A Lesson in Metric for my Family and American Friends

Over the years, living in America, I’ve often wondered why we are the only country using measurements like pounds, inches, feet, and miles, while the rest of the world uses metric. But then again, we also use millimeters and centimeters, which just confuses the issue. Now that I’m in “the rest of the world”, I’m finding it even more annoying, as I must convert everything my friends and news outlets say into measurements that mean something to me.

In my office, there are 4 foreign teachers: 1 Canadian, 2 Brits, and me. If we talk about the temperature, they all talk in Celsius/Centigrade. I have to convert to Fahrenheit. And I’m really bad at it. And of course no one who uses Celsius knows the conversion. Why would they? There’s no reason to learn how to convert your measurement so you can talk to one country worth of people, when the other 219 know what you’re talking about.

Miles and kilometers are also a bit annoying for me, but I can figure out more-or-less what it is. Kilometers are something like 30% more of the miles measurement.

Centimeters and millimeters I find obnoxious, because clothing here is in cm, and shoe sizes are mm. If there was a size 10.5 in women’s shoes in the U.S., that would be what I’d wear. Here, that size is a 270, which they don’t make in women’s shoes. Women’s shoes stop at 250, unless you choose from one of ten pairs of 260s at the “Large Feet Store” in Daegu. I must buy men’s shoes, and even then 270 is hard to find. There is one store in Seoul that I found, called “Barbie Shoes” that carries large sizes exclusively, but they are frequently out of 270s, and all the shoes are super girly heels. But I digress.

Inches versus cm I can figure out with some work. There are 2.54 cm in an inch. Not terribly helpful if you’re in a conversation; “Um, yeah, wait a minute…2.54 times 20 is…um…”

I don’t know the difference between a meter and a yard. I think a meter is slightly larger, although my whole childhood I thought the opposite.

Pounds. A kilogram is 2.2 pounds, so I can figure out the conversion with some work. (Remember, I teach English, not math. ) But I always forget the number I see on the electronic scale at the doctor’s office because it doesn’t mean anything to me, and is easily dismissed. If I see a number that is obviously too low, it takes me a minute to realize it’s in kg. (It’s true that drug dealers are the only ones who kept up with their metric learning in school…)

What’s more confusing is talking to Katie, my English coworker and neighbor. The U.S. is messed because we use some measurements that no one else uses. Great Britain uses some metric and some U.S. She does pounds and miles, but buys liters of gas, and measures for clothes in cm. But no matter what you’re discussing, she’ll always assume when you say pounds you mean money, like GBP, before she’ll think you’re talking weights.

I’m looking forward to a time when simple things are also easy things. I hope that someday that time comes.