# Current Events and Childhood Misunderstandings **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [May 3, 2010, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115 "2010-05-03T04:08:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Nobody](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/94ad74/32.png) [@Nobody](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nobody)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2010, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/21 "2010-05-04T19:25:58Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Well, there were real tunnels in the Underground Railroad, but they were much shorter-- From the basement of a house to a river bank a hundred feet away, or so. If that’s any help. > > When I first heard about the Challenger accident (I was one of the few schoolchildren who did not actually see it on TV), I was convinced that the astronauts had managed to get out and take refuge on Skylab, and that we’d be hearing about a rescue soon. Never mind that Skylab had been down for nearly a decade by then; I had so many cool books that talked about it, it _had_ to be up there. Though that probably wasn’t so much a misunderstanding, as good old-fashioned denial. But shortly after the Challenger blew up there were jokes everywhere about it, including jokes about the dead crew members. ---
**Author:** ![Rasa](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rasa/32/3578_2.png) [@Rasa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rasa)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2010, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/22 "2010-05-04T19:28:00Z")
Not me, but my brother… When we were young, I guess there was a lot on the news about South Africa and aparthied. One day my brother horrified us all by saying something about “all those monkeys” they kept talking about in South Africa. After some careful questioning, we discovered that, since our recent trip to the zoo, he thought aparthied meant “prehensile”. Obviously he didn’t recall the word prehensile but he thought the news was always talking about monkeys who could use their tails. ---
**Author:** ![Rasa](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rasa/32/3578_2.png) [@Rasa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rasa)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2010, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/23 "2010-05-04T19:29:32Z")
Oh, and since you mentioned Skylab… back in the '70s or whatever, when it was coming down, my aunt was completely paranoid that it was going to fall from the sky and kill my cousins. She wouldn’t let them play outside till it fell, “just in case”. ---
**Author:** ![dangermom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e274bd/32.png) [@dangermom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dangermom)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2010, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/24 "2010-05-04T19:31:14Z")
> [@Rasa](#): > > I’ll cop to this too! I pictured it more like those coal carts on rickety tracks, because, come on now, how could entire trains fit underground? Me too, totally. I always imagined people running underground along train tracks, or riding in coal cart-type things. I didn’t see a subway until I was 13, that probably didn’t help. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2010, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/25 "2010-05-04T19:46:13Z")
> [@dangermom](#): > > Me too, totally. I always imagined people running underground along train tracks, or riding in coal cart-type things. I didn’t see a subway until I was 13, that probably didn’t help. I thought this too. In Oro-Medonte township (Simcoe County, Ontario) we have a family cottage near a church, called the African Episcopal Church, which was said to be the ‘end station on the Underground Railway’ - it was built by a community of escaped ex-slaves. It’s a historic site and usually locked - I always wanted to see the inside because I thought there would be a mini subway station in there (and when I did see the inside, I was horribly disappointed!) My mom had an even better one - she grew up in Toronto during WW2, and heard that on the other side of Yonge St. in Toronto there were **Germans**. She assumed that this meant that WW2 was “happening” there, right on the other side of Yonge St. - and since she was Jewish, that she’d be _killed_ if she dared to walk east of Yonge. She hated going to the east half of the city for years and years because of this child-hood phobia, long after she knew it was absurd. ---
**Author:** ![Swallowed\_My\_Cellphone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9d8465/32.png) [@Swallowed\_My\_Cellphone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Swallowed_My_Cellphone)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2010, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/26 "2010-05-04T20:03:45Z")
> [@DCnDC](#): > > As a small child in the early 80’s I thought (through the evening news as background while I was playing) that Nicaragua was full of rebel gorillas with guns. I was old enough to know that they weren’t literal gorillas, but I still thought they were called “Gorillas” kind of like the Black Panther Party or the Tamil Tigers. You know the Nicaragua Gorillas. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2010, 8:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/27 "2010-05-04T20:22:11Z")
> [@Kyla](#): > > Admit it, people, who else thought that the Underground Railroad was a real railroad? Yeppers. And when I, a Protestant kid, first heard about the Stations of the Cross, the image in my head was of _train_ stations, and I envisioned a kiddie train going from one to the next. _Toot, toot, all aboard!_ Oh, and the holy family’s ‘flight to Egypt’ - as a kid, I wondered how that worked, when the Wright Brothers’ first flight wasn’t until 1903. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2010, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/28 "2010-05-04T20:30:43Z")
> [@](#): > > Yeppers. > > And when I, a Protestant kid, first heard about the Stations of the Cross, the image in my head was of train stations, and I envisioned a kiddie train going from one to the next. Toot, toot, all aboard! > > Oh, and the holy family’s ‘flight to Egypt’ - as a kid, I wondered how that worked, when the Wright Brothers’ first flight wasn’t until 1903. And _I_ wondered how they could have a Pilot named Pontius back then, before there were planes. ---
**Author:** ![Morbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/morbo/32/389_2.png) [@Morbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morbo)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2010, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/29 "2010-05-04T20:40:41Z")
I was confused as to why the Army would get into a fight over a [Grenada](http://www.tocmp.com/pix/Ford/images/1975%20Ford%20Granada%20Ghia%20Sedan%20f3q_jpg.jpg). ---
