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I think a lot of it is that Americans simply don't have time to experience many new places, meet new people or learn things, they work far to many hours every week to do anything but sleep, eat and work. Its why Americans have terrible mental health compared to Europeans, they don't get time to invest in hobbies and there culture is forced on them in a very unnatural way.
You SHOULD care about geography! Otherwise how can you navigate yourself in your surroundings, situate people you speak to or understand the news - and what is at stake, properly ? You should not be proud of showing your ignorance in public(and make money out of it)...
No, it is Geography sprinkled with some general knowledge like the question about how many kms are in one mile. Don't pretend like knowing the capitals of countries isn't geography.
@@Chikina Incorrect: First hit in Google: Geography is defined as the study of Earth and the forces that shape it, both physical and human. More specifically, it is the study of Earth's landscapes, people, places, and environments. So knowing capitals, country names and other 'games' is most definately NOT Geography. As an AS level student in the 70's we studied trade routes, infastucture, economics, manufacturing, resources. etc etc. Along with a fair dose or regional history and polotics. That is 'Geography' as a subject. No brownie points really for knowing a capital city. That's just general knowledge.
@@stevekirkby6570 "it is the study of Earth's landscapes, people, places, and environments" - capitals are, in fact, places on Earth, and learning their names is part of geography
I am European and I feel so dumb😂 I probably knew only like 30% on this questions😂. Also the participants of the event are all very interested in international politics, it is an event of the European Parliament after all!
It's cultural too, I'm British and I knew the 'related to Britain' questions but not many of the others and I'm pretty good at this sort of thing. (like the NZ ones that FR was impressed by.. I was like, everyone knows that tho right?)
Nowadays, even in Europe unfortunately its not done right. Most of the classes are about trying to spread "the message" meaning wokism instead of the actual lectures.
@@emanuelfer456 what the fuck are you talking about? My kids still seem to learn all the similar stuff i did but i live in finland so i guess it could be different.
10:46 "He's from Africa, he lives there, so it should be easy'. Yeah, but Africa is enormous and has 54 countries. By that logic, it should also be easy for Americans to know the capitals of all 50 US states, but we've seen the videos of how often they get that wrong...
These are not simple questions, but what's more important, the crowd is not random. He quizzed the attendants of an youth event organized by European Parliament, all participants are keenly interested in international politics and by that virtue possess above the average political geography knowledge. Capitals, languages, flags, anthems - things he asks about all fall under political geography. I'm very curious how would they fare with other branches of geography. All in all, it's a clean case of cherry picking the data. Like asking fashion questions first on a fashion show, and at sporting event later, and comparing the answers of both groups.
@@nillyk5671 I was coming in the comment to say exactly what @echinorlax said. I mean come on, of course a youth event about the european parliament, it's a crowd of people interested by the subjects. Look the guy who answered the question about the only EU language that has afroasiatic roots just told he had learned it 30min ago, this event is ABOUT the topic! Also just the fact that it's people who speaks english and that is not their native language. And I can tell you that in France, people who speak english as easily as them is not every random guy in the streets And the Example of the girl answering the number of countries in Africa... She is from Africa, so I'm pretty glad she answered corectly without hesitation! I mean, I'm french with west afrian roots, coming from well educated family (more scientists than geograpphy), so yes maybe people around me could answer correctly to most of theses questions (not all clearly), but we're not representative of the whole french population. People coming from a lower class would probably not do as well as the ones in this video! I'm not jealous, I'm impressed!
Yes, maybe. But there's this guy who interviews students around the campuses in the US, asking them very simple questions, such as how many Moons does Earth have or how much is 3x7 and so on. Those university students don't know anything.
The guy makes a mistake in te 9:30s Gaelic (from celtic) is not a oficial language in Spain, is Galician (from latin). Are not in the same family, only in protoindoeuropean language.
@@lesfreresdelaquote1176 I thought that was odd too. Thanks for clearing up. Also the way he describes 'all the different gaelics' is also inaccurate. All 6 Celtic languages, only one of which is Gaelic. Galicia is Celtic Spain tho no?
Galician is a latim language, which is actually just Portuguese written with Spanish script but still Portuguese. It is official in Galicia/Galiza (North West of Spain) and completely unrelated with Gaelic. Galician folklore is to some extent Celtic and common to Ireland and French Bretagne, but the Galician language is not, neither linked to Gaelic.
We had to memorize European, African, South American and Asian countries + capitals, as well as US states and capitals in elementary school (atleast in the 90s in Finland, when I was in 1-6th grade). We had map tests of all of them.
In Greece, we had a lesson in 4th grade called "environmental studies", where we memorized the rivers, lakes and mountains of every prefecture in the country. Then, we made our own "geography" IDs. Those looked like the official greek IDs, but instead of personal information, they included the geographical characteristics of our hometown. It was fun to design them at the end of the school year.
About 40 years ago, when I was young, a school board game called "countries, cities" was quite popular, in which several people had to write down a country, city, river, animal, plant, dish in about 1 minute - there were many variants of other things - that started with a randomly selected letter. The more people wrote down the same thing, the lower the score. So the winner was the one who knew the most unique names for a given letter. Maybe it was a sneaky game invented by teachers, but it was a great way to remember things that were useless to anyone, so that you could show off in front of others.
In Germany it’s called „Stadt, Land, Fluss.“ (city, country, river) We had the same rules for this game. :) I sometimes play it with my sister even though we’re both in our 30‘s. It keeps our brains active.
"Just need to understand directions, north, east, south west. And to read a map, that's enough" It's so funny, because in my schooling that wasn't a geography thing, that was gym class. Orienteering, specifically. It was too much of a basic skill to be taught in geography class when more or less everyone had learned at least that much before even reaching school age :'D
Understanding the directions is the least important part in geography. Knowing countries, capitals, languages, the people etc where they are and what are they like is VERY important in understanding the world around you. Knowledge is everything.
I knew most of the answers. The bit that always blows my mind, as a Brit, is that they are answering in English when they are not native speakers. I am able to order food and drink in a few European countries, but that’s it. 😢
well I think it's a handicap not speaking English in 2024. it's Lingua Franca. the internet is in English, most pop culture is in English... you have no choice but to speak if only a little bit.
For most Europeans it's totally normal to learn more than one language in school 😅 In East-Belgium we had French and German in primary school (class 1 to 6 over here) and from class 7 till class 12, we had English and Dutch too 🤷🏻♀️ Maybe because Belgium has 3 languages (German, French, Flemish) 😂
I'm Romanian and I started learning English in kindergarden at ages 4-5. Then they kept teaching us in school until graduation, but I honestly learned more from the internet than I could ever learn in school.
Most of the kids learn geography in middle school here in Europe and goes deeper with capital and rivers too. Then in high school we goes deeper in with civics in the different countries. I think we goes deeper then the American school
@@Divig Agreed. But, if you don't learn mental arithmetic, you're also not able to do an estimate. Basic geography learns you to estimate where a country or city is, by having an idea of the worlds geography and the names sound familiar and gives you a sense of direction on a map. It makes you do educated guesses, instead of answering complete garbage or having to say 'I don't know' every time. Like if I ask you where Norway is, you don't answer South-America and if I ask the same for Venezuela or Brazil, you know it's not in Europe. It narrows down the options.
@@DimitriMoreira gaelic is a celtic language. Galician language does include some celtic words and names and Galician people are considered celtic, but theirs is a romance language.
@@DimitriMoreira he's wrong about the others too. Gaelic, gallic, Welsh (cymraig), Cornish, Breton, Manx are the Celtic languages. Only one of them is called Gaelic. (Apologies I can't remember the proper word for Cornish and if I got any of the other spellings wrong x)
To be fair: These Europeans are not randomly picked out on the street. They know way more than the average European. I did not know the answers to several of these questions and usually I am pretty good at general knowledge questions. Those who act in the comments as if answering these questions correctly is easy for normal Europeans are lying and have probably breathed a little too much national pride.
i think i could have answered wrong to max 4-5 questions in total . i don't know if i am the average or not : flags , countires , capitals were in my interests when i was a kid .
