Remember when every classroom had a pull-down map right above the front blackboard? Thanks to those maps, I learned that there were continents and islands and that I lived on a small one called the Big Island.
The Pacific was always cut in half, situating North, Central and South America in the center, so until much later, I had no idea that our ocean on the left side of the U.S. was twice the size of that manini one on the right.
After leaving my island and moving to continents, I became quite proficient at reading maps, and in an era before technological crutches, map-reading skills combined with my island orientation once averted a grave disaster.
After a weekend on the Oregon Coast, we headed back to Seattle.
Five minutes down the road, I noticed a large body of water on my passenger side. Is that the Pacific? I wondered. I looked at the driver for any sign of consternation, but he was happily humming along to the radio.
I whipped out my neatly folded map of the Pacific Northwest, checking to see if perhaps there was a large, a huge, an enormous lake right in the middle of the Oregon Coast. Nope, so now it was time to broach the awkward subject, because as we all know, challenging male drivers is like ringing the bell for round one of the fight.
“Are we driving back to Seattle?” I ventured.
“Did you want to do something else?” He offered.
“No, but are we going to Washington?” I persisted.
“Yes. First we will go north to the Columbia River, turn east and at Portland, cross the state line,” he patiently explained as if speaking to one of the grandchildren.
On an island, you can talk all you want about north, south, east, west, but we don’t care. We use mauka and makai, and the ocean is always makai. On a continent, compass directions are useful, but when on a coast, I still use makai as one of my markers. Doesn’t everyone? Guess not.
“Well, if that’s the Pacific Ocean on our right, then we’re heading south.”
“Hah?” questioned the driver, born on an island but raised on a continent.
“Tell you what,” I said, as if negotiating with a 4-year old. “If the next exit is Newport, we’re heading north. But if it’s Yachats, we are going south.”
Sure enough, a few minutes later, we saw: Exit Yachats. We veered off and sped over to the highway on the other side in order to go north.
Whew! If not for my dependable island orientation and superior map reading skills, not to mention exquisite tact, we would have eventually cruised past the “Welcome to California” sign.
Another time, at one of these educator conferences that I used to attend, a speaker recounted that when he told his class he was going to Texas, a student asked if he would be visiting Hawaii, since it’s right next to Texas.
After Alaska and Hawaii became states in 1959, U.S. maps had to be redrawn. But rather than show true scale, cartographers plopped in two boxes, one for each new state, resulting in some students thinking Hawaii and Alaska are next to the American Southwest.
I wonder if anyone learns map-reading skills anymore. With GPS and self-driving cars, who needs them, right? Maps are becoming obsolete, and perhaps we are returning to a time when we’re neither aware of geographic locations nor think about how to relate to the rest of the world.
I think it’s called regression.
Rochelle delaCruz was born in Hilo, graduated from Hilo High School, then left to go to college. After teaching for 30 years in Seattle, Wash., she retired and returned home to Hawaii. She welcomes your comments at rainysideview@gmail.com. Her column appears every other Monday.
