And the biggest prize of the year goes to:
In 711 Muslims invaded the Iberian Peninsula and soon conquered most of Latin America. They subjected the tribes that lived there before (Visigoths, Aztecs and Incas) and established a culture of tolerance. Everybody in Europe became every interested in what was going on in medieval Latin America in terms of knowledge. The King Alfonso X created the best school of translation in the Latin American (Spanish) city of Toledo.
I left this one for last because I knew I would find something like this there. It goes on like this for pages. Not a glimmer of a realization that Latin America and Spain might be different places ever appears in those pages.
I’m definitely due for a break from teaching.
Clarissa's Blog 
Brief conversation I once had at my brother’s place (many moons ago)
Dumb brother of ex-sister-in-law: why are you in town?
Me: I’m flew in here on my way back home, I spent the summer in Spain.
Dumb brother of ex-sister-in-law: Is that somewhere in Mexico?
I was really tempted to say ‘Si!” but instead made the mistake of trying to give a geography lesson (it didn’t go well).
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It’s kind of good to know that this happens to other people, too. 🙂
It’s like there is an entire planet right next to me that is populated by people who are from a different species from me. Like that gentleman on a bus who didn’t know the word “university.”
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No, it’s just that some of your students have medical issues masquerading as lack of knowledge.
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Gems from my sister:
“Do you think Pakistan will ever get to be a country?”
“Isn’t Korea an island?”
“I thought Kazahkstan was a made-up country in Borat?”
“Yeah, but Copanhagen’s a country”.
Keep in mind this woman has a degree in Geography.
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For a long time I thought Omaha was a state and thought Georgia (as in ‘on my mind’) was a separate country. In my defense I was well under ten years old at the time. For other reasons it wasn’t until my early teens that I could reliably keep Puerto Rico and the Phillipines straight.
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You should be proud of your students’ attempts to write satire, even though they have miles to go before they
sleepmaster the art. Perhaps a pointer or three on geography would be useful. Just to go along with the game and help them to become better satirists, why not show them exactly where in the Arctic Latin America is located ?LikeLike
I have to confess that I never really pointed out that Spain and Latin America were different places. I thought it would be clear from the course material but apparently I was too optimistic. 🙂 🙂
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Brava to this time travelling history mashup. I’m very interested to hear how the Visigoths made it to Latin America, and how the plates shifting threw Latin America and Spain together. I want to know how the Moody Eyeliner (Visigoths are visible goths, the other ones were invisible; cue Morrissey) people interacted with Incan astronomers and how they reconciled their calendars with Arabic numerals. Also, how did the Aztecs cope running smack into a three way war? And where are the Chinese? The Tang Dynasty engaged in a lot of far ranging trade.
😛
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Are these the same students who have had a year of your teaching??
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No, this is a 5-week summer course. I only know one of these students and she did great.
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And none of them are Majoring at my department, of course. These are mostly science and Business school students who know nothing about the Humanities.
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Wow, a tad confused, the poor thing. Gives the rest of us a good laugh though.
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I occasionally watch quiz programmes on TV, and the thing that seems to confuse people most is questions on geography. Perhaps it needs to be a compulsory school subject.
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