Let's say that the average reasonably educated European can answer the vast majority of these questions. I'm an average musicologist from a European country, but I knew the answer to most of them and I'd find it difficult to name someone from my relatives and my circle of friends who would fare worse than me is such a quiz.
I literarily knew the answers to most of these and I'm not a geography nerd. Just know this stuff because I learned it in school. Some of the questions were pretty hard though.
@@filipferencak2717So you have learned in school which national anthems don‘t have words? Which school was it?! I was also able to answer the majority of the questions. But several of them I couldn‘t answer or was more or less lucky to have them right. And my common knowledge is very good. My point is: You can‘t answer them all with "normal" common knowledge. It‘s just not true. But they make it look that way, just to show everyone how ignorant US Americans are in comparison to Europeans. Take these questions, go on the streets anywhere in Europe and ask random people! I guess you‘d be surprised of how "ignorant" the average European is compared to the people that are shown in this video.
Don't make jokes of kids who know capital cities! When I was 7, I could tell you all the European capitals (but sometimes I confused Bucharest with Sofia...) 🤓
@@78Pharaoh78 I apologise very much, but I was only 7 years old. I probably just mixed up Romania and Bulgaria, maybe it sounded similar to me. Hungary sounds completely different. By the way, I don't think most seven-year-olds even know that Bucharest and Sofia exist (they might not even be able to spell them).
I sometimes confuse the names as I learned them in Bulgarian and didn't have to learn them in English. Bar the most obvious ones of course. For example the Chinese capital in my language is Pekin but in English it is Beijing...
Wait, I currently confuse those two, because my teacher in middle school taught me that Sofia wasn't the capital of Bulgaria. She also taught us that Hong Kong was the capital of China, Taiwan didn't exist according to her. There were neither Israel nor Palestine, according to her (which I only know due to my old geography notebook, which I rediscovered recently) and the capital of Liechtenstein was Liechtenstein according to her. She also made many more mistakes, like confusing China with Asia and saying Japan isn't Asian, but Australian.
calling Maltese an _Afroasiatic_ language is technically true but given the context it comes across almost like a trick question. Maltese is a Semitic language; a mix of Sicilian-Arabic mixed with some Romance influences.
I don't consider people knowing places beyond their own country borders to be geographic nerds: we learn this stuff in school, and also often enjoy games like Trivial Pursuit or the ABC games (usually about countries of various continents which my sons and their friends love to play while enjoying their weed). Furthermore, most people around the world enjoy foreign movies and TV-shows which will teach you some facts as well.
Because he lives in Africa doesn't mean he would be able to name all the capital cities! There are 54 countries in Africa, would you even be able to name all the capital cities in the Americas because you were born there?! People who are from Europe can't name all European capital cities so I don't know why this changes because he is African. How come you got so upset when she didn't mention the United States in her answers for countries which start with "the" I love your videos though, it's all love brother!
I may not know where every country is or what the capital may be but I do know where to find out. I will always try to fill the gap in my knowledge rather than remain in ignorance!
In the school, all of the students had to complete "mapas mudos" (just with the border line's) we must were able to write the names of the countries and the capitals as well. Included the map from USA with the name of all the states. It was not an extraordinary culture, it was necessary to pass to the next course. Also a map from all the world with the most important mountains, rivers, deserts, seas....
Hi I recall watching you during pandemic from Cpt, that you wanted to go to Europe.. Then by chance I see you again and you've done it... Hope your journey grows even more.
The thing is that if you live in Europe you're very conscious that Europe is made of several countries, so all of this is a logic part of education - then when you read a lot and go to school " general culture" is a big part of what you get to learn about the world in general - Myself I spoke several languages already when I was 16, and had been travelling all around Europe already, as well as some other countries outside of Europe - all of this was normal to me -
Don't feel stupid bro. In fact you're better informed than the average American. And what you - ant they - lack in knowledge is just the result of a world view based on the idea that the only things that are worth knowing or caring about are those between Canada, Mexico, the East Coast and the West Coast. The American superiority complex. That's the world view which guides your education system and coming out of that system will almost guarantee that you'll know far less about the rest of the world than almost any reasonably educated person on the planet. The fact that you actually know many things and you can answer some of these questions is a credit to you, your openness and curiosity.
Well if all these people are working at the European Parliament, no wonder they know all these questions... the level of knowledge required of from these people is insane
7:51 The kid that answered "England" to the capital of the Netherlands, yes he got it wrong. *But* he's from Luxembourg, English isn't his first language, maybe not even his second ! The fact he even understood the question and tried to answer is still pretty impressive. Maybe he didn't know which country is "the Netherlands" in English because it has a completely different name in his native language (it has in mine).
While it's true that we were taught all this in school, I actually don't remember more than maybe half of the answers here. And to Americans: ask Europeans to name and place all the states in USA and their capitols 😂! I am sure you had to learn all those when you were in school. I only have a sense where the states is but no way I could name the capitol cities 😅. And your states are as big as many European countries.
But then, why would we learn about that? We were never taught about the different German states either, or the Chinese provinces and autonomous regions.
@@Divig that was not the point. The point was that Americans have to first learn 50 different states and their capitols before they try to memorize all other countries. In Europe at least, ther are not any countries that have that size to try to learn 😊. And of course in some cases people can learn both if they are interested enough. Just the sheer size of USA makes it harder to get fully educated on.
@@beatricenilsson4530 except for Russia (for size). I do get your point, but I would think that the number is more important than the size. Just guessing from your name, but at least I had to learn all 25 of our Swedish landskap, and our 21 län (with their residensstäder) in school as well as learning about other countries. I would guess that other countries learn about their own internal regions as well. And we did actually learn the individual states of the US, but not their "capitals". (Not that I remember more than 1/3 of them...)
Europe has 51 countries, we had to learn about them and their capital in school, and then also about the rest of the world. I feel it would be similar to Americans learning about all the states, no excuse to not learn about the rest of the world.
(EU citizen here) For the 'K' countries, I paused just after she said Kenya, so couldn't guess that myself. And I instantly came up with Kazakhstan. For my second one - not Kenya - I came up with Kurdistan (although not fully independent), then came up with Kosovo (also somewhat disputed, but UN-recognized, so should count). So, I think I got there, even without Kenya. The guy naming all the somewhat obscure capitals though is crazy informed. And most of these people he is interviewing are politically engaged, studying international politics and visiting the European Parliament. These people are not the standard. I assure we, we are much dumber and less informed than these people! These seem people that will be the future politicians or ambassadors of EU countries. I've seen a couple of interviews by this guy, don't let him fool you, he interviews students that are well-informed and often times specialize in world politics and history. Generally, you seem more informed than the average American, and I am more informed than the average EU-citizen (I think). But these guys in the video, these are the top percentiles of the European youth (or non-European youth studying in Europe). We should not compare to ourselves, and especially not compare to the median of US-citizens. It's apples and pears, really...
No, i disagree. Everyone should compare oneself to the best. And have some more ambitions for themselves. It is because people only compare themselves to the biggest idiots out there, in TV reality or in "dumb americans" videos... that this world becomes more stupid by the year. The best should be set as examples to strive towards, not be occulted as "oddities".
These participants are at the European Parliament. If you questioned participants at a NASA convention about planets off course they’ll know more than the average person 🤣
I'm surprised that I knew almost all questions. I never made it past middle school and our geography teacher in middle school sucked, so this is like super cool.
Don't be upset guy, for most Europeans this is just general knowledge. The issue Americans have results from a national absence of competent geography teachers, but there is a serious issue that is created as a result. Because of the range of international affairs affecting the world at the moment, Americans are at a serious disadvantage through not understanding where conflicts are, and their possible effects on international relations, trade, population movement, and other consequences. Geography is more than compass directions. Regards, good luck with the channel.
