Is there any context that will enable me to get the joke, or is it not worth it?
Countries:
Washington DC
Ottawa
London
Paris
Rome
Copenhagen
Stockholm
Oslo (Just passed through)
States of US
I’ve stayed overnight (or at least driven through) the following
Augusta (driven through only)
Concord
Boston
Providence
Hartford
Albany
Harrisburg (driven through only)
Charleston (driven through only)
Atlanta
Tallahassee
Lansing (driven through only)
Madison
St. Paul (driven through only)
Des Moines
Topeka (driven through only)
Salt Lake City
Helena
Boise
Denver
Olympia (driven through only)
Juneau
Honolulu
US: Washington DC, Little Rock (Arkansas), Springfield (Illinois), Des Moines (Iowa), Saint Paul (Minnesota), Lincoln (Nebraska), Austin (Texas), and Madison (Wisconsin). I would have thought more, but I guess not. Some flight connections, but that’s all.
Internationally: Reykjavik (Iceland), Dublin (Ireland), London (UK), Paris (France), Athens (Greece), Rome (Italy). Also a couple of flight connections.
Ottawa is only the national capital. Toronto is the capital of Ontario.
Oops. Add:
Quebec City
Toronto
Canada:
Ottawa, Canada
Toronto, Ontario
Québec, Québec
Halifax, Nova Scotia
Fredericton, New Brunswick
Winnipeg, Manitoba
Victoria, British Columbia
Regina, Saskatchewan
Edmonton, Alberta
St. John’s, Newfoundland & Labrador
Yellowknife, Northwest Territories
Whitehorse, Yukon
Missing: Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, and Iqualuit, Nunavut.
United States:
Washington, D.C.
Boston, Massachusetts
Other Countries:
London, U.K.
Dublin, Ireland
Paris, France
New Delhi, India
Canberra, Australia
Sydney, New South Wales
Melbourne, Victoria
Adelaide, South Australia
Canadian provincial capitals: Victoria, Edmonton (outskirts only), Regina, Winnipeg (airport stop only), Toronto, Quebec City, Charlottetown, Halifax.
US state capitals: Madison, WI --incredibly, that’s the only one I’m sure of. Most of my US traveling was either car trips when I was a teenager where I don’t remember the route, or a couple of business trips later on that definitely didn’t go anywhere near a state capital.
National capitals: Ottawa, Washington, Helsinki, Stockholm, Copenhagen, Paris, London.
Outside the US:
Rome
Vatican City
US-based:
Washington DC
Atlanta, GA
Annapolis, MD
Boston, MA
Lansing, MI
Austin, TX
Madison, WI
Charlotte Amalie, USVI
Within the US:
Washington, DC
Columbus, OH
Lansing, MI
Indianapolis, IN
Springfield, IL
Frankfort, KY
Nashville, TN
Charleston, WV
Richmond, VA
Atlanta, GA
Annapolis, MD
Boston, MA
Within Japan:
Tokyo
Fukushima, Fukushima
Niigata, Niigata
Maebashi, Gunma
Utsunomiya, Tochigi
Mito, Ibaraki
Chiba, Chiba
Saitama, Saitama
Yokohama, Kanagawa
Nagano, Nagano
Kofu, Yamanashi
Toyama, Toyama
Kanazawa, Ishikawa
Kyoto, Kyoto
Nara, Nara
Osaka, Osaka
Kobe, Hyogo
Okayama, Okayama
Matsue, Shimane
Hiroshima, Hiroshima
Fukuoka, Fukuoka
Miyazaki, Miyazaki
Others:
Seoul
Jeju City, Jeju (Korea)
Toronto, Ontario
So only about 37 total if you count provincial and prefectural capitals. Only 3 national capitals.
Wait, what? I’m finding that Chillicothe was Ohio’s first state capital, and March 1st, 2003 was Ohio’s bicentennial. There were celebrations in Chillicothe, but I don’t see anything mentioning restoring its capital status, even ceremonially.
My country-only capitals are:
Washington, D.C.
Quito
San Jose
Paris
Berlin (and Bonn when it was a capital)
Athens
Rome
Brussels
London
Amsterdam
Vienna
Helsinki
Moscow
Seoul
Beijing
Hanoi
Phnom Penh
Vientiane
Bangkok
Singapore
Hong Kong (before the handover)
Cape Town and Pretoria
Mbabane
Canberra
Wellington
Forgot -
Genoa, Liguria, Italy
Totally forgot about Juneau. Been there too.
