(Turkish or Persian, n.) The
Balkans is geopolitical region that is within southeastern Europe. Within
the region's several countries, there is a total of 55,000,000 people (if we are counting the Greek Islands), or 32,000,000 people within the region's peninsula.
The term "
balkans" originally came from the Persian "
balk", which means mud, and the Turkish suffix "kan" which is a swampy forest. However, in modern Turkish, the word "balkan" means "a chain of wooded mountains".
A home to a wide variety of cultures, countries, and consistently useless and pointless wars, the region is well known for its exportation of competent individuals with slightly nationalistic tendencies, exceptionally strong liquor, (apparently) good wine, very tasty but fat-inducing cuisinery, gästarbeiters for Western countries, and the term known as "
balkanization", which is a pejorative term for the fragmentation of a larger region or state into smaller regions or states that are often hostile or uncooperative with each other because of pointless differences.
The region contains the Adriatic,
Ionian,
Aegean, and Mediterranean seas, the Dinaric and Albanian Alps, and certain places that are either popular with tourists or underrated. The highest peak in the Balkans is Mt. Musala, and the Balkans is home to various amounts of
flora and fauna.