Can anyone answer this question without looking it up?
What is the capital of Australia?
It's something like Canbera or something like that. Don't really know how to spell it I heard it during one of the AO broadcast last year or year before. Why?
Canberra, you're missing an "r".
Well at least I remembered! 
Thanks for the spelling correction. Now I'll always know how to spell it!
Because all of my life, up until now, I thought, I knew that the capital of Australia was Sydney. And on MTF, I learned it was Canberra. 
I swear to you al, that wasnever taught to me. In fact, it wasn't until I was 14 that I learned that Scotland and Ireland were two different places. Way to go American education system. 
Don't blame the education system, blame yourself. Geography is typically the subject least paid attention to, or liked. Just memorizing names, dates and places. I can speak from experience, I met one person from another country who asked me if Los Angeles was very close to New York City.
BTW, I didn't know the capital of Australia either, and I liked geography.
I got straight A's in World Geography. We never got to Oceania so that's why I never learned it. We ran out of time. In fact, we had to teach ourselves Eastern Europe and Russia and Asia.
Sorry, but I have to agree with blackgirl on this. American education (when it comes to geography ONLY) sucks really. I think you are comparing 2 things that are not certainly equal. Scotland and Ireland are 2 different countries, whereas Los Angeles and NY City are just cities. You can't compare a person who thinks that 2 countries are 1, and another person thinks 1 city is near another in 1 country. As I already have said, I have met (not 1, but alot) of americans that when asked "Do you know where Spain is?" they answer "South of Mexico ain't it?" in fact somebody actually said Spain was in Africa. And as I said, not 1 but alot. And I think that Geography as you said dmas is the subject least paid attention to, but I think knowing where countries around the world are, is important. And the education system is to blame for that.
I didn't like Geography, but I can tell you where most of the countries are, and I had to look it up in sooo many places because it wasn't taught to me.
So, without even reading about it, can you tell me if Madrid is close to Barcelona? what about Valencia? or can you tell me if Stuttgart is close to Frankfurt? how about Frankfurt from Berlin? and Munich? And between Rome and Venice? or Paris to Florence? Insbruck to Zurich? See what I mean? cities within countries are different from thinking 2 countries are 1.