It is general knowledge in the sense that its not specialzed knowledge, but most people on the street wouldnt be able to answer half of these questions. And both of us probably belong in that category. Dont act like we europeans are so much superior in general knowledge.
@@dinardos6222 that is truth - in general we can (doubt that youngsters still can) name a decent number of countries. In case of K-country - I was like Kirgistan, Kazachstan (worked with Kazakchs), but it takes some effort to get Kosovo and Kiribati and Kuwait I took from comments - in that fast pace it is not so easy. Capital of Kazachstan or Kirgistan (spelling like in my language) I recognized them when they were said. I was sad that I cannot figure out Vilnius (but mostly have no idea which belongs to which Baltic country) and some crazy stuff like Catalla, Basque, Spanish (I worked with Basque-s) ... I heard sometime in a past about Catalania (but no clue that it's lang. is official) and Galician - some history lesons or something? Cyprus as a former soldier with our troops deployed there - easy, Malta capital huh - never interested in and so on and on. I am checking former yugoslavia countries twice a year because I feel it as a shame to not know them and still forgetting some and placing them on a map - Slovenia, Serbia, Croatia - where I have been is OK, but rest ... "somewhere down there". I understand that these are entertaining vids, some way a bit educative (he pronounced right answers - american style says "yes" all the time), but that is for sure not a norm here - average europian speaks ... languages - I barely learnt English and do not count related languages to my mother one - I do not speak them, I can somehow understand them.
Well, let's keep in mind that the European people in this video are not ordinary people passing by in the street, they're clearly attending some sort of meeting/convention sposored by the European Parliament (at least that's what I can guess from the panel below). This means they are particularly interested in foreign politics, so no doubt they put extra effort in studying a bunch of capitals.
Ok my friend... don't be nervous! As you can see on the background, this guy is at the building of European Parliament! So, he is asking some people with educational level far than average!
I bet he is really good at sports, dancing, and music. He is probably kind hearted also, and humble. He should not feel badly for not knowing stuff he will never need to use. Like names of places he will never care to go to.
8:15 You only need to memorize at least 194 names of countries + capital cities. That is the minimum in the world After graduating from elementary school
8:02: No, it is not about the fact that he may have know the capital as a child... The kid is from Luxembourg, and the guy asks him questions in ENGLISH. This is the shocking part. He would have to be either very precocious, or to be raised in a multilingual family. I could answer maybe 50% of these questions. Many were difficult.
@@edipires15 English is not one of those languages. Since when "multilingual" is tantamount to "oh, he must know english" ... Makes no sense. Except for the anglosphere i guess, which just assumes the world should make all the efforts so that they can be lazy forevermore.
One point perhaps: knowing the world's capitals doesn't represent any 'extra work' in Geography. It's barely enough to pass the test at your high school...🤔
@@Asa...S English is enough foreign for americano speaking people - I remember when question was "Name two of united states ..." and YT guy was ranting 5min what that does mean and what is he asking about ... ;)
These are attendees at a european parliament event so its their special interest to know about other countries. Saying that it's amazing how fluid people are across europe in switching between languages and dialects. Also in school, in my experience, from a young age we have to learn about a continent and then specialise in a country / state and give a presentation to the class a couple of times a year. We used to practice reciting capitals of europe, states of the USA plus their capitals and be quizzed on various world national flowers, flags etc. This more considered general knowledge you should know rather than geography which is the more nitty gritty politics, agricultural practices, population trends, topography, fauna and flora.
4:18 In high school, me and the kids in my class, we often had self-made geography tests that we did on regular basis. All tests were supervised by our geography teacher. They usually involved naming all countries of the world in 40 minutes, or all US states + bonuses for each state's capital, or world capitals, rivers, political and other boundaries... it was fun every time we did them and we were scored on them. I knew all capitals of the world back then when I was in 4th grade. I knew data like length of top 20 longest rivers, depths, locations, lakes..etc. Such competitions in school made us retain that data for decades. Was it helpful? Hell yes.
My 12 year old sister needed to know all the names, locations and capitals of 31 countries in Europe, plues some other important cities, plus main rivers, seas and mountain ranges just for her first test in the school year. She also had to study all countries of the Americas last year. And she is not even attending a school where they teach kids much about topics like Goegraphy and such. Compared to my school, she is learning about one fifth of what I had to learn and her IQ has been determined to be above average and I went to a regular public school with no special program or whatever. And despite the school having no special program, I still had 5 years of geography, 5 years of history, 4 years of music, 5 years of drawing/handcraft/design, 2 years of general Life Sciences which, after those 2 years, then got divided into 5 years of physics/chemistry and 5 years of biology/geology, 1 year of psychology, 2 years of philosophy, 12 years of maths, 3 years of french, 12 years of native language (grammar, literature, etc), 9 years of english and those are just rhe biggest subjects. Besides those, there were still minor classes, namely different types of projects we needed to get involved in and/or build and present, physical education, citizenship, economy, drama, IT, etc. This school program was MANDATORY. If you were privileged, then you could enrol in schools with upgraded programs, with additional subjects and extracurricular activities for you to do. So yeah, the idea that I get is that even what we call "minimum level of education and general knowledge" over here is still above what a lot of prestigious american schools have to offer. It's sad that the american education system sucks so badly, I dont really blame their ignorance on americans really, but when there are comparisons to be made, europeans def come on top a lot of the times in terms of amount of general knowledge they own vs the americans.
To be fair to you, he is interviewing them in the European Parliament, these are probably people who work there and it's their job to know these sorts of things.
My kid, which is now 21😂, with his five years knew more a out capitals, cities and countries than I. We portuguese as a lot of europeans dream of traveling around our wonderful world. Also we teach our kids the history of all the world, not only our own
12:31 I'd excuse her since she probably thought about Inner Mongolia, which is an autonomous region in China (and actually has an even bigger Mongol population than Mongolia itself, 4.5 mil compared to 3 mil).
Saying "I don't care about geography" and considering it nerdy stuff is part of the problem. So many Americans say that: I could know all that, but I'm not interested enough. Why is that? Why aren't people interested in what exists outside of their own environment? Most Europeans have not learned these things by heart. They know it because they often deal with these topics. They know their neighboring countries, they watch or read the news, they watch or read travel reports or documentaries, they travel around themselves, talk to the locals, they realize which countries and cities they pass through by car or train on their route. They are interested in the world they live in and accumulate knowledge over years and decades. I often hear "I don't care" from Americans and I don't understand why. They don't even know their own continent. Many don't know that Mexico is not part of South America. Many don't know how many states the US has or which coast is on the other side of the Atlantic. And why? They don't care. There's a word for this mentality. It's called ignorance. It's why Americans have such a bad reputation almost everywhere (and often they don't even know it), why the rest of the world thinks they're stupid or uneducated. They're not. Americans are as smart and educated as most people. They're just disinterested and ignorant. The good news is: you can work on that. Try it!
I just watched a video where someone asked americans about geografy etc. They asked:name two countries that share borders with the USA. No one in the video could answer that. Then they asked:name 3 countries that are not the USA. They couldn't answer. And here they ask questions that even I can't answer as fast as they. 😅
I've noticed that when ever they have quiz in US cartoons, they stay inside US borders. I would dare to do quiz about USA because the knowledge I got from games and movies ect. geography, history, general knowledge, you name it.
Hi, Spanish here. I’m having a meltdown over what I just heard at minute 13:06. The three official languages of Spain are, from left to right: Galician (Galego NW Spain) (it’s a Romance language like Spanish and has nothing to do with Gaelic), Basque (Euskera N of spain), and Catalan (Català NE of spain). However, you should also include Valencian (Valencià) and Balearic (Balear).
There are very few islands that have two languages/are divided…we have one in Germany and every teenager has learned in school that cypress is another example for that…
I always treat moment I feel stupid like this - if I feel stupid, I educate myself. Nothing works better as ego boost and there is not a better way to at least appear "erudite".