I forgot a couple.
Basseterre (St. Kitts and Nevis)
St. George’s (Grenada)
That reminds me- Hamilton, Bermuda
Not very many.
Outside the US:
Rome, Italy
Vatican City
London
Dublin
In the US:
Washington DC
Boston MA
Phoenix AZ
Denver CO
Hartford CT
Atlanta GA
Indianapolis IN
Annapolis MD
Trenton NJ
Santa Fe NM
Albany NY
Oklahoma City OK
Providence RI
Richmond VA
Amsterdam
Andorra la Vella
Athens
Bangkok
Beijing
Berlin
Bratislava
Brussels
Budapest
Buenos Aires
Canberra
Caracas
Copenhagen
Dublin
Hamilton
Hanoi
Helsinki
Kampala
Kuala Lumpur
Lima
Lisbon
London
Lusaka
Luxembourg
Madrid
Maputo
Monaco
Montevideo
Nairobi
Oslo
Papeete
Paris
Phnom Penh
Prague
Cape Town (Legislative, it looks like South Africa has 3 capitals)
Quito
Riga
Rome
San Jose (Well, I was in the airport, which doesn’t really count)
Santiago
Sarajevo (not really, passed through on a train)
Singapore
Stockholm
La Paz
Talinn
Tokyo
Vatican City
Vienna
Vientiane
Vilnius
Warsaw
Washington DC
Wellington
And I think Bern, Zagreb and Lilongwe. Pretty sure about Zagreb.
Let’s see, in the USA:
Phoenix
Sacramento
Denver
Airport in Honolulu
Boston
Saint Paul
Carson City
Salt Lake City
Driven through Olympia, I think.
Madison
Whoa, thought I had mistakenly deleted the national capitols! Phew!
Washington
London
Dublin
Paris
Madrid
Amsterdam
Luxembourg City
Brussels
Berlin (and Bonn when it was West Germany)
Copenhagen
Stockholm
Athens
Sacramento
Seattle
Honolulu
Carson City
Phoenix
Santa Fe
Oklahoma City (drove through)
Baton Rouge
Montgomery
Knoxville
Atlanta
Harrisburg
Indianapolis
Denver
Salt Lake City (changed planes at the airport)
Baltimore (drove through)
If there’s a deeper context, I don’t know it.
Outside US:
Guatemala City
Lima
Buenos Aires
Yaounde
Bamako
Addis Ababa
Lusaka
Harare
Johannesburg
Beijing
Ulan Bataar
Manila
Bangkok
Kathmandu
Delhi
London
Paris
Rome
Vienna
Vatican City
Inside the US:
DC
Sacramento
I don’t get the Denver Internet meme either.
I notice at least one Tel Aviv. That one’s controversial. An editor over here recently told me he’d just received an angry letter from a reader demanding that Jerusalem stop being referred to as the Israeli capital. Never been myself, but the wife has been in Jerusalem a couple of times for a for a few weeks each. A project she was in charge of here in Thailand was receiving funding from Hebrew University. She stayed in Jerusalem but also visited Tel Aviv. The same project also received funding from Utrecht University, so she lived there for half a summer, also visiting Amsterdam and the Hague. While there, she also took a trip with a colleague and stayed in Luxembourg City and Brussels.
In addition to Jerusalem/Tel Aviv, she’s been to every other Asian capital I’ve listed in the OP too and in the US visited Honolulu, Santa Fe, Boston and Washington DC. We passed through Oklahoma City twice while driving on the interstate but didn’t stop, so I won’t count that one for her.
I almost visited Bern. I changed trains there and spent an hour or two in the station. Actually I was supposed to call some distant relatives in the city, from the branch of the family had that had stayed in Switzerland back in the day. But this was pre-Internet days, and I discovered when I was in the station that I’d lost their contact info and even their names! I’d been backpacking around, no real firm plans to meet up with them, I’d already spent time elsewhere in Switzerland with other members of the family (one of them gave me the Bern info and said I should call), so blew it off and just jumped another train to Brussels, where the time for my flight home was fast approaching anyway.