Dublin is in London, isn't it?

[mharbourgirl]

I think many of them wouldn't mind that so much...airfare is damn expensive and trying to catch a ferry off the Rock is getting increasingly difficult. I know I wouldn't mind being able to drive off the island!

Well, I've heard talk of building a tunnel across to Labrador, though it would be expensive and difficult to say the least. That would make the commute MUCH nicer. The ferry trip across the strait scares the stuffins out of me.

[Jetfire]

I once had a customer proudly tell me that he was driving up to Cape Breton that afternoon. I made mildly enthusiastic noises about that, and then nearly blinked when he added "Cape Breton is in Sydney, right?" I politely informed him that actually Sydney is the largest city on Cape Breton Island. He didn't believe me. Why? Because after he left Cape Breton he was going to take the Canso Causeway to Newfoundland. For those of you from away, the causeway connects mainland Nova Scotia with... you guessed it... Cape Breton Island.

(And let's just say the Newfs would be mighty pissed if someone actually managed to build a causeway connecting the Rock with the rest of Canada. )

Dude was a tourist, no question. But this is where it gets embarrassing. He wasn't from another country.

He was from Ontario.

They're everywhere.

Well to be fair, there is no city called "Sydney" in Nova Scotia. It's the "Cape Breton Regional Municipality" as far as the government is concerned.

But yeah, he was lost.

[Hyena Dandy]

It isn't even on the same land mass.

Well its in the same archipelago!

[Blue Ginger]

Like the numpty that wanted to know how long the ferry between Oz and New Zealand would take.
And another that wanted to know what the bridge that joined Oz to NZ was called.

Or the dips (tourists that had done no research) that thought crossing the Nullabor (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nullarbor_Plain) in a Beetle would be easy. When my parents found them, they had broken down several hours before. They only had one bottle of water between 2 people and very little food. They also had NO spare fuel. This was in the seventies, way before mobile phones. My parents couldn't leave them, but also had no room in their own panel van (spare water and fuel takes up a fair bit of space). It was another 3 hours before a truck came past that they managed to wave down. In total these 2 were broken down for over 9 hours.

PS: this was before it was fully sealed. They had broken down in an unsealed area that had massive potholes from trucks.

[HawaiianShirts]

I'm sure I'm giving this guy and his admin too much intellectual credit here, but...
Perhaps he needed to send that mail to a road in London called Dublin (if there is one)? Or a business with that name? (Apparently, my mind needed a rational explanation for this story, and that's the best I could come up with.)

While visiting New York from Utah once, I got into an argument with somebody who vehemently insisted that "Idaho" was just a brand of potatoes.

And when I told my friends that I was going to Spokane, Washington, for a few months after high school, they all told me to bring an umbrella and other rain gear and refused to believe me when I explained that Spokane is on the east side of the state where the Cascades create a relatively arid rain shadow.

These kinds of stories are why I want to have a big globe and a wall of maps so my kids don't grow up geographically stupid.

Basically unless you live in Dublin, there is no post code system. In Dublin, north of the river is odds and south is evens.

Really? They must have changed things since I last mailed something there, then. I used to work the mailroom for a laboratory, and we occasionally sent reports to Ireland. If the business was in Dublin, the postal code was either 1 or 2. I never saw any other number. I actually thought it was kind of cool, and that's now on my list of reasons to visit Ireland someday.

[laborcat]

What? Dublin is not in England? Berlin is not in Italy? Rome is not in Ohio (ok..so there is a town called Rome, and one called Idaho..but anyhow)? My mind she is blown!

OMG you know where Rome, OH is? I'm gonna faint... that place is more desolate and smaller than where I grew up in the same county.

[Mytical]

Yep, know where rome and Idaho both is, been a few more exotic places without ever leaving Ohio also .

[Eisa]

Huh...I didn't know I lived in an imaginary potato.

[Ben_Who]

Roommate Red is fine with geography in general, but he really gets bogged down when it comes to scale. His parents used to take advantage of his father's Naval status to take their vacations in Canada when he was a sprout, and all he remembered about Canada was that you had to go through Maine to get there from where he was.

