‘Geographically challenged’

I laughed my guts out while reading this.

Then I had another bout of laughter thinking of all the incidents that happen with me.

For a long time now I have known that I am, what I like to call, ‘geographically challenged’ :)

Situation 1 - If I go inside a building (happens mostly with residential buildings), then after I exit the lift (elevator) or come down the stairs, I cannot quickly locate the gate !

Situation 2 - If I am inside a building, I will routinely point in wrong directions to indicate places outside the building.

Situation 3 - I am presently at office. I have come here from home. Now I have to go to some place where I have always gone from home and never from office. What do I do ? I go home first and from there I go to that place. It doesn’t matter if it is a longer distance or takes more time. I have to do this, because simply have no mechanism to re-align my mental map to my present location !

Situation 4 - Another thing is that if I have come to your place in day time, I cannot find my way (even if I follow the exact same route) at night time. As it is it will take me at least two to three trips to a place to memorize the route. ONE route. (Refer to Situation 3 above) So, twice or thrice in light, twice or thrice at night, and then finally ONE route to a certain place will get fixed in my mind.

But there is a paradox…and it is HUGE !

Here’s the strangest thing – If I give anybody directions to any place, they can’t get lost even if they try. Really. Anybody who knows me will vouch for this. In fact I regularly receive compliments for this.

So my surmise is that nobody gives precise and detailed directions as I do. If anybody could match my direction-giving skills, I wouldn’t be geographically challenged ;)