Guinea-Bissau is a small country on the west coast of Africa. It sits between Guinea and Senegal. The capital is Bissau, which is also the second half of the country's name. About 1.7 million people live there. It used to belong to Portugal, so Portuguese is still the official language — though actually most people at home speak other West African languages, and the everyday mix is often a creole. Do not mix it up with Guinea next door (capital Conakry, once French), or with Equatorial Guinea, or with Papua New Guinea far away in the Pacific. They share an old European name for a stretch of coast, not one government.