# Stupid Geography Questions **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [May 18, 2001, 9:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-geography-questions/65805 "2001-05-18T09:32:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2015, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-geography-questions/65805/81 "2015-06-22T02:58:13Z")
It’s not only Americans who come up short in the geography department. Semi-retired _Bangkok Post_ columnist Roger Crutchley, an Englishman who has lived in Bangkok for 46 years, noted in this week’s column – [Waterloo – Song, Station or Battleground](http://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/opinion/598524/waterloo-song-station-or-battleground) – that in one survey he’d read, one in six Britons “could not pick out the United Kingdom on a world map. One person even pointed to a spot in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. And a quarter did not know 1066 marked the Battle of Hastings.” He also had this: \*\*While we are at it, the Brits are not too hot on geography either: Presenter: Vietnam has borders with Laos, Cambodia and which other country? Contestant: The US? Presenter: Which mountain range separates France from Spain? Contestant: The Himalayas? Presenter: In which country is Mount Everest? Contestant: Er … it’s not Scotland is it? (er, no it isn’t). Presenter: Where is the Sea of Tranquillity? Contestant: Ibiza?\*\* ---
**Author:** ![Sangahyando](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f14d63/32.png) [@Sangahyando](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sangahyando)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2015, 12:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-geography-questions/65805/82 "2015-06-22T12:40:56Z")
> [@Rick\_Kitchen](#): > > The state of New Mexico puts out a magazine called, logically enough, “New Mexico Magazine”. They run a regular feature called “One of Our 50 is Missing”, about New Mexicans who have had encounters with people who had no clue that New Mexico is a US state. Here’s the archive of columns for the last couple of years: > > [http://www.nmmagazine.com/one-of-our-50-is-missing/](http://www.nmmagazine.com/one-of-our-50-is-missing/) Over this business, I always feel that at the time of the USA’s annexing New Mexico and other regions from Mexico in 1848, the US authorities might have foreseen this situation; and accordingly changed the name of the area concerned, to something not involving the word “Mexico”. In all periods of history, there are plenty of people who are not very bright, and are prone to becoming confused and getting the wrong end of the stick ! ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2015, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-geography-questions/65805/83 "2015-06-22T13:37:52Z")
> [@Siam\_Sam](#): > > Presenter: Where is the Sea of Tranquillity? > Contestant: Ibiza? I suspect the Ibiza tourism board might actually find that offensive… all those years trying to set themselves up as Party Capital of the World and there’s brits (one of Spain’s biggest sources of tourists) who think they are _tranquil_! One of my dorm-mates in college was trying to enter Tourism School. She had to do a multiple choice test; the questions were take-home, so we got to review them with her. One of the questions was which countries did Andorra have borders with - she’d picked one of the wrong choices. She was from Andorra :smack: Girl could speak five languages at the native level, but geography was clearly not her best subject. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2015, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-geography-questions/65805/84 "2015-06-22T20:27:19Z")
Some people struggle with spatial relationships and directions. Things like what your country borders, or whether it’s north or south to a particular destination, are very difficult for some people to grasp. Maybe it’s a learning disability. ---
**Author:** ![buddha\_david](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ee7513/32.png) [@buddha\_david](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/buddha_david)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2015, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-geography-questions/65805/85 "2015-06-22T21:22:57Z")
My friend never lived down this answer he gave in Trivial Pursuit: Question: Where is the Medulla Oblongata? Him: Bangladesh? ---
**Author:** ![leahcim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/b4bc9f/32.png) [@leahcim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/leahcim)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2015, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-geography-questions/65805/86 "2015-06-22T21:46:27Z")
> [@Sangahyando](#): > > Over this business, I always feel that at the time of the USA’s annexing New Mexico and other regions from Mexico in 1848, the US authorities might have foreseen this situation; and accordingly changed the name of the area concerned, to something not involving the word “Mexico”. In all periods of history, there are plenty of people who are not very bright, and are prone to becoming confused and getting the wrong end of the stick ! I heard that what they wrote on the map was actually “Not Mexico”, but the ink smudged. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2015, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-geography-questions/65805/87 "2015-06-22T23:52:22Z")
> [@buddha\_david](#): > > My friend never lived down this answer he gave in Trivial Pursuit: > > Question: Where is the Medulla Oblongata? > Him: Bangladesh? Haha! Everyone knows that’s in Saudi Arabia. ---
**Author:** ![enipla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/54ee81/32.png) [@enipla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/enipla)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2015, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-geography-questions/65805/88 "2015-06-23T00:37:36Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Some people struggle with spatial relationships and directions. Things like what your country borders, or whether it’s north or south to a particular destination, are very difficult for some people to grasp. Maybe it’s a learning disability. Yup. I’m in GIS and some folks just don’t think spatially. Not sure I would call it a disability though. Geography itself can contribute to this. I grew up in areas where the streets and roads for the most part where organized in a NSEW grid pattern. I often give directions using these cardinals. My wife grew up in Pittsburgh. NSEW for directions is not very useful there. You need to direct using right turn left turn. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2015, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-geography-questions/65805/89 "2015-06-23T02:29:42Z")
I can list the state capitals. I can locate Honduras on a map. I can identify at least several of the constituent states of the former Soviet Union. I know which continent is Africa. The one thing I can not understand - at least not without an actual globe right in front of me - is how Portugal winds up being closer to the East Coast than Ireland, or how the shortest route from New York to Paris takes you over Canada. Damn my two-dimensional thinking! ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2015, 2:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-geography-questions/65805/90 "2015-06-23T02:54:43Z")
Long, long ago I had a batch of “flash cards” – memory cards, with the nations of the world on them. Really helpful in memorizing! (Now, Google “flash cards” and you get plug-in RAM cards!) ---
**Author:** ![JKellyMap](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jkellymap/32/15880_2.png) [@JKellyMap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKellyMap)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2015, 12:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-geography-questions/65805/91 "2015-06-23T12:16:11Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > Long, long ago I had a batch of “flash cards” – memory cards, with the nations of the world on them. Really helpful in memorizing! > > (Now, Google “flash cards” and you get plug-in RAM cards!) My four year old has been enjoying Geopuzzles since he was two. They’re jigsaw puzzles, one for each continent, where the pieces are mainly individual countries. (Unfortunately, he’s forgotten a lot of what he learned a year or two ago. Perhaps there is a certain stage of cognitive development after which names, shapes, and relatives locations tend to “stick.”) ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/46a35a/32.png) [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2015, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-geography-questions/65805/92 "2015-06-24T04:33:49Z")
> [@panache45](#): > > I’ve mentioned this in other threads: I have a cousin who think Alaska and Hawaii are near the coast of California, because that’s where they were in the big map they had back in school. I (and a lot of friends I have talked to from the wide-open plains of the midwest US ) were rather surprised to see _how small_ most of the countries of Europe are. Partly this comes from our geography classes – all the country maps seemed to fit nicely on a standard page – the USA, Great Britain, France, Switzerland, etc. So unconsciously we thought they were all about the same size. It’s startling to realize that France, so involved in history, is really about the size of Minnesota & the Dakotas. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stupid-geography-questions/65805.md?page=4)