An Adult Should Really Know This - Silly Things You've Had to Tell People

[Dazi]

When I was a kid, I had a game - Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego - for my Commodore 64 (I know, I'm dating myself). It came with a world almanac and was a GREAT way to learn geography. And a bit about political and monetary systems and languages, too.

Totally loved that game!   

[PastryGoddess]

When I was a kid, I had a game - Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego - for my Commodore 64 (I know, I'm dating myself). It came with a world almanac and was a GREAT way to learn geography. And a bit about political and monetary systems and languages, too.

There was a show on TV called Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego.  I loved loved loved watching it!

[Pen^2]

We had an awesome geography teacher at school. If there were 5 minutes to fill at the end of class, he would get us to stand up and we'd play this country game. Basically, we'd choose a random letter, and then have to go around the class saying in turn the name of either a country or a capital which starts with that letter. No repeats were allowed. If you couldn't think of one, or if you took too long (about 5 seconds), you had to sit down. The last person standing got a small chocolate.

We probably only did it once a week or so, but the hope of that chocolate helped me learn more countries than anything else ever had. You'd be surprised how sophisticated the strategies became, also. And I'll always know how to spell tricky countries with silent first letters, like Djibouti, too

[readingchick]

When I was a kid, I had a game - Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego - for my Commodore 64 (I know, I'm dating myself). It came with a world almanac and was a GREAT way to learn geography. And a bit about political and monetary systems and languages, too.

There was a show on TV called Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego.  I loved loved loved watching it!

I loved it too! That's how I learned some obscure world capitols!

[A.P. Wulfric]

That's how I got started- How else would I remember Bamako, Mali and Kigali, Rwanda?  There was also where in time and where in the usa, but the show was Where in the World is...

(And I still say it in my head like Rockapella did. Where in the world is....Carmen Sandiego?)

[kherbert05]

I clean house for an elderly lady who has two adult daughters.  Daughter2 came to visit her mother and we were chatting about Daughter1's vacation. The following conversation ensued:
D2: My sister is on vacation, so if you need more cleaning supplies, call me, not her.
Me: oh okay, I wish I could go on vacation.
D2: Me too.  I wish I had enough money to go out of the country like my sister.
Me: oh, where did she go?
D2: Hawaii
Me: *facepalm*

I'll let that pass if they are thinking of the expense of flying there being about the same as flying to Europe. When we first moved to San Angelo we were amazed at the number of licence plates from Hawaii and Alaska. I think we had only seen Alaskan plates on vacation in Canada and never seen Hawaii plates in real life. A neighbor explained that the military considers Hawaii and Alaska assignments to be overseas and will transport 1 vehicle per family back to the mainland when they move. If they move within lower 48, they have to transport the car themselves.


That and the car seats in the back of patrol cars, with infants - preschooler riding in them were the two biggest shocks moving there. Cops took their patrol cars home. The cops were allowed to use the vehicle to drop their kids off at daycare/school on the way to work and pick them up on the way home. It did lower the amount of SS behavior in the school pick up lines to have 2 -3 patrol cars in the line.

[that_one_girl]

I clean house for an elderly lady who has two adult daughters.  Daughter2 came to visit her mother and we were chatting about Daughter1's vacation. The following conversation ensued:
D2: My sister is on vacation, so if you need more cleaning supplies, call me, not her.
Me: oh okay, I wish I could go on vacation.
D2: Me too.  I wish I had enough money to go out of the country like my sister.
Me: oh, where did she go?
D2: Hawaii
Me: *facepalm*

I'll let that pass if they are thinking of the expense of flying there being about the same as flying to Europe. When we first moved to San Angelo we were amazed at the number of licence plates from Hawaii and Alaska. I think we had only seen Alaskan plates on vacation in Canada and never seen Hawaii plates in real life. A neighbor explained that the military considers Hawaii and Alaska assignments to be overseas and will transport 1 vehicle per family back to the mainland when they move. If they move within lower 48, they have to transport the car themselves.


That and the car seats in the back of patrol cars, with infants - preschooler riding in them were the two biggest shocks moving there. Cops took their patrol cars home. The cops were allowed to use the vehicle to drop their kids off at daycare/school on the way to work and pick them up on the way home. It did lower the amount of SS behavior in the school pick up lines to have 2 -3 patrol cars in the line.

