I though they hated each other because in "recent history" every asian country was in war with every other asian country at some point. Be it some local war or WW1 and WW2. Not to say that asians usually have high "standards" of loyalty to their own country, so wars can get really gruesome and brutal, specially when you are "brain-washed" to HATE your enemy and think that you're superior.

Oh Asian countries have long gauge over thousands of years of wars with each other. I don't think we actually care much about that any more. We love the Korean, Japanese, Vietnamese, etc. It had been peaceful for too many decades.

The Asian frontline was never properly recorded in WW2 history, not by western historians. We can only find fragments of videos by some western journalists. Japan had done many despicable deeds to Asian countries back then, there was an idealistic "Great Asia Circle" which they pictured as an utopia led by Japan. Much like the utopia Hitler made up to bring war to the world.

May the Force be with us.

I don't know how I've gone through life not knowing any of this. I am totally reading up on this.

I've learned so much from these Traveler's threads that it's really kinda sad. I can't say I'm surprised of how ignorant I am on things outside the US (we are pretty darn self-centered) but it's been a learning experience and then some.

Thats suprising people dont know. I only know the basic info, allthough Im not sure where I learned about it. It wasnt in school, the history there was pretty bad. We didnt even learn much about our country (UK), even less on Wales.

As it's our latest discussion topic, I want to ask everyone... How is education (Specially "International" Education, as in "anything that isn't only about your own country") in your country?

for people in ireland
what is st. patricks day about, i dont celebrate it because i dont have irish heritage

It's commemorating St. Patrick, but in other parts of the world, it's more like a celebration of being Irish.

Pretty much non existant. People could learn French and that was it.

Im from the UK, Wales specificly. Hopefully the other UK members, didnt have an education as [censored] as mine.

Did you not study world religions like we did?

UK here, I'd say we were pretty well educated about other nations. I remember studying prohibition in the US in History, doing case studies on India among others in Geography, and studying all the major religions in Religious Studies, for example.

Catholic school :/

For some reason we had 2 Sikh pupils though.

Weird. My sister went to a Catholic college but they still had to study Islam.

There is none that I can recall. I'm trying to remember if there was a World History class, because I want to say there was, but I honestly don't remember a thing about it if we did have one. I do remember all the reports I did on American History and Economics though. Things on JFK, the civil war, current economics (back in the 90's), etc. I'll be honest - I know absolutely nothing about the countries outside the US... something I will make right in the up coming years, mind you... but as far as required education goes (school years 1-12) we didn't learn anything that I've retained. Now in college (years 13+), you can choose to take classes with a world view such as World Religions, but you're not required. But, US school systems are a huge failure - more so now then ever before - because the kids now-a-days are being taught to pass a certain test, not for the general education and well being of the child. I can't say more though, as it could get political.

Edit: I'm not saying they don't learn it now or that I wasn't taught something about it when I was in school many moons ago... I'm just saying that they didn't push it as hard as American history because I kept all my reports and I have none on anything not related to America.

At my school you have to take World History, then you can take AP (college level) European history. This is a small American highschhol, so I imagine larger schools offer more courses.

Was that good or important. We had French and Italian speaking classes but only a handful were interested in them. History class focuses on anything important in days gone by but mainly focused on the history of the UK. Politics no doubt encompasses a large amount of foreign discussion since for strange reasons foreign policies affect lands out with their original borders.

Here you learn about Europe, the history of colonisation and the World Wars... That's about it. I'm glad I didn't grow up here. Yeah, it's pretty much on par with a lot of the (Western) world's education but... well, I had an awesome education elsewhere (mostly-- I obviously wasn't taught much about Asian geopolitics or history; which I intend to remedy when I have some spare time again), and I'm glad I did. I love knowing stuff about stuff.

I would say our options were really varied for international history/culture. By the time I was studying higher history I wasn't learning about the UK at all. Higher history was American Civil Rights, South African History and Slave Culture in the Carribbean. Then advanced higher was American Civil War.

For language options we had German, French and Spanish.

Really? Hahah. Interesting. What kind of events/movements/eras did you learn about?

I honestly don't remember much about it - it was 10 years ago. But it was mainly about the move from tribal culture and the relationship with Britain etc...

You never learned about apartheid?

Even I learned about that and we barely covered anything different in my history classes. Usually just some ancient civilizations and typical wars, not even in any real depth.

People who kept up with hostiry just went on to do the crusades, more on WW2 and the black death...
Our history was [censored], we did a bit on the Romans, then it was Hastings, Tudors (way too damn long), gunpowder plot and the world wars.

We did the Titanic in history for a few months then it was William Wallace and then WWII

I did learn about it, but I didn't think it was considered that important, really... Huh. I wonder if North Korea's going to get the same treatment if/when they come out of their funk. Or the Middle East, or... You know. So it just sounds a bit strange, to me, to hear that South African history or Apartheid is taught at schools.


That sounds dreary...

It was, even when there was an attempt to make it fun (saw the film and made newspaper articles about it) it was still boring.