Do Americans have built in compasses? How do they keep track of which way is north/south/ and east/west?
by 
Carmella
ANSWERS: 10
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Their stomaches always lean north! :) No offense guys, just joking :)
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We don't, why do you think we are the biggest consumers of GPS devices?
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You will meet one who has a built-in compass at the AB Gathering...OS has one..so you can ask him in person how it works. I don't...some do to varying degrees...maybe it's a guy thing, but I don't know for sure. :)
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I'm a girl and I figure it out by where the sun comes up (east) and where it sets (west). North and south are pretty easy to figure out when you know where east and west are.
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The sun rises in the east, sails across the daytime sky in what's more or less the south sky, and sets in the west. If you know that, you get a basic idea of direction, at least on sunny days. When it's cloudy, forget it. We all wander around lost.
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Here's a new perspective. Out here in the middle of the vast Pacific Ocean, compass directions have little meaning, and we rarely use them in daily speech. Instead we use native words: makai, meaning toward the ocean, and mauka, meaning toward the mountains. When we need to make a reference to other types of direction, we use place names like Eva-bound or Diamond Head-bound. Those terms are used in traffic reporting on Oahu.
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I have a mental map of where I am in my head. I can't really function with directions like "turn left at the green house"... I have to translate it into a map.
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I don't understand why Americans specifically might have built in compasses, why not British, Spanish or anybody else. We need to find our way about as well. I think it might even be easier for Americans, at least in some cities, because Streets run north/south and avenues east/west - or is it the other way round?
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We do here in Chicago. Easy to orient with a lake to the East and the Sears tower to the North.
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Well aside from watching the position of the sun, I live sort of just West of the largest of the Great Lakes in the United States, so that helps a good deal to determine East.
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