**Author:** ![purplehorseshoe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/purplehorseshoe/32/2996_2.png) [@purplehorseshoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/purplehorseshoe)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2010, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/30 "2010-05-04T21:12:36Z")
I don’t remember just how young I was, but some teacher talking about classical mythology mentioned Hades offhand. I didn’t know what the word meant and when I got home, I asked my father about Hades. Well, he thought I said “Haiti.” He’s a racist sumbitch, so he goes off on a rant about how it’s an awful, awful place, full of poor black people, and hotter’n’hell. It took me a while to get that straightened out. ---
**Author:** ![Meyer6](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/cc9497/32.png) [@Meyer6](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Meyer6)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2010, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/31 "2010-05-04T21:43:36Z")
At the end of the cold war people were always talking about the Iron Curtain. I thought the Iron Curtain was an actual thing, like a big wall separating the Communist countries from the rest of Europe, but entirely made of iron and pleated to look like a fabric curtain. After all, the Berlin Wall was a real thing, right? Speaking of the Berlin Wall, I thought that it went clear across Germany, separating east from west, and that it was just bad luck that it happened to go right through the middle of Berlin. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2010, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/32 "2010-05-04T23:29:07Z")
> [@Green\_Bean](#): > > No no, they explained to me. The camp was at _Threemile Harbor_, not Three Mile Island. East Hampton? ---
**Author:** ![Algher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Algher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Algher)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2010, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/33 "2010-05-05T00:15:19Z")
> [@IvoryTowerDenizen](#): > > I was 4 or 5 when Watergate broke. I pictured a damn bursting and water everywhere. What it had to do with the President, I never understood. Ditto. My brother asked me if I wanted to watch the watergate special on the TV - I told him that sounded boring if it was just a bunch of water going over a dam. ---
**Author:** ![LeeshaJoy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e8cbc/32.png) [@LeeshaJoy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LeeshaJoy)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2010, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/34 "2010-05-05T00:35:35Z")
I was eight years old when the first Gulf War started. I remember hearing reports about it on the news, and wondering why the Persians were so big on golf. ---
**Author:** ![KRC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/45deac/32.png) [@KRC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KRC)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2010, 1:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/35 "2010-05-05T01:21:14Z")
When Nixon was being impeached my little sister said “He’s the president. He can do anything he wants.” We set her strait on that, but then there was a show about Andrew Johnson being impeached, and even though it was on after her bedtime she insisted on staying up so she could see the part where “they throw the peaches at him.” ---
**Author:** ![cwthree](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9de0a6/32.png) [@cwthree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cwthree)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2010, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/36 "2010-05-05T01:44:10Z")
I was a child in 1974, and I overheard the evening news broadcast, which was covering the invasion of Cyprus. I fully expected to see soldiers marching past our suburban home, which happened to be on _ **Cypress** _ Lane. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2010, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/37 "2010-05-05T01:49:49Z")
> [@IvoryTowerDenizen](#): > > I was 4 or 5 when Watergate broke. I pictured a damn bursting and water everywhere. What it had to do with the President, I never understood. Very similar story here. I was probably 8 or so when the scandal broke. My parents were watching the news, and they were talking about Watergate…in that same newscast, there was also story about a flood somewhere, and in that story, there was a bit of film, showing a fence which was mostly underwater. Somehow, my little brain stuck together “Watergate” and that underwater fence, and I was certain, for some time, that the two were the same story. ---
**Author:** ![pudytat72](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ce7236/32.png) [@pudytat72](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pudytat72)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2010, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/38 "2010-05-05T03:20:26Z")
My older brother and two older sisters heard that “every 4th child in the world was Chinese”. Since I was the 4th child, I had to be Chinese. They would talk to me in “Chinese” and I would cry because I did not understand them. ---
**Author:** ![Marlitharn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/779978/32.png) [@Marlitharn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marlitharn)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2010, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/39 "2010-05-05T18:23:19Z")
I was 5 when Skylab fell. I overheard just enough about it on the news to convince me that it was going to fall right on my house, and was very upset with my parents that they wouldn’t let us all sleep in the basement. ---
**Author:** ![picunurse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7bcc69/32.png) [@picunurse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/picunurse)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2010, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115/40 "2010-05-05T18:43:11Z")
> [@Meyer6](#): > > At the end of the cold war people were always talking about the Iron Curtain. I thought the Iron Curtain was an actual thing, like a big wall separating the Communist countries from the rest of Europe, but entirely made of iron and pleated to look like a fabric curtain. After all, the Berlin Wall was a real thing, right? > > Speaking of the Berlin Wall, I thought that it went clear across Germany, separating east from west, and that it was just bad luck that it happened to go right through the middle of Berlin. No, it was made of chainmail, I was sure I’d seen pictures of it. (I had a rich fantasy life as a child.) 😃 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/current-events-and-childhood-misunderstandings/538115.md?page=3)