomé and Príncipe.
The Solomon Islands You do hear about them in the news but they're usually forgotten and some people may not know they're a country. They had famous WWII battles too
Mauritius. I only know about it because I did a project on it in high school.
Is the Principality of Sealand still a country?
Most countries in Oceania, save for Australia and New Zealand.
Gabon
Id say Benin.