By the time I met him, 25 years later, he was weirdly convinced that all of Canada, from British Columbia to Labrador to Nunavut, existed in a hundred square mile strip just north of Maine, and all of it could be reached with just a few hours' drive. We once planned a trip to New Brunswick, and he started talking about taking a day trip to some provincial park in Ontario - 1100 miles away.

Once we got to the second largest country in the world, he was constantly boggled by how far distances were. Fredericton to Halifax? 435 km. Saint John to Eastport? Two and a half hours. You gotta go around the big bodies of water, dude. No, Montreal isn't just a quick jaunt out of the way; it's about nine hundred km. Sure, we could cut through Maine to get there, but since there aren't any roads in that part of Western Maine we'd be adding about 100 km.

The whole time we were there, he was having a hell of a time judging distances. Eventually he admitted that during these road trips to Edmonton and Calgary and everywhere else, he spent most of the time asleep in the back seat. The metric system also screwed with his head mercilessly. In the end, he was flagrantly and vocally disappointed that he hardly got to visit a handful of the places he remembered during our week of vacation time, as if it was Canada's fault that he had no idea where anything was. ...No, we're not anywhere near Moose Jaw! Shut up and go back to sleep!

[MoonCat]

Huh...I didn't know I lived in an imaginary potato.

It gets worse. I recall reading a letter in the paper in which the writer said that when they mentioned the state of Iowa, some idiot said in a snooty tone, "Where I come from we pronounce it Ohio."

[wolfie]

I once had a customer proudly tell me that he was driving up to Cape Breton that afternoon. I made mildly enthusiastic noises about that, and then nearly blinked when he added "Cape Breton is in Sydney, right?"

Dude was a tourist, no question. But this is where it gets embarrassing. He wasn't from another country.

He was from Ontario.

But he WAS from another country - Ontario is a suburb of Los Angeles, California. As it says on my flashlight (and any CPF users who have comments, please take them to Fratching), "MAG-LITE MAG INSTRUMENT - ONTARIO, CALIFORNIA, USA".

[Blue Ginger]

HawaiianShirts, you aren't confused. Dublin is the name of the capital city and the name of the county.

So if the mail is going to the centre of town, it would be simply street address, Dublin 1 (or 2), Ireland.
However, if it is going outside of the centre of town, it would be street address, Donnybrook, Dublin 4, Ireland or street address, East Wall, Dublin 3, Ireland. Donnybrook and East Wall are both suburbs within Dublin. There can be multiple suburbs sharing the same postcode.

The stupid customer had put 'blahdeblah, Dulbin #, Ireland' as the address. So it was definitely going across the pond.

I recommend everyone should visit Ireland at least once. Temple Bar is great for a night out, just be prepared for way over priced drinks. But there are heaps of pubs around the area that aren't a rip off. The Porterhouse Brewing Co does their own beers and makes yum cocktails. Queen of Tarts is the best place for breakfast and baked goodies.
Just be aware that nothing is opened before 12 on a Sunday.

[Dreamstalker]

But he WAS from another country - Ontario is a suburb of Los Angeles, California.

Mattel's main shipping center is in Ontario CA. Each time there's an action figure sale on the site, more than one person on the Ghostbusters forum will be amazed that a package from "Canada" took 2 days to reach Nevada, or that nobody in the US has to pay Customs charges.

[RootedPhoenix]

*whimper*

I don't know whether I want to slap the idiots in the OP, or whether I just want to cry.

... *gets out some cookies and shares with everyone*

[BeenThereDoneThat]

While visiting New York from Utah once, I got into an argument with somebody who vehemently insisted that "Idaho" was just a brand of potatoes.

My high school history teacher (in New Jersey) used to say "there's no such thing as Idaho". I know he was too smart NOT to be kidding...but still

I fully intend to visit Ireland one day soon. We have friends there. My husband's good friend here in Florida met a girl from Dublin online, and after several years of off and on courting, they finally got married maybe 7 or 8 years ago. Mrs. V. was here on a temporary visa but there was a glitch in the paperwork and they made her go back...Mr. V. was only too happy to go with her. They are still there, 2 kids and a lot of love later.