Cyrillic alphabet: Serbia, Montenegro, Bulgaria, North Macedonia, part of Bosnia known as Republika Srpska, Russia, Ukraine, Belarus. Some use only Cyrillic, some use Cyrillic and also Latin scripts.
Ahaha when we were little at kindergarden, we were playing games with geography. I learned a lot back then. Many of these questiins answeres, i didnt know tbh
Dude, when you roll your eyes it makes me wanna slap you until I roll them back 😂😂😂😂 Anyway, one of the first interaction I've had with an American was like 22-23 years ago, I was in middle school and we had American students in an exchange between schools and when he heard us speaking in 3-4 different languages in normal dialogue between us he was "everyone in here speaks multiple languages? Everyone except you dude". 😂😂😂😂 And he was also bad at... Well everything
In 3 or 4 grade (I don't remember) in geography classes we actualy had to learn all countries and their respective capital city. I wonder what are you learning in geography in USA?
RELAX!!! What we were taught years ago in our European schools, meant that we knew A LOT about geography and History ( History being a subject we can question, since there are SO MANY lies)... I am French and 67 and there are many useless teachings we were taught, but kids were good at learning about language, their own obviously, and good with numbers. Not the case anymore!! So sadly, if those questions were asked to young adults in France, their answers might be the same as young Americans.
It depends on the interests of every single person. I'm swiss and I know all 50 US States, can name them on a US States Map and know all their capitals, too. But I don't know any other swiss person who does. It's a matter of interest.
I (Swede) barely find my way in my own hometown, buddy, please don't feel dumb. I wouldn't be able to answer most of these questions myself(some of my siblings would but only cause they like geography and do a lot of geography quizzes).
May I react on your comment at 10:47 “he is from Africa, he lives there..”, the continent has 54 countries, I doubt you know all 57 countries and their capital on the American continent 😉
How he even can say that somebody is from somewhere - on the street of my small town I can say that one is from Korea (S), that one is from Vietnam, that one is from Africa (all of them were born here and speak fluently our lang. - probably more than 90% of them, older maybe quite broken way, but still can speak it) regarding to that - he is from Africa and lives there ...
Whilst I would've struggled with some of the questions ( namely capitals with the same name as the country, bar Brazil I'm blank) most are very common knowledge here in Europe... Say I can name more than two countries with K without even thinking much. I know the Azeri capital and most of the old ussr countries capitals.
@@svetoslavtodorov2427 Thanx for your input, there were some easy ones. But to say everone knows questions like the capital of Fiji, come on! Also your user name honestly suggests familiarity with the east. Try asking the average West-German about anything right of Berlin...
@@xfranczeskax it's true that I'm from Eastern Europe , certainly not denying it, but this were things we learned prior to high school. Deffo not sure how's the education system in the west, but for us is the norm. And I had to sit a test in geography at year 6 with capitals of far and wide countries we learned over the year... In year 5 we had Africa, in year 6 we had the Americas...
6:23 Bro you should watch and react the Americans answering the capital of the USA question. Most populars are New York and “I don’t know.. California?” 🤣
To be honest: these are not random "Europeans" you meet on the street and interview them and get a glimp of the common knowlegde. These are well educated Europeans at an international event which seems to have something to do with international topics or a similar event, as the guy at 10:22 said "i saw this in a presentation half an hour ago". (or so) . Some of the answers were impressive. greetings from Germany. Nice reaction.
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Please don't post content where people like this case 0:59, use God's holy name to cuss.
I think a lot of it is that Americans simply don't have time to experience many new places, meet new people or learn things, they work far to many hours every week to do anything but sleep, eat and work. Its why Americans have terrible mental health compared to Europeans, they don't get time to invest in hobbies and there culture is forced on them in a very unnatural way.
@@PunkDogCreations Who do you think you are? At least 70% of the world's population doesn't give a sh** about your Christian sensitivities.
@@PunkDogCreations freedom of speech. People can cuss using god’s name all day long!
You SHOULD care about geography! Otherwise how can you navigate yourself in your surroundings, situate people you speak to or understand the news - and what is at stake, properly ? You should not be proud of showing your ignorance in public(and make money out of it)...
PS - for Europeans, this is not really Geography - it would be considered 'General Knowlege'.
For sure
No, it is Geography sprinkled with some general knowledge like the question about how many kms are in one mile. Don't pretend like knowing the capitals of countries isn't geography.
For me is Kids ganes😂🇪🇸
@@Chikina Incorrect: First hit in Google: Geography is defined as the study of Earth and the forces that shape it, both physical and human. More specifically, it is the study of Earth's landscapes, people, places, and environments.
So knowing capitals, country names and other 'games' is most definately NOT Geography. As an AS level student in the 70's we studied trade routes, infastucture, economics, manufacturing, resources. etc etc. Along with a fair dose or regional history and polotics. That is 'Geography' as a subject. No brownie points really for knowing a capital city. That's just general knowledge.
@@stevekirkby6570 "it is the study of Earth's landscapes, people, places, and environments" - capitals are, in fact, places on Earth, and learning their names is part of geography
Not only they respond, but it's not even in their main language.
I am European and I feel so dumb😂 I probably knew only like 30% on this questions😂.
Also the participants of the event are all very interested in international politics, it is an event of the European Parliament after all!
Makes sense
It's cultural too, I'm British and I knew the 'related to Britain' questions but not many of the others and I'm pretty good at this sort of thing. (like the NZ ones that FR was impressed by.. I was like, everyone knows that tho right?)
my thoughts as well
Proof that public education works if done right
Proof that public education (ig done right) has no practical purpose.
Nowadays, even in Europe unfortunately its not done right. Most of the classes are about trying to spread "the message" meaning wokism instead of the actual lectures.
@@emanuelfer456 what are you talking about 😂
@@emanuelfer456 what the fuck are you talking about? My kids still seem to learn all the similar stuff i did but i live in finland so i guess it could be different.
Estonia has incredible education, but America’s is better than most European countries. Just take a look at the PISA rankings.
10:46 "He's from Africa, he lives there, so it should be easy'. Yeah, but Africa is enormous and has 54 countries. By that logic, it should also be easy for Americans to know the capitals of all 50 US states, but we've seen the videos of how often they get that wrong...
exactly, that was the video's lowest moment by far. otherwise, this dude provided me some nice laughs with his honest reactions
agreed, lowkey a racist af comment to make. Rubbed me the wrong way
@@whatdavodidignorant, not racist.
These are not simple questions, but what's more important, the crowd is not random. He quizzed the attendants of an youth event organized by European Parliament, all participants are keenly interested in international politics and by that virtue possess above the average political geography knowledge. Capitals, languages, flags, anthems - things he asks about all fall under political geography. I'm very curious how would they fare with other branches of geography. All in all, it's a clean case of cherry picking the data. Like asking fashion questions first on a fashion show, and at sporting event later, and comparing the answers of both groups.
Just say you are jealous 😊.
@@nillyk5671 maybe. But he does have a point. Though I, as an european who s*cks at geography, do envy them.
@@nillyk5671 No he is absolutely right. I am Italian btw.
@@nillyk5671 I was coming in the comment to say exactly what @echinorlax said.
I mean come on, of course a youth event about the european parliament, it's a crowd of people interested by the subjects. Look the guy who answered the question about the only EU language that has afroasiatic roots just told he had learned it 30min ago, this event is ABOUT the topic!
Also just the fact that it's people who speaks english and that is not their native language. And I can tell you that in France, people who speak english as easily as them is not every random guy in the streets
And the Example of the girl answering the number of countries in Africa... She is from Africa, so I'm pretty glad she answered corectly without hesitation!
I mean, I'm french with west afrian roots, coming from well educated family (more scientists than geograpphy), so yes maybe people around me could answer correctly to most of theses questions (not all clearly), but we're not representative of the whole french population. People coming from a lower class would probably not do as well as the ones in this video!
I'm not jealous, I'm impressed!
