This happened about fifteen years ago, my most egregious error in geography. That time line must tell you it was well past my days of school or even college education. Yet, I made the biggest error in geography one can make – thinking South Africa was in the northern hemisphere!
No, it was not as crude as that, but close enough. I was lounging in the hall in front of the TV in the company’s guest house when a colleague of mine sauntered in. After the usual pleasantries, he mentioned that he was on his way to Johannesburg in an effort to drum up business there. I blurted out, “Oh, that must be, say, four or five hours flight from here [Mumbai].” He shot back, with contempt writ large on his face, “No, it is more than 11 or 12 hours.” I knew that I had slipped and slipped badly. The banana peel was my coming under the thrall of Mercator projection of the globe.
I saw Johannesburg approximately along the latitude of Ankara and hence my time estimate, so wrong it was. I never forgot this re-learning (after having unlearned it!) in geography, with the help of an egregious error. What is ironic was I had been studious in learning why my cousin’s flight from San Francisco to Tokyo buzzed the North Pole. Yet, at a crucial moment, my learning failed me.
This post is my insurance against making similar types of errors. This time it is about the size of landmasses, again, as depicted by and you guessed it, Mercator projection. Looking at the above map, you will not be wrong to conclude that Greenland is comparable in size to Africa. I will give you some numbers. Greenland: 2,166,086 sq.km; Africa: 30,221,000 sq.km. Africa is about 14 times larger in area than Greenland! Take that you, immapant (a neologism to mean “Illiterate in map reading”; I like it because it tells me why I misestimated the flight time to Johannesburg from Mumbai!)
Now, someone named Kai Krause could not stand such immappancy and it is his efforts that are highlighted in an article in The Economist [1] (the article may go behind a pay wall any time).
It is truly an eye opener that you can accommodate 18 countries, including the biggies like the US, China, India, within Africa and have some leftovers for tomorrow. The Economist was not happy (and I am glad they were not) did a revised country-fitting inside Africa.
OK, I am not into details, and I am happy that the two fittings do not contradict each other by much.
After having imbibed this article and after having gone to Google as the article suggested, I wish to claim that I am a little less immapant than before. Now, the next time I fly off to Australia, I will be able to remember that Sydney is in the southern hemisphere and about 4 1/2 hours to the east of us, longitude-wise. But, that translates into multiples of that duration in flying time; if I paid for 4 1/2 hours of flying time, I will be unceremoniously dumped somewhere in the middle of the Indian Ocean, like Osama bin Laden was.
Raghuram Ekambaram
References
1. http://www.economist.com/blogs/dailychart/2010/11/cartography
No, it was not as crude as that, but close enough. I was lounging in the hall in front of the TV in the company’s guest house when a colleague of mine sauntered in. After the usual pleasantries, he mentioned that he was on his way to Johannesburg in an effort to drum up business there. I blurted out, “Oh, that must be, say, four or five hours flight from here [Mumbai].” He shot back, with contempt writ large on his face, “No, it is more than 11 or 12 hours.” I knew that I had slipped and slipped badly. The banana peel was my coming under the thrall of Mercator projection of the globe.
I saw Johannesburg approximately along the latitude of Ankara and hence my time estimate, so wrong it was. I never forgot this re-learning (after having unlearned it!) in geography, with the help of an egregious error. What is ironic was I had been studious in learning why my cousin’s flight from San Francisco to Tokyo buzzed the North Pole. Yet, at a crucial moment, my learning failed me.
This post is my insurance against making similar types of errors. This time it is about the size of landmasses, again, as depicted by and you guessed it, Mercator projection. Looking at the above map, you will not be wrong to conclude that Greenland is comparable in size to Africa. I will give you some numbers. Greenland: 2,166,086 sq.km; Africa: 30,221,000 sq.km. Africa is about 14 times larger in area than Greenland! Take that you, immapant (a neologism to mean “Illiterate in map reading”; I like it because it tells me why I misestimated the flight time to Johannesburg from Mumbai!)
Now, someone named Kai Krause could not stand such immappancy and it is his efforts that are highlighted in an article in The Economist [1] (the article may go behind a pay wall any time).
It is truly an eye opener that you can accommodate 18 countries, including the biggies like the US, China, India, within Africa and have some leftovers for tomorrow. The Economist was not happy (and I am glad they were not) did a revised country-fitting inside Africa.
OK, I am not into details, and I am happy that the two fittings do not contradict each other by much.
After having imbibed this article and after having gone to Google as the article suggested, I wish to claim that I am a little less immapant than before. Now, the next time I fly off to Australia, I will be able to remember that Sydney is in the southern hemisphere and about 4 1/2 hours to the east of us, longitude-wise. But, that translates into multiples of that duration in flying time; if I paid for 4 1/2 hours of flying time, I will be unceremoniously dumped somewhere in the middle of the Indian Ocean, like Osama bin Laden was.
Raghuram Ekambaram
References
1. http://www.economist.com/blogs/dailychart/2010/11/cartography
6 comments:
ha ha loved the closing
Thanks Balu ... that was an inspired (?) ending to this drab subject, wouldn't you say?
RE
Indeed, this is an eye-opener. I had never imagined Africa was as big as that.
Matheikal, to tell you the truth, even though I was aware of the distortions, I too was taken aback by the magnitude! maps fool even the best professionals, not to speak of me!
You could possibly lead your students to this post. Nice fun-time education, it can be.
RE
Yes, Raghuram, I'm forwarding this post of yours to some of my students who would be interested.
Thanks Matheikal.
RE
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