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naturegirl321 · Joined: 04 May 2003 Posts: 9041 Location: home sweet home

I got the chance to go visit my family in January and am still shocked at some of the misconceptions people have about Latin America. Here are some of them.

No one speaks English. (Some of the Peruvians I�ve met speak better English than many Americans)
Everyone is short, dark-haired and dark-skinned. (There are bond-haired, blue-eyed, tall Peruvians)
Everyone is poor. (There�s heaps of rich people here)
Everyone lives on farms (A quarter of the population live in Lima)
It�s an uncivilised and backwards country. (People here are educated and polite)
Basically, everyone lives like the Andean people that they see in National Geographics. (Some do, but not everyone)

I just don�t understand how people can lump others together. Yes, there are people who live like the people in National Geographics, however, there are others who live like they�re in NY. I guess I�m shocked at the fact that some, not all, Americans couldn�t be bothered with the rest of the world and are content with living in a bubble. My best friend, who is geographically challenged, asked me while we were out for coffee. �Listen this is going to sounds stupid, but Peru is in Asia, right?� Not quite. I tried to explain that it was near Ecuador at Chile. See didn�t know where that was either. Brasil? Nope. Ok, go south of Mexico and then you get to Panama, then south a bit more, and you hit Peru.

After living in China, I was asked if people spoke English. Where I was living, most people didn�t speak English. So then how did I communicate? they wanted to know. I learnt some Chinese I told them. But isn�t it difficult? Anything can be difficult, you just have to learn a bit and not think that it is difficult.

I don�t think that this only holds for Americans, I�m sure that many of you have contact with people back �home�. Family, friends, people you work with, forums. What are some of the misconceptions you�ve run across?

geaaronson · Joined: 19 Apr 2005 Posts: 948 Location: Mexico City

All attributable to the lack of intensive geography lessons in grade school. So quick, where`s Goa, Azud Hind, Sri Lanka, the Atlas Mountains, Malagasy Republic, Tierra del Fuego? If you didnt answer the last few in 25 seconds or less you too are geographically challenged.

JosephP · Joined: 13 May 2003 Posts: 445

cangringo · Joined: 18 Jan 2007 Posts: 327 Location: Vancouver, Canada

Well, I hate to pick on Americans but I am Canadian and the best one was when hubby was visiting LA and the waitress asked how he got there...huh...so he said on his dog sled, to which she replied "Oh, wow really?" He told her it was parked outside and she ran to the window to look. I am not making this up.

I have had people ask if it's cold all the time, do you live in igloos etc. I'm sure it's not just Americans but those are the people I happened to get these kinds of questions from.

I am fairly geographically challenged myself but I don't every assume anything about another culture. And, after watching the friend's ep where they were trying to name all the States in 6 mins, I was happy that I named about 30 in that time and finally managed to come up with the rest. There are a lot...

If you want some good geographically challenged stuff, watch Rick Mercer on CBC - you can watch online. It's very amusing but also sad.

Jizzo T. Clown · Posted: Thu Feb 22, 2007 8:42 pm Post subject:

mondrian · Posted: Fri Feb 23, 2007 12:24 am Post subject: Re: so where is it?

lozwich · Joined: 25 May 2003 Posts: 1536

bigbadsuzie · Posted: Fri Feb 23, 2007 7:04 am Post subject:

Thanks for finding that link Jizzo, makes you proud to be from that neck of the woods .When you listen to total ignorance like that and dangerous misinformation coming from the people of the most powerful nation on the planet,it kinda puts the whole issue of poor cover letters and punctuation into a more realistic perspective.I wonder how many of those well fed
people had the chance of a good education with an extremely WELL QUALİFİED teacher m.d phd etc etc ,nice to know it didn't make a scrap of difference .

jonniboy · Posted: Fri Feb 23, 2007 8:06 am Post subject:

Some of my favourites...

(In Wisconsin USA, upon hearing that I was from Ireland) "Wow your English is really good, how long did it take you to learn it?"

(My ex-girlfriends father in Minnesota reacting to her moving to Spain) "Waddya wanna go to Mexico for?"

(family in Ireland where the Summer temperature struggles to pass 20 degrees, on being told that it was 32 in Latvia) "wow I never knew they had warm weather there, I just thought it always snowed in those places near the North Pole."

Of course there's the minor things as well, people who just can't get their heads round the fact that Latvia isn't in Russia, people here don't wear bearskin hats or do cossack dancing...

Seriously though many people are just geographically illiterate, but to be fair we tend to know about the places that we need to. I'd consider myself good on geography but even then I only managed 40/53 on level 3 of this

http://www.sheppardsoftware.com/African_Geography.htm

Get your family doing this, they might learn something, even if not you can still laugh at their efforts.

http://www.sheppardsoftware.com/Geography.htm

JosephP · Joined: 13 May 2003 Posts: 445

Sheikh Inal Ovar · Joined: 04 Dec 2005 Posts: 1208 Location: Melo Drama School

One of the greatest misconceptions about Dubai is that it's worth a visit ...

... the residents of the place are equally mistaken in their belief that everyone in the world thinks it's the greatest place on earth ...

rossttuedu · Joined: 03 Feb 2006 Posts: 66 Location: Tianjin

Some people back home actually think they still use rickshaws in China...

Johanna · Joined: 10 May 2005 Posts: 19 Location: Adelaide, Australia

All this ignorance going around... am I the only person worried that the interviewer in Jizzo's youtube clip is an Australian, not a Brit?

basiltherat · Joined: 04 Oct 2003 Posts: 952

that all kazakhs are like borat and syria is a nation of terrorists and very dangerous to reside in or even visit.

Oh for God's Sake !!

I don't think we can blame individuals for these kinds of misconceptions but i think the media and political clowns have a lot to answer for in this respect.

best
basil Very Happy

ilaria · Joined: 26 Jan 2007 Posts: 88 Location: Sicily

I work in Sicily, and of course the only thing people from home know about Sicily and want to talk about is the Mafia. Mafia, mafia, mafia. 'Are you sure it's safe there with all those mafia types?' 'I was reading this interesting article the other day about the mafia...'

Also it's slightly irritating when friends and family end their emails with 'Anyway, enjoy that winter sun!' I wish. Sicily in winter can be as cold, damp and miserable as... well, England. There's no way I can convince them of this, though.