Yes, maybe. But there's this guy who interviews students around the campuses in the US, asking them very simple questions, such as how many Moons does Earth have or how much is 3x7 and so on. Those university students don't know anything.
The guy makes a mistake in te 9:30s Gaelic (from celtic) is not a oficial language in Spain, is Galician (from latin). Are not in the same family, only in protoindoeuropean language.
I was about to comment about this... This was a very bizarre error. Especially, that Galician is very close to Portuguese.
@@lesfreresdelaquote1176 I thought that was odd too. Thanks for clearing up. Also the way he describes 'all the different gaelics' is also inaccurate. All 6 Celtic languages, only one of which is Gaelic. Galicia is Celtic Spain tho no?
Galician is a latim language, which is actually just Portuguese written with Spanish script but still Portuguese. It is official in Galicia/Galiza (North West of Spain) and completely unrelated with Gaelic. Galician folklore is to some extent Celtic and common to Ireland and French Bretagne, but the Galician language is not, neither linked to Gaelic.
Came to the comments to say this thanks
@@lesfreresdelaquote1176 Galicia had a Celtic language that was spoken until the 9th century. Maybe that confused him.
We had to memorize European, African, South American and Asian countries + capitals, as well as US states and capitals in elementary school (atleast in the 90s in Finland, when I was in 1-6th grade). We had map tests of all of them.
Bro this kind of video Made in America people dont know 2+2-2 lol
Same here in Hungary. 😁
In Greece, we had a lesson in 4th grade called "environmental studies", where we memorized the rivers, lakes and mountains of every prefecture in the country. Then, we made our own "geography" IDs. Those looked like the official greek IDs, but instead of personal information, they included the geographical characteristics of our hometown. It was fun to design them at the end of the school year.
Same in France ✨
Same in the Czech R xd
"What's the two languages of Cyprus"
"Greek and English"
"Turkish"
"It shouldn't be"
Shots fired!
About 40 years ago, when I was young, a school board game called "countries, cities" was quite popular, in which several people had to write down a country, city, river, animal, plant, dish in about 1 minute - there were many variants of other things - that started with a randomly selected letter. The more people wrote down the same thing, the lower the score. So the winner was the one who knew the most unique names for a given letter. Maybe it was a sneaky game invented by teachers, but it was a great way to remember things that were useless to anyone, so that you could show off in front of others.
In Germany it’s called „Stadt, Land, Fluss.“ (city, country, river) We had the same rules for this game. :) I sometimes play it with my sister even though we’re both in our 30‘s. It keeps our brains active.
In Polend it's called "Państwa, miasta.
I don’t remember the name in French but I used to play it as well.
In Italy it's called "Nomi, cose e città" ❤
@@bemilie2841 it’s called " le jeu du bac"
"Just need to understand directions, north, east, south west. And to read a map, that's enough"
It's so funny, because in my schooling that wasn't a geography thing, that was gym class. Orienteering, specifically. It was too much of a basic skill to be taught in geography class when more or less everyone had learned at least that much before even reaching school age :'D
Same. Orienteering, like swimming, is a compulsory part of gym education here.
Orientation dates from before Columbus. Otherwise we would also have occidentation
@@benverdel3073Ex Oriente Lux - Ex Occidente Luxus! 😉
Understanding the directions is the least important part in geography. Knowing countries, capitals, languages, the people etc where they are and what are they like is VERY important in understanding the world around you. Knowledge is everything.
I knew most of the answers. The bit that always blows my mind, as a Brit, is that they are answering in English when they are not native speakers. I am able to order food and drink in a few European countries, but that’s it. 😢
well I think it's a handicap not speaking English in 2024. it's Lingua Franca. the internet is in English, most pop culture is in English... you have no choice but to speak if only a little bit.
The fact that the kid could understand English was amazing to me.
Why? 🤔
The fact that literally like 95% of people in europe learn more than their own language in school is for us pretty basic
For most Europeans it's totally normal to learn more than one language in school 😅
In East-Belgium we had French and German in primary school (class 1 to 6 over here) and from class 7 till class 12, we had English and Dutch too 🤷🏻♀️
Maybe because Belgium has 3 languages (German, French, Flemish) 😂
We all start at 7, unless you have a cool kindergarten and they start you earlier xD
I'm Romanian and I started learning English in kindergarden at ages 4-5. Then they kept teaching us in school until graduation, but I honestly learned more from the internet than I could ever learn in school.
Most of the kids learn geography in middle school here in Europe and goes deeper with capital and rivers too. Then in high school we goes deeper in with civics in the different countries. I think we goes deeper then the American school
besides in America you choose the classes you want to apply to !!
And then we forget about much of the things we never get to use. 😅
@@Divig Agreed. But, if you don't learn mental arithmetic, you're also not able to do an estimate. Basic geography learns you to estimate where a country or city is, by having an idea of the worlds geography and the names sound familiar and gives you a sense of direction on a map. It makes you do educated guesses, instead of answering complete garbage or having to say 'I don't know' every time.
Like if I ask you where Norway is, you don't answer South-America and if I ask the same for Venezuela or Brazil, you know it's not in Europe. It narrows down the options.
I learned all of this plus more in elementary school in a 3rd world central american school.
@@georgesheffield1580 You must have done elementary school for at least 10 years then? 😄
9:31 The other one is actually Galician, not Gaelic
Came to say this lol
He misspoke, but it has the same roots. Which is why he references the others.
@@DimitriMoreirano, it doesn't. They have nothing to do
@@DimitriMoreira gaelic is a celtic language. Galician language does include some celtic words and names and Galician people are considered celtic, but theirs is a romance language.
@@DimitriMoreira he's wrong about the others too. Gaelic, gallic, Welsh (cymraig), Cornish, Breton, Manx are the Celtic languages. Only one of them is called Gaelic. (Apologies I can't remember the proper word for Cornish and if I got any of the other spellings wrong x)
To be fair: These Europeans are not randomly picked out on the street. They know way more than the average European. I did not know the answers to several of these questions and usually I am pretty good at general knowledge questions.
Those who act in the comments as if answering these questions correctly is easy for normal Europeans are lying and have probably breathed a little too much national pride.
i think i could have answered wrong to max 4-5 questions in total . i don't know if i am the average or not : flags , countires , capitals were in my interests when i was a kid .
Let's say that the average reasonably educated European can answer the vast majority of these questions. I'm an average musicologist from a European country, but I knew the answer to most of them and I'd find it difficult to name someone from my relatives and my circle of friends who would fare worse than me is such a quiz.
Nah I learn that at school and not even high school
I literarily knew the answers to most of these and I'm not a geography nerd. Just know this stuff because I learned it in school. Some of the questions were pretty hard though.
@@filipferencak2717So you have learned in school which national anthems don‘t have words?
Which school was it?!
I was also able to answer the majority of the questions. But several of them I couldn‘t answer or was more or less lucky to have them right. And my common knowledge is very good.
My point is:
You can‘t answer them all with "normal" common knowledge. It‘s just not true. But they make it look that way, just to show everyone how ignorant US Americans are in comparison to Europeans.
Take these questions, go on the streets anywhere in Europe and ask random people! I guess you‘d be surprised of how "ignorant" the average European is compared to the people that are shown in this video.
Don't make jokes of kids who know capital cities! When I was 7, I could tell you all the European capitals (but sometimes I confused Bucharest with Sofia...) 🤓
how can you confuse Bucharest with Sofia? Usually Bucharest is confused with Budapest...
@@78Pharaoh78 I apologise very much, but I was only 7 years old. I probably just mixed up Romania and Bulgaria, maybe it sounded similar to me. Hungary sounds completely different.
By the way, I don't think most seven-year-olds even know that Bucharest and Sofia exist (they might not even be able to spell them).
@@zwiderwurzn5908 I get that I would also often confuse their placement on the map as Bulgaria and Romania are right next to each other.
