Foto O’ the Dia 4
by David
(This one is for you Nimithri).
The picture I snapped above is of a National Geographic Survey map found on the wall in our hotel room in Cuenca, Ecuador. The map was printed in the U.S.
There are indeed many subtle, yet noticeable, differences between life in the U.S. and the U.K. In the U.K., for example, the etiquette of the road has apparently been passed on to the behavior (behaviour?) of pedestrians, where one is always expected to pass on the left side of an escalator or stairwell. (Feigned British accent.) It would be quite rude to do otherwise!
Another wonderful difference I noticed was the look of maps, which in the States are invariable U.S.-centric. When I see a world map, I expect to find the only country that matters right smack in the epicenter: Yep, you guessed it, America. Is this an arbitrary geographic formulation? Yes. Have we capriciously sliced the world’s biggest landmass into two halves, placing each on the fringe of our map? Yes. Have we ignored the strictures of longitude and international agreements to standardize time? Yes. Does America care about these things? No.
In Britain, I learned that the horizontal center of the map was placed at 0 degrees longitude, a convenient, if more sensible, reason to place England near the middle. But who said America was sensible? Britain, I’ve got my eye on you.
Comments
I would like to point out that apparently Canada is not as self centred as you folks – or maybe maps were cheaper for us to get from Britain. We definitely are on the far upper left, but not in the middle.
Hi David – I am so happy to hear you are in Ecuador and having a blast learning spanish and working in the healthcare field. Nowadays, med schools like to see international experience as it shows an ability to deal with a variety of people. In fact, my friend who is finishing her residency at Mount Sinani also spent one month working in an Ecuador hospital as part of her training. Unfortunately, her spanish fell by the wayside as soon as she returned.
P.S. Cool photography!