places

I actually believed that if I dug far enough down I would reach China.

Sirrus Templar

Not my wrong belief, but at least two Exchange Students we had were shocked seeing Australians had world maps without the Americas at the centre, which was the way they had always seen maps in the US, and obviously thought that was the proper way. One at least got the joke when I gave him one with Australia at the top of the world and Greenland at the bottom. Why not? - there is no real "up" or "down" in space.

Swanny

I belived tx was a country

Anon

As a kid, I learned of the city of Birmingham (the one in Alabama), and thought it was named for someone overcooking ham (I thought it was Burningham).

Ellen

When I was little, I used to believe that the clouds in the sky was the North Pole, and that was where Santa Claus lived. I also believed that the nearby industrial area was Sydney (I live in Melbourne). I was a bit disorientated when my parents announced we were actually going to Sydney!

Anon

In my geography class, we went to the library to research our country projects. My friend and I did not have the same country, but we sat next to each other anyway. My country was Australia. We were talking about it and she mentioned how our governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger,came from their. I had to explain to her that Austria is in Europe and Australia was on the opposite side of the Earth. The funny part is that we are 9th graders and it was the highest level geography class.

Mar

When I was young, I lived in a place with lots of mountains. I used to think that those mountains were different countries, like Australia and Canada.

Anon

When I was maybe 4 or 5 the family would be watching the Jackie Gleason show on tv. I remember him saying during the intro "Here we are in Beauuutiful Miami" I kept thinking, well where is his beautiful MAMMY he keeps talking about??

judd

I got confused as a kid about Neverland. I knew Peter Pan came from there, and therefore it didnt exist, but then I was shown a spot-the-mistake map, with Netherlands on it, and I was convinced they'd just made a typo and that was the mistake ...

Gemz

I used to think there were two Canadas and two Russias because on the map it shows Canada and Russia twice because they couldn't fit it all in one place on the map.

Anon

i used to beleive that the city "amseterdam" in denmark i think, was really called "hamsterdam" and it was infested with hamsters, running all over the streets, and in peoples houses and stuff. When my dad came back from a bussness trip from there i was really mad at him for a week, because he hadnt brought me back a hamster, it wasnt untill he asked me what was wrong, that he told me i was wrong lol.

viki

well this is kind of embarassing. i live in texas and i have heard that that everythings bigger in texas and texas woman have big hair (i used alot of hair spray at age four)
i thought women in texas,especially cow girls,were sopposed to have big hair.well one time i was at the grocery store with my mom. we were geting our film back and i was siting on the counter while my mom was talking to the lady.i asked the lady if she was from texas and when she said yes i got mad. she didn't have big hair.well....i stood up on the counter yelled "but you dont have BIG hair!!! you have to!!!" an i smaked the lady on the head. my mom turned bright red yanked me of of the counter an left the store with out our film and groceries

amanda

i would always confuse canada with canberra (an australian city) and poland with portugal

Anon

As a child, I once had a conversation with a friend of mine who told me that he and his family were moving to LA. I nodded and pretended to know what he was talking about. It wasn't until years later that I came to realize that LA and Los Angeles were the same thing. I used to think LA was spelled Ellay, a different city and not an acronym for Los Angeles.

Paulie

i used to think arkansas was pronounced 'ar-kansas'.....just like the state kansas but having the 'ar-' infront of it...

casey malcolm

My grandparents on both sides came to Australia with their families from Britain in the 1920s, as did many of their friends and, like many Australians, still referred to Britain as "home". This was very confusing to me as a child, trying to imagine a house so huge as to have so many people in it. Then one day I saw a picture of Buckingham Palace - ah! - that explained it! I had a rather grandiose idea of my family origins for years afterwards.

Swanny

My father, trying to explain maps to me, aged six, showed me Australia and said,"That's where we live". It didn't look much like our house, but adults have funny ways of representing things. But I thought I had it all worked out, and triumphantly said, "And that's where Leonie lives!", pointing to New Guinea, just to the north (Leonie was my friend who lived across the road). Dad patiently explained that it was New Guinea, but I knew that we had lived in New Guinea when I was smaller, and that I had never lived in Leonie's house, so put the whole conversation down to overactive adult imagination.

Swanny

I used to think that Hawaii and Alaska were floating around where Mexico is because thats what is on all the maps.

UsedToBeDumb

I believed this for a long time (longer than I'd care to admit!): I knew that midgets were referred to as "little people" and for years I thought that Reno was a big city of little people because it is known as "the biggest little city on earth".

Tif