I sometimes confuse the names as I learned them in Bulgarian and didn't have to learn them in English. Bar the most obvious ones of course. For example the Chinese capital in my language is Pekin but in English it is Beijing...
Wait, I currently confuse those two, because my teacher in middle school taught me that Sofia wasn't the capital of Bulgaria. She also taught us that Hong Kong was the capital of China, Taiwan didn't exist according to her. There were neither Israel nor Palestine, according to her (which I only know due to my old geography notebook, which I rediscovered recently) and the capital of Liechtenstein was Liechtenstein according to her. She also made many more mistakes, like confusing China with Asia and saying Japan isn't Asian, but Australian.
calling Maltese an _Afroasiatic_ language is technically true but given the context it comes across almost like a trick question. Maltese is a Semitic language; a mix of Sicilian-Arabic mixed with some Romance influences.
Sicilian is a romance language!
I think Maltese is closer to Arabic. Tunisians tuning into Maltese TV and radio can get the gist of what’s being said apparently.
I don't consider people knowing places beyond their own country borders to be geographic nerds: we learn this stuff in school, and also often enjoy games like Trivial Pursuit or the ABC games (usually about countries of various continents which my sons and their friends love to play while enjoying their weed). Furthermore, most people around the world enjoy foreign movies and TV-shows which will teach you some facts as well.
being a nerd is a badge of honor not an insult only anti intellectual bafoons use it that way.
Because he lives in Africa doesn't mean he would be able to name all the capital cities! There are 54 countries in Africa, would you even be able to name all the capital cities in the Americas because you were born there?! People who are from Europe can't name all European capital cities so I don't know why this changes because he is African.
How come you got so upset when she didn't mention the United States in her answers for countries which start with "the"
I love your videos though, it's all love brother!
Le preguntó igual que a todos 🤷🏼♀️
oh yeah I saw how disappointed he was when *the* united states wasn't mentioned
some of those questions are pretty tough, not all of these things are taught even here in the UK
I may not know where every country is or what the capital may be but I do know where to find out.
I will always try to fill the gap in my knowledge rather than remain in ignorance!
This was filmed at some European Union event, it's not surprising they were so good.
Yes all of those are college students
Exactly. This fully explains the motives behind Brexit.
In the school, all of the students had to complete "mapas mudos" (just with the border line's) we must were able to write the names of the countries and the capitals as well. Included the map from USA with the name of all the states. It was not an extraordinary culture, it was necessary to pass to the next course.
Also a map from all the world with the most important mountains, rivers, deserts, seas....
Hi I recall watching you during pandemic from Cpt, that you wanted to go to Europe.. Then by chance I see you again and you've done it... Hope your journey grows even more.
Love this! Shared it w/my daughter in Florida to show her 3 daughters. I live in N Ireland now.
The thing is that if you live in Europe you're very conscious that Europe is made of several countries, so all of this is a logic part of education - then when you read a lot and go to school " general culture" is a big part of what you get to learn about the world in general - Myself I spoke several languages already when I was 16, and had been travelling all around Europe already, as well as some other countries outside of Europe - all of this was normal to me -
I usually tell younger friends to learn as much as possible about as much as possible. Very useful.
Don't feel stupid bro. In fact you're better informed than the average American.
And what you - ant they - lack in knowledge is just the result of a world view based on the idea that the only things that are worth knowing or caring about are those between Canada, Mexico, the East Coast and the West Coast.
The American superiority complex.
That's the world view which guides your education system and coming out of that system will almost guarantee that you'll know far less about the rest of the world than almost any reasonably educated person on the planet.
The fact that you actually know many things and you can answer some of these questions is a credit to you, your openness and curiosity.
true, the American superiority. but a lot of people there don' thave general knowledge about the us either.
Well if all these people are working at the European Parliament, no wonder they know all these questions... the level of knowledge required of from these people is insane
They don't work there for sure. Some of the people are not even 18 years old. It must be some kind youth event
7:51 The kid that answered "England" to the capital of the Netherlands, yes he got it wrong. *But* he's from Luxembourg, English isn't his first language, maybe not even his second ! The fact he even understood the question and tried to answer is still pretty impressive. Maybe he didn't know which country is "the Netherlands" in English because it has a completely different name in his native language (it has in mine).
While it's true that we were taught all this in school, I actually don't remember more than maybe half of the answers here. And to Americans: ask Europeans to name and place all the states in USA and their capitols 😂! I am sure you had to learn all those when you were in school. I only have a sense where the states is but no way I could name the capitol cities 😅. And your states are as big as many European countries.
yes , i think the same , i know very few capitals of the States . but when i was in my 20s ( now i am close to 50 ) i knew all of them .
But then, why would we learn about that? We were never taught about the different German states either, or the Chinese provinces and autonomous regions.
@@Divig that was not the point. The point was that Americans have to first learn 50 different states and their capitols before they try to memorize all other countries. In Europe at least, ther are not any countries that have that size to try to learn 😊. And of course in some cases people can learn both if they are interested enough. Just the sheer size of USA makes it harder to get fully educated on.
@@beatricenilsson4530 except for Russia (for size).
I do get your point, but I would think that the number is more important than the size. Just guessing from your name, but at least I had to learn all 25 of our Swedish landskap, and our 21 län (with their residensstäder) in school as well as learning about other countries. I would guess that other countries learn about their own internal regions as well.
And we did actually learn the individual states of the US, but not their "capitals". (Not that I remember more than 1/3 of them...)
Europe has 51 countries, we had to learn about them and their capital in school, and then also about the rest of the world. I feel it would be similar to Americans learning about all the states, no excuse to not learn about the rest of the world.
(EU citizen here) For the 'K' countries, I paused just after she said Kenya, so couldn't guess that myself. And I instantly came up with Kazakhstan. For my second one - not Kenya - I came up with Kurdistan (although not fully independent), then came up with Kosovo (also somewhat disputed, but UN-recognized, so should count). So, I think I got there, even without Kenya.
The guy naming all the somewhat obscure capitals though is crazy informed. And most of these people he is interviewing are politically engaged, studying international politics and visiting the European Parliament. These people are not the standard. I assure we, we are much dumber and less informed than these people!
These seem people that will be the future politicians or ambassadors of EU countries. I've seen a couple of interviews by this guy, don't let him fool you, he interviews students that are well-informed and often times specialize in world politics and history.
Generally, you seem more informed than the average American, and I am more informed than the average EU-citizen (I think). But these guys in the video, these are the top percentiles of the European youth (or non-European youth studying in Europe).
We should not compare to ourselves, and especially not compare to the median of US-citizens. It's apples and pears, really...
Yeah, they are above average.
EU citizen here also: to me there are only three countries in the world that have a name starting with "K": Kosovo, Kuwait and Kiribati.
In German it's Kroatien = Croatia 😅 @@module79l28
@@module79l28 From Bing AI:
Here are the countries that start with the letter “K”:
Kazakhstan
Kenya
Kiribati
Kosovo
Kuwait
Kyrgyzstan
No, i disagree. Everyone should compare oneself to the best. And have some more ambitions for themselves. It is because people only compare themselves to the biggest idiots out there, in TV reality or in "dumb americans" videos... that this world becomes more stupid by the year. The best should be set as examples to strive towards, not be occulted as "oddities".
These participants are at the European Parliament. If you questioned participants at a NASA convention about planets off course they’ll know more than the average person 🤣
I'm surprised that I knew almost all questions. I never made it past middle school and our geography teacher in middle school sucked, so this is like super cool.
Your comment around the 4th minute was basically correct. Those are guys who are into it. That's some European Union event. Greetings from Portugal
Don't be upset guy, for most Europeans this is just general knowledge. The issue Americans have results from a national absence of competent geography teachers, but there is a serious issue that is created as a result. Because of the range of international affairs affecting the world at the moment, Americans are at a serious disadvantage through not understanding where conflicts are, and their possible effects on international relations, trade, population movement, and other consequences. Geography is more than compass directions. Regards, good luck with the channel.
