-------- Original Message --------
Subject:        Re: MAPS-L: geographical illiteracy
Date:   Fri, 21 Jul 2006 17:13:48 -0400
From:   Michael Holt <[log in to unmask]>
To:     Maps, Air Photo & Geospatial Systems Forum <[log in to unmask]>



This is true.  I was there.

My wife worked in a place that enjoyed, for a year or two each time,
foreign scientists doing research.  One trio came from the UK, and were
Indian (as in Siva and all that).  They were eager to lose their British
accents and to be a part of the local social scene.  This they did
fairly well.

Yes, they were Indian, but they'd never been to India.  All they knew
was the UK.  Now, they were in Richmond VA; they'd never been to the
United States.

One Friday, soon after they got here, they announced they wished to
drive somewhere -- they had one of the college cars that seem to be for
sale all the time -- and they asked for ideas. They wanted to be
tourists, they said.  We suggested Williamsburg, DC, Virginia Beach,
and, if they became adventurous, even the Outer Banks.  They listened
carefully, looked at my crude (but quite accurate!) maps, and went away
smiling.

Monday morning they came into the lab looking like they'd been on a
three day drunk.  In their eyes one could see a combination of total
exhaustion and confusion.

Once they'd been given coffee and Twinkies, they told their story.  They
had looked at a map of the U.S. and decided that the tourist destination
they'd see over the weekend was the Grand Canyon.  Somewhere in Missouri
it had dawned on them that the Grand Canyon was further from Richmond
than Birmingham was from Cambridge.

I don't think they left Richmond again except to go to the airport.



Michael