If she had said "overseas" then I would have understood.  LOL

[Pen^2]

When DH and I visited mainland USA, we were complimented daily on our great English. We are Australian. One guy, upon hearing we were Australian, said something like, "wow, that's overseas, isn't it? Like Canada?" I don't know, is there a prevalent belief that only people in America and England speak English? We traveled around quite a bit, so it wasn't just in one place.

I would have thought that people would be vaguely aware of which countries speak the same language as you, if only for potential holiday purposes.

Although, I've actually met British people who have complained of the same problem. Maybe we were just unlucky with the numbers of clueless people we encountered.

We always replied to the compliments with, "thanks, your English isn't too bad either!"

[Slartibartfast]

Those of you who are geography fans . . . have you tried http://geoguessr.com?  Really interesting geography game - it plops you down in a Google street view somewhere in the world, and you have to wander around a bit until you feel confident taking a guess at where you are.  You get points based on how close to accurate you were (in miles).  I found it really interesting what things I ended up using for clues - foliage, language on signs, license plates, shop names, etc.  My closest so far was .1 miles (it plopped me down in front of an easily-identifiable restaurant which was named for the bay it was in, which I've been to) and my farthest was mixing up Scotland and New Zealand 

[menley]

When DH and I visited mainland USA, we were complimented daily on our great English. We are Australian. One guy, upon hearing we were Australian, said something like, "wow, that's overseas, isn't it? Like Canada?" I don't know, is there a prevalent belief that only people in America and England speak English? We traveled around quite a bit, so it wasn't just in one place.

I would have thought that people would be vaguely aware of which countries speak the same language as you, if only for potential holiday purposes.

Although, I've actually met British people who have complained of the same problem. Maybe we were just unlucky with the numbers of clueless people we encountered.

We always replied to the compliments with, "thanks, your English isn't too bad either!"

I get the same - I live in a tourist destination in Europe - whenever they hear me speak, people ask where I'm from. I usually respond "Texas" and the response is inevitably "Wow, your English is really good!" These are not people who don't know where Texas is... they all say "Oh, Dallas! Who shot JR!" They just don't think we speak English there, apparently...

[Contrary]

Slartibartfast, you are awesome!  I showed this game to my 10 year old geography fiend and he's been transported (pun intended)!   

[Slartibartfast]

Slartibartfast, you are awesome!  I showed this game to my 10 year old geography fiend and he's been transported (pun intended)!

And I just played it again and had my bestest score ever (31750) - all five rounds put me somewhere I could identify!  (With the help of Google, but still - cool that a random roadside stand in rural Africa had a Facebook page!)

[PastryGoddess]

Those of you who are geography fans . . . have you tried http://geoguessr.com?  Really interesting geography game - it plops you down in a Google street view somewhere in the world, and you have to wander around a bit until you feel confident taking a guess at where you are.  You get points based on how close to accurate you were (in miles).  I found it really interesting what things I ended up using for clues - foliage, language on signs, license plates, shop names, etc.  My closest so far was .1 miles (it plopped me down in front of an easily-identifiable restaurant which was named for the bay it was in, which I've been to) and my farthest was mixing up Scotland and New Zealand 

Thanks   It not like I have anything else to do for the next several hours

[lady_disdain]

Well, you asked for it...

Name all the countries in the world: http://www.sporcle.com/games/g/world
Pick all the countries in the world out of a list: http://www.sporcle.com/games/gwukelic/eenie_meenie_miney_moe

Curiously, I find the second harder than the first.

[Bluenomi]

Those of you who are geography fans . . . have you tried http://geoguessr.com?  Really interesting geography game - it plops you down in a Google street view somewhere in the world, and you have to wander around a bit until you feel confident taking a guess at where you are.  You get points based on how close to accurate you were (in miles).  I found it really interesting what things I ended up using for clues - foliage, language on signs, license plates, shop names, etc.  My closest so far was .1 miles (it plopped me down in front of an easily-identifiable restaurant which was named for the bay it was in, which I've been to) and my farthest was mixing up Scotland and New Zealand 

To be fair parts of NZ and Scotland do look very alike and both use English so that won't help!