the world

When I was young we lived in a town that was connected to a larger town by crossing a bridge across the river. We could see only the top of this bridge from our home and I used to be afraid to drive to the next town because I thought we had to drive across the top of bridge to get there and I was afraid we would fall through to the river.

I persuaded myself that I had been conned all along by the local shop - who had been charging me a penny per sweet I bought from there. The sign said 1p - not 1p per sweet. So I tried to buy 20 - with 1p. I argued my case, but the shopkeeper was bigger than me.

I used to believe that the Purdue University Boilermakers referred to the cocktail, rather than "people who make boilers."

When I was about 7, I was told we were moving to Hawaii. I envisioned us living in grass huts with one room, no roads and worst of all ~gasp~ no TV! I was terribly upset. I still live here today...

when i was little(about 2), george Bush was president and i thought he and his vice president were people who snuck around and hid behind bushes and got information about people, and his vice president wrote down everything.

My brother once told me that the world would become so polluted that one day it would explode.
Shortly afterwards I overheard a news report on the television about NASA revealing more "evidence in support of the Big Bang Theory".
For several days I was absolutely terrified.

When I was 6 or 7, my dad was temporarily relocated to Austin, Texas. (We lived in Dallas at the time.) He would commute back and forth on weekends, but one day, my mom, brother and I actually drove down to with him to spend the week. I was so excited to be going--I had never been "out of town" in my memory--so I was repeatedly asking my dad, "Daddy, what's Austin like?" He couldn't communicate to me that it was just another city, and I was relentless in my asking. So, to give me a ridiculous answer that I would laugh at and maybe give up on asking him, he told me, "In Austin, there are lots of wild animals. And everyone eats nothing but breakfast cereal." I was shocked. "Really?" I asked. He thought it was so funny that I actually believed him that he told me all about it, and how everyone's favorite meal is a really cool breakfast cereal thing called fruit soup. When we passed a deer crossing sign, I knew that had to mean that it was true: there WERE wild animals in Austin. I was so disappointed when we got there and there were no wild animals and we ate plain old hamburgers!

Ok, this one is about my brother.

Years ago, my family went up to Maine. Over there, we were go suppossed to go on a cruise to Canada. Unfortunately, there was a storm and we couldn't go.

My brother came to a conclusion that Canada was an island! I had to prove it to him, when he was 11, that Canada is connected to the US!

When I was younger, to while away the hours, a few friends and I dug holes in the ground to see how deep we could go, well I was totally convinced that one day if we dug deep enough (like, just a couple of feet!!), that we would dig right through to Australia, imagine my disappointment when I realised that was never going to happen, by the way, I'm going to Australia next year, by......PLANE hahaha ( do you think someone in Australia might have thought the same thing and think they could dig through to Britain??) I wonder....

I'm not sure how old I was exactly but it was pretty young. I had a piece of wrapped up Christmas candy and I was playing with it. For some reason I was trying to sell it to all the adults. I started out with a dollar and my aunt said no. Then I said a penny and she said "That's way to expensive for me!" Obviously she was being sarcastic but for the longest time after that I though the less amount of money you had the more it was worth.

There was a US presidential election when I was in 2nd Grade, my teacher showed the class what the president says as he is sworn in: "I do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the President of the United States etc."

I used to believe for about a year following that day that the incoming President *executes* the President who's leaving. My parents laughed so hard -- apparently, they thought it was fitting for the old President to be executed!

I used to have a stuffed globe I used as a pillow when I was first learning to read. Phonetically sounding out the countries, I used to believe that Niger and Nigeria, were pronounced with a hard G, and proudly announced their names to my mother as Nigger and Niggeria. She VERY quickly corrected me.

I grew up in southern long island, New York, and went to the beach a lot. The horizon of one particular beach I went to a lot had a bit of land in the far distance. I knew that England was across the ocean, and I assumed that land in the distance was england. When i was 4, i almost drowned trying to swim there ( i wanted to meet the Queen so badly!). My brother saved me and crushed my beliefs by telling me the land was not england; it was staten island and queens. go figure.

I used to tell my mom that i never want to be turkish, when she finally asked me why, i replied saying because everyyear at thanksgiving we always eat the turkeys!!

I used to believe that when you took money to the bank, they had a big box that had your name on it, and they threw your money into the box, and when you took money out, they would find your box and give you the money you wanted.
The stupid part is that I always pictured the boxes as looking like miniature washing machines.
The sad part is that I believed this until I was 10 years old and got my own bank account.

i used to believe that at Picadilly Circus, there was actually a circus. i persuaded my mum to take me there when I was five, and i was so upset that the circus was not there, i refused to speak to my mum for a week, cos i was convinced that she had told the circus to go away.