As a child in the U.S., I once saw a detailed map of London, on which I noticed Picadilly Circus and other circuses. I became envious of the people of London, thinking that circuses, of the kind that come to town only once a year where I live, were going on all the time in London, and there one could go and be entertained by the acrobats, clowns, and animals, etc. any day of the year.

Lisa

I live near a beach and when I was little we'd go down to the beach almost every day. There's an island nearby, and when I was little I'd look out over the water and think that island was England.

When I visited my cousins in California I saw another island off the beach and desided it was Japan. On the way back I reasoned it couldn't be Japan, Japan's too far away. It must have been Hawaii.

Banana Hanna

When I was in first grade, my teacher taught us about the equator. She explained that it was an invisible line circling the earth. However, she had quite a thick southern accent. I thought she said there's an invisible lion (yes, the animal) circling the earth. I even raised my hand and asked her again! For quite a while I believed that there was an invisible lion running around and around the earth. Too funny!

Kris

This is quite embarrassing because i believed it only up until the other day and i'm 22!! Me and my friend were discussing unusual and unique names and I said "it's surprising you don't hear more girls named Liberty" and she asked why and i said "Well, people are naming their kids after countries and places and Liberty just seems to be an obvious choice."

To cut a long story short, I thought the statue of Liberty in the US was just that: A statue of someone named Liberty (i thought she was the first ever presidents wife or something!)

Jay

when I was about 7, I saw a picture of the Great Wall of China taken from a satelite so that the whole wall could be seen.... When my mom pointed it out and asked if I knew what it was I rsponded "waterslide, big deal"

melissa flanagan

I was just old enough to ride my bicycle around our Seattle Neighborhood in the Northwestern US. My understanding of geography was such that Washington, was just south of Canada. With this in mind, I set out one day to bike to Canada. Some six to eight blocks north of our house I asked a lady doing yardwork, "Is this Canada?" "No. You have a ways to go yet." she replied.
So maybe it was a 120 miles, give or take, but then I couldn't have told you how far a mile was either.

Kevin

When I was little in the 70's the issue of Quebec Separatism was big in the news. I couldn't for the life of me figure out how all those french people were going to physically separate their province from the rest of canada. Then I figured they were probably all just going to move to France. Much easier!

Tikifish

As a child I enjoyed watching a tape of an educational special on dinosaurs. One line in the show went, "Dinosaur bones have been discovered in every continent except Antarctica." I asked my parents what "Antarctica" meant, and they (who must have misunderstood me, since I can't imagine them telling me this on purpose) said that it meant a place where there were many houses and buildings. Even years later, when I knew what the continent of Antarctica was, I still had this image of houses and buildings whenever I watched the tape and heard that line.

Jason from Illinois

I used to believe that traveling in cognito was a place in Africa or somewhere.

Jennifer

I grew up learning that Alaska and Hawaii were the two newest US ststes, both becoming states in 1959. I never had any trouble realizing that they were real places before they became states. That might have something to do with the fact that they are disconnected form the rest of the US. Later, I learned that before Alaska and Hawaii, New Mexico and Arizona had been the newest states, becoming states in 1912. Then, I somehow envisioned, for quite some time, that before 1912 there had been a giant bottomless hole in the Earth where New Mexico and Arizona were later to come into existence as states.

Wendy

When I was about 4 years old, we had a globe that had all the countries in different colors to outline their political borders, and it also had a compass that was drawn on the Pacific Ocean next to San Francisco, California. I believed that you could see the different colors and the compass from outer space, or at least from an airplane. When I was five I thought I would finally see the compass because my mom & I flew to the Philippines from San Francisco, and we would be flying over the compass. An hour into the flight, I then had a feeling that the compass didn't exist becuase I kept staring out the airplane window the whole time and I didn't see it.

Daff

I live in Australia and my cousin who is the same age as me lives in Poland. From a very young age i grasped the concept that when it was day here it was night in Poland and vice-versa. In my mind however i believed that our lives worked in perfect unison but in reverse. For example, as i got out of bed, she got into bed. when i ate breakfast, she ate dinner. when i went to school she came home from school etc. The whole idea overwhelmed me but at the same time I remember it gave me a strong feeling of connection to my cousin.

Joanna

I sincerely believed that Mexico and Texaco were two states next to each other somewhere "down south".
After seeing an atlas of the US in my granddad's car, I spent my car trips with my nose pressed against the window, desperately watching to see the enormous "IOWA" that must have been painted on someone's field. I could never fully explain to anyone what I meant when I asked them if they'd seen "the BIG IOWA" yet.
Amazingly enough, I am allowed to mingle in the general population.

Tiff-tiff the terrible

i used to believe that the other half of the world was an exact mirror image of this half, and that everyone had someone else that looked exactly like them on the other side. I always thought it was a race with your own look-a-like to finish whatever it is you do in life first. If i was reading a book, i would always wonder if my look-a-like on the other side of the world was up to the same page I was. I would imagine i was always winning with her having to run to catch up. I called it the Game of Life and even wrote stories about it.

Jyssica

When I was a kid, a playmate told me once that "Insomnia" was a country somewhere in the world, and it seems I believed that for quite some time.

Wendy

I used to believe that each country is on its own Earth. Therefore there were more than one Earths. And to travel internationally meant planet-hopping from one Earth to the other.

Anna Lim

When I was little, I thought Saudi Arabia was 'Salty Arabia', and that all those sand dunes were made of salt. It made sense to me.

John Price

When I first heard that Newfoundland didn't become a part of Canada until 1949, I thought its name meant that it was a land only first found at that time, and was previously unknown.

Deirdre

I used to think the Black Country region in the UK was called that because everyone lived in darkness there.

K

When i was young (in fact up until i was about 22 when i actually had the guts to try it out) my mum used to say tht if you didn't step off escalators in time it would suck you under the moving stars forever. Even now when i look at escalators i intentially stand on unitl i hit the edge - just because i can!

Ally Wilson