It is general knowledge in the sense that its not specialzed knowledge, but most people on the street wouldnt be able to answer half of these questions. And both of us probably belong in that category. Dont act like we europeans are so much superior in general knowledge.
@@dinardos6222 that is truth - in general we can (doubt that youngsters still can) name a decent number of countries. In case of K-country - I was like Kirgistan, Kazachstan (worked with Kazakchs), but it takes some effort to get Kosovo and Kiribati and Kuwait I took from comments - in that fast pace it is not so easy. Capital of Kazachstan or Kirgistan (spelling like in my language) I recognized them when they were said. I was sad that I cannot figure out Vilnius (but mostly have no idea which belongs to which Baltic country) and some crazy stuff like Catalla, Basque, Spanish (I worked with Basque-s) ... I heard sometime in a past about Catalania (but no clue that it's lang. is official) and Galician - some history lesons or something? Cyprus as a former soldier with our troops deployed there - easy, Malta capital huh - never interested in and so on and on. I am checking former yugoslavia countries twice a year because I feel it as a shame to not know them and still forgetting some and placing them on a map - Slovenia, Serbia, Croatia - where I have been is OK, but rest ... "somewhere down there".
I understand that these are entertaining vids, some way a bit educative (he pronounced right answers - american style says "yes" all the time), but that is for sure not a norm here - average europian speaks ... languages - I barely learnt English and do not count related languages to my mother one - I do not speak them, I can somehow understand them.
Well, let's keep in mind that the European people in this video are not ordinary people passing by in the street, they're clearly attending some sort of meeting/convention sposored by the European Parliament (at least that's what I can guess from the panel below). This means they are particularly interested in foreign politics, so no doubt they put extra effort in studying a bunch of capitals.
7:50. Technically we do have two: Amsterdam, the official one; and The Hague, where the King and government are.
Ok my friend... don't be nervous! As you can see on the background, this guy is at the building of European Parliament!
So, he is asking some people with educational level far than average!
Your face is a picture of bewilderment during this episode :)
I bet he is really good at sports, dancing, and music. He is probably kind hearted also, and humble. He should not feel badly for not knowing stuff he will never need to use. Like names of places he will never care to go to.
@@joanofarcxxi Indeed, is was meant as a humorous take :) He seems like a great guy.... and is doing stuff.
4:44 you look impressed and surprised.
But thats actually an easy question if you know the history of Cyprus or the current situation for that matter!
Those guys know more than the average Europeans.
8:15 You only need to memorize at least 194 names of countries + capital cities.
That is the minimum in the world After graduating from elementary school
its refreshing to see an American acknowledge their ignorance of general knowledge and even be embarrassed by it.
8:02: No, it is not about the fact that he may have know the capital as a child... The kid is from Luxembourg, and the guy asks him questions in ENGLISH. This is the shocking part. He would have to be either very precocious, or to be raised in a multilingual family.
I could answer maybe 50% of these questions. Many were difficult.
A lot of kids in europe these days learn english alongside their native tounge at a young age, do not have to be bilingual.
@@RobinAsp77 That's plain weird. And worrying.
Luxembourg is a multilingual country, so it shouldn't be shocking that he knows English
@@edipires15 English is not one of those languages. Since when "multilingual" is tantamount to "oh, he must know english" ... Makes no sense. Except for the anglosphere i guess, which just assumes the world should make all the efforts so that they can be lazy forevermore.
@@nox8730 I’m from Luxembourg, and English is widespread here even though it’s not one of the national languages.
One point perhaps: knowing the world's capitals doesn't represent any 'extra work' in Geography. It's barely enough to pass the test at your high school...🤔
If he asked those questions on the street, like in analogous films about United Statesians, the myth of intelligent Europeans would crumble
A bit more and these students will know also what you have eaten this morning... 🤣🤣🤣
And now the same questions to USamericans!
Yes! And the questions should be asked in a language that isn't their first language, just like the participants in this video! 😁
@@Asa...S English is enough foreign for americano speaking people - I remember when question was "Name two of united states ..." and YT guy was ranting 5min what that does mean and what is he asking about ... ;)
These are attendees at a european parliament event so its their special interest to know about other countries.
Saying that it's amazing how fluid people are across europe in switching between languages and dialects.
Also in school, in my experience, from a young age we have to learn about a continent and then specialise in a country / state and give a presentation to the class a couple of times a year. We used to practice reciting capitals of europe, states of the USA plus their capitals and be quizzed on various world national flowers, flags etc. This more considered general knowledge you should know rather than geography which is the more nitty gritty politics, agricultural practices, population trends, topography, fauna and flora.
I had to know everything in this trivia to pass elementary school in Mexico City public education back in the 90s lol
4:18 In high school, me and the kids in my class, we often had self-made geography tests that we did on regular basis. All tests were supervised by our geography teacher. They usually involved naming all countries of the world in 40 minutes, or all US states + bonuses for each state's capital, or world capitals, rivers, political and other boundaries... it was fun every time we did them and we were scored on them. I knew all capitals of the world back then when I was in 4th grade. I knew data like length of top 20 longest rivers, depths, locations, lakes..etc. Such competitions in school made us retain that data for decades. Was it helpful? Hell yes.
My 12 year old sister needed to know all the names, locations and capitals of 31 countries in Europe, plues some other important cities, plus main rivers, seas and mountain ranges just for her first test in the school year. She also had to study all countries of the Americas last year. And she is not even attending a school where they teach kids much about topics like Goegraphy and such. Compared to my school, she is learning about one fifth of what I had to learn and her IQ has been determined to be above average and I went to a regular public school with no special program or whatever. And despite the school having no special program, I still had 5 years of geography, 5 years of history, 4 years of music, 5 years of drawing/handcraft/design, 2 years of general Life Sciences which, after those 2 years, then got divided into 5 years of physics/chemistry and 5 years of biology/geology, 1 year of psychology, 2 years of philosophy, 12 years of maths, 3 years of french, 12 years of native language (grammar, literature, etc), 9 years of english and those are just rhe biggest subjects. Besides those, there were still minor classes, namely different types of projects we needed to get involved in and/or build and present, physical education, citizenship, economy, drama, IT, etc. This school program was MANDATORY. If you were privileged, then you could enrol in schools with upgraded programs, with additional subjects and extracurricular activities for you to do. So yeah, the idea that I get is that even what we call "minimum level of education and general knowledge" over here is still above what a lot of prestigious american schools have to offer. It's sad that the american education system sucks so badly, I dont really blame their ignorance on americans really, but when there are comparisons to be made, europeans def come on top a lot of the times in terms of amount of general knowledge they own vs the americans.
me too, but I was 12 more than 30yrs ago ;) - I could do like 50% at most
To be fair to you, he is interviewing them in the European Parliament, these are probably people who work there and it's their job to know these sorts of things.
My kid, which is now 21😂, with his five years knew more a out capitals, cities and countries than I. We portuguese as a lot of europeans dream of traveling around our wonderful world. Also we teach our kids the history of all the world, not only our own
I'm European and only knew like half of that... Don't compare yourself to the people in this video as these people are not average.
I learned something today, Spain has four official languages, Spanish, Katalan, Baks and Gaelic, thanks !
It's not Gaelic, it's Galician or Gallego.
Galician, not Gaelic.
@@joanofarcxxi Thank you !
I grew up in Europe. The reason we are so well versed in geography in Europe,Africa and Asia is because we actually have use for that knowledge.
And also because of colonizing.
The thing is bro people assume knowing random facts makes you smart in actuality it just means you remembered a lot lol Intelligence is different
Knowing a lot is being educated, learning fast is intelligence.
knowledge cultivates intelligence even more and gives result. What would Einstein be without his studies and theories, just a smart nobody
12:31 I'd excuse her since she probably thought about Inner Mongolia, which is an autonomous region in China (and actually has an even bigger Mongol population than Mongolia itself, 4.5 mil compared to 3 mil).
