places

I was well into my teens before I realized that Pearl Harbor wasn't in California.

Anon

I used to believe that Florida was up in the clouds and that's why we had to take a plane to get there.

Anon

Whenever we saw something that said "Made In USA" our dad told us that "Yoosa" (USA) was an island in the Pacific.

Brad

I grew up in California. I used to think that "Out West" was a region in the middle of the country, where the "Wild West" happened. Past that, was "Back East" which was obviously the east coast. California couldn't possibly be more west of west because things got wilder the more west you went, and my life involved absolutely zero train heists or saloon shoot-outs.

Lia

I used to believe that everyone had a twin somewhere in the world living the same exact life you were living, since there just seemed to be too many people for the amount of personalities.

LB

My grandmother was born in Transylvania. When I was young and she told me stories about life there, I used to think that that was a state next to Pennsylvania!

Anon

I lived in the San Francisco Bay Area and believed that the Golden Gate Bridge led one out of California and the United States: after all, the word "gate" always meant that it led to something else!

Joe

I live in Michigan, and I was convinced for the longest time that New Jersey (where my grandparents lived) was a different country. I mean, Canada is a different country and New Jersey was waaaay more different from Michigan than Toronto is.

Gillian

When I was about four or five, I thought that Washington was a place full of soapy water, and people were just used to swimming around in it with furniture floating around in it. I grew up in Australia, but that's no excuse.

Gladys

I really wasn't looking forward to my first ever school field trip because I though we would literally just visit a field.

Kim

when I was a kid and we went to visit our grandparents in a place called easingwold, I thought it was easingworld and was amazing we didnt have to take a rocket to get there

Anon

I used to think that there was a main, or central, place in the world. Kind of like a capital city, but of the world. I thought where I lived was that place.

Natasha

I thought the safari was a place you went, not a type of trip. I was trying to explain this to my sister telling her these characters were from the safari, she quickly set me straight. I was 15

Anon

i used to think that Las Vegas was actually pronounced 'Lost Vegas' and i thought it was a place called Vegas that got lost

Anon

I used to think when I saw a building with a sign saying 'founded' that it was always just there and someone finally found it and put up the sign

Wendi

When I was three my family moved to a place called Black Rabbits. I looked all over the place for those rabbits but I never saw them.

Finally I said something about it in front of my parents and they laughed, and we drove down the lake to the place where the RAPIDS were, and they pointed out the sign that said Black Rapids. (Yes, I could read when I was three.) They explained that rapids were a place where the water in the lake moves fast through a narrow spot, and I got the idea.

Still, for at least a little while, whenever we drove past or boated through the rapids I would imagine that I could see the rabbits swimming in the choppy water.

Brenda

The first line of Canada's nation anthem is "O Canada our home and native land." When I was young I thought that every country in the world used Canada's national anthem but they'd just substitute "Canada" for whatever their country's name was.

Anon