Geography 911

"Is Russia bigger than the U.S.?"

When my mother asked this, I dutifully selected my favourite atlas and returned to the room for a little Geography Lesson. I was glad I did so. My mother is an intelligent woman, but she also happens to be a woman who cares very little for learning for learning's sake. Anyhow, some disturbing comments:

"Where's Africa?"

"Egypt's in Africa?!"

"You can diss the U.S. all you want, but no one else lives like we do. How is that, we're not that big?"

"So there's Norway..."

Again and again, I showed her the places that we went as a family, roughly traced the extents of empires, narrated the silk road and Hannibal's crossing of the Alps. I said it before; she's a smart lady. I could almost see her putting the pieces together. I guess it just goes to show that you can take nothing, not even Geography, for granted.