All of them are easy. Im like "valetta, valetta, valetta" and "Jamaica, Jamaica, Jamaica" 😂
In another video, Americans couldn't even answer what date July 4th is celebrated.😂
Kids, when you want to conquer and colonize then you got to know your geography.
Edit: Lighthearted joke, no need to go nuts.
Agreed,it’s just good manners.
Dont feel dumb, its a challenge!
In Europe they really teachers work not like in usa
@@annakinzel4212 true!
I'm chuffed to know most answers, but i do love geography quizzes.
I’m european and I really like geography but those people are on another level..
Theres an old saying that might help you understand you situation "Travel broadens the mind"
min 09:35 - gallego, thank you (a Romance language quite different from the Celtic ones here mentioned)
Saying "I don't care about geography" and considering it nerdy stuff is part of the problem. So many Americans say that: I could know all that, but I'm not interested enough. Why is that? Why aren't people interested in what exists outside of their own environment? Most Europeans have not learned these things by heart. They know it because they often deal with these topics. They know their neighboring countries, they watch or read the news, they watch or read travel reports or documentaries, they travel around themselves, talk to the locals, they realize which countries and cities they pass through by car or train on their route. They are interested in the world they live in and accumulate knowledge over years and decades. I often hear "I don't care" from Americans and I don't understand why. They don't even know their own continent. Many don't know that Mexico is not part of South America. Many don't know how many states the US has or which coast is on the other side of the Atlantic. And why? They don't care. There's a word for this mentality. It's called ignorance. It's why Americans have such a bad reputation almost everywhere (and often they don't even know it), why the rest of the world thinks they're stupid or uneducated. They're not. Americans are as smart and educated as most people. They're just disinterested and ignorant. The good news is: you can work on that. Try it!
I just watched a video where someone asked americans about geografy etc. They asked:name two countries that share borders with the USA. No one in the video could answer that. Then they asked:name 3 countries that are not the USA. They couldn't answer. And here they ask questions that even I can't answer as fast as they. 😅
I've noticed that when ever they have quiz in US cartoons, they stay inside US borders. I would dare to do quiz about USA because the knowledge I got from games and movies ect. geography, history, general knowledge, you name it.
Hi, Spanish here. I’m having a meltdown over what I just heard at minute 13:06.
The three official languages of Spain are, from left to right: Galician (Galego NW Spain) (it’s a Romance language like Spanish and has nothing to do with Gaelic), Basque (Euskera N of spain), and Catalan (Català NE of spain). However, you should also include Valencian (Valencià) and Balearic (Balear).
There are very few islands that have two languages/are divided…we have one in Germany and every teenager has learned in school that cypress is another example for that…
It's not that we put in some extra work, but we have schools and tests, so we have to study all that or say bye bye to our chance to graduate
7 African countries:
1 guinea
2 guinea Bissau
3 equatorial guinea
4 dr congo
5 congo brassaville
6 central african republic
7 Ghana
I always treat moment I feel stupid like this - if I feel stupid, I educate myself. Nothing works better as ego boost and there is not a better way to at least appear "erudite".
Cyrillic alphabet: Serbia, Montenegro, Bulgaria, North Macedonia, part of Bosnia known as Republika Srpska, Russia, Ukraine, Belarus. Some use only Cyrillic, some use Cyrillic and also Latin scripts.
Ahaha when we were little at kindergarden, we were playing games with geography. I learned a lot back then. Many of these questiins answeres, i didnt know tbh
Dude, when you roll your eyes it makes me wanna slap you until I roll them back 😂😂😂😂
Anyway, one of the first interaction I've had with an American was like 22-23 years ago, I was in middle school and we had American students in an exchange between schools and when he heard us speaking in 3-4 different languages in normal dialogue between us he was "everyone in here speaks multiple languages? Everyone except you dude". 😂😂😂😂 And he was also bad at... Well everything
In 3 or 4 grade (I don't remember) in geography classes we actualy had to learn all countries and their respective capital city. I wonder what are you learning in geography in USA?
RELAX!!! What we were taught years ago in our European schools, meant that we knew A LOT about geography and History ( History being a subject we can question, since there are SO MANY lies)... I am French and 67 and there are many useless teachings we were taught, but kids were good at learning about language, their own obviously, and good with numbers. Not the case anymore!! So sadly, if those questions were asked to young adults in France, their answers might be the same as young Americans.
It depends on the interests of every single person. I'm swiss and I know all 50 US States, can name them on a US States Map and know all their capitals, too. But I don't know any other swiss person who does. It's a matter of interest.
As an American of European descent, it never ceases to amaze me how attractive the indigenous European women are. 😍
*In personality and appearance.
As a European that lived in South Africa, I never knew there where more than 2 capital cities, I thought Pretoria was the only one.
I know there are three but the one with B I can't spell even if my life depended on it...
5:33
SHOULDNT BE?!?!? As a Turk, i am VERY offended- she doesnt determine what our brother country speaks!!
Well you kinda invaded and forced it to be that way, kinda what Russia does to Ukraine now... So yeah it shouldn't be that way...
My geography teacher asked me to indicate on a blank map the names of rivers, cities, mountains and states around the world.
north, east, south, west.. you know all of the fancy stuff in geography 😅
I (Swede) barely find my way in my own hometown, buddy, please don't feel dumb. I wouldn't be able to answer most of these questions myself(some of my siblings would but only cause they like geography and do a lot of geography quizzes).
pro geoguessr players - the best tool for learning geography and having fun
There is a joke about the US military. It is the only way to learn geography.
May I react on your comment at 10:47 “he is from Africa, he lives there..”, the continent has 54 countries, I doubt you know all 57 countries and their capital on the American continent 😉
Or the Capital of every State in the US😅
How he even can say that somebody is from somewhere - on the street of my small town I can say that one is from Korea (S), that one is from Vietnam, that one is from Africa (all of them were born here and speak fluently our lang. - probably more than 90% of them, older maybe quite broken way, but still can speak it)
regarding to that - he is from Africa and lives there ...
It is also important to note that none of these people who are answering in English are from countries that speak other languages!
As italian to America:Son...if you want dominate the world,you must know the world.😅
Ok, now this is totally not just any crowd. Most Europeans would never know this either. Many of these are not basic or simple questions.
Bull. Most of us know a lot of European capitals.
@@ranica47 Sure. And you totally knew that Africa has 54 countries or which national anthems have no text. Stop bullshitting yourself.
Whilst I would've struggled with some of the questions ( namely capitals with the same name as the country, bar Brazil I'm blank) most are very common knowledge here in Europe... Say I can name more than two countries with K without even thinking much. I know the Azeri capital and most of the old ussr countries capitals.
@@svetoslavtodorov2427 Thanx for your input, there were some easy ones. But to say everone knows questions like the capital of Fiji, come on! Also your user name honestly suggests familiarity with the east. Try asking the average West-German about anything right of Berlin...
@@xfranczeskax it's true that I'm from Eastern Europe , certainly not denying it, but this were things we learned prior to high school. Deffo not sure how's the education system in the west, but for us is the norm. And I had to sit a test in geography at year 6 with capitals of far and wide countries we learned over the year... In year 5 we had Africa, in year 6 we had the Americas...
6:23 Bro you should watch and react the Americans answering the capital of the USA question.
Most populars are New York and “I don’t know.. California?” 🤣
To be honest: these are not random "Europeans" you meet on the street and interview them and get a glimp of the common knowlegde.
These are well educated Europeans at an international event which seems to have something to do with international topics or a similar event, as the guy at 10:22 said "i saw this in a presentation half an hour ago". (or so) .
Some of the answers were impressive.
greetings from Germany. Nice reaction.
My son is 11 years old and knows pretty much all the capitals in the world, much more than i do, and many other facts about the countries 😊
That’s wonderful quite impressive
9:37
Serbia
Greece
Ukraine
Russia (partly in Europe)
That would be my guess!
You know more things when education actually works in your home country.