Relativity
Man, I have had this same problem for the longest time. Irksome for an east coaster. Also, the tool tip (if you mouse over the comic on the home page) reads: “Also, is it just me, or do Japan and New Zealand look suspiciously similar? Has anyone seen them at a party together?” I think my NZ JET friends would have to answer, “heck yeah.” 
on November 13th, 2008 at 12:26 am
I think my mind is just naturally geographically Euro-centric, and it’s always been easy for me to imagine Asia as the “East” and Europe/The New World as the “West”.
Meh, I just refer to myself as on the Left-side of the Pacific, anyway. But if you’re in Australia where the world is upside down and I think toilets flush neither to the right or left but actually up despite gravity, I’d actually be on the right side. (Australians will try to prove me wrong, but they’re confused from being upside down all the time! Don’t listen to them!)
Alexs last blog post was: Remake of Karate Kid…Is nothing sacred anymore?
on November 13th, 2008 at 3:17 pm
I’d never looked at it that way before but, yes, Australia’s personal Canada (aka NZ) does indeed look spookily like Japan!
The East West thing doesn’t phase those of us who grew up in Oz - we are capable of not seeing ourselves as the centre of the Universe teehee
Danielles last blog post was: Moving to Japan Tips: The Language Question
on November 13th, 2008 at 7:41 pm
The terminology makes historical sense if you know the background. After Constantine split the Roman empire, the east was everything from Byzantium (which is now Istanbul) eastward, and the west was everything from Thrace westward. Of course the eastern empire was eventually conquered by Turkish and Islamic forces; whereas, in the west the government just sort of fell apart and lost control and you ended up with a feudal system of many regional authorities each controlling smaller amounts of territory.
What’s labelled “the east” on xkcd’s map is technically the *far* east, which wasn’t discovered by the Europeans until later. Everything east of the Mediterranean is “the east”. Also, the Americas, especially North America, are very much part of the western world.
Alternately, just draw your world map with the international dateline on either end, like all the world maps we were ever shown in gradeschool, and the split between east and west pretty much goes down the middle (approximately).
I never thought about the resemblance between Japan and New Zealand before, but they *are* both composed mostly of a small number of fairly large islands, in the Pacific, with a comparable amount of total land area…
on November 13th, 2008 at 7:45 pm
Forgot to mention: Australia and New Zealand goof everything up by being a part of the western world culturally (even though they’re on the other side of the globe geographically), but that’s because their population is made up almost totally of transplanted Europeans.
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on November 17th, 2008 at 4:55 pm
Alex - my problem isn’t so much that I don’t know where I am - my mental map tends to center on where I am at the moment, BUT things always “feel” like they should be in a given direction (relative to my upbringing in SC). So the Atlantic always feels east of me…even when it’s not. Basically, I’m weird. But it might be a common thing.
Danielle - you do you see yourselves as down under, though. Right? So…down under what?
Jonadab - errr….thanks for the impromptu history lesson! Ha ha. I think you’re analyzing this web comic a bit too much (kinda sucks all the fun out of it, don’t you think?), but I do appreciate the point about culturally “western” places. I would suggest that there are more outliers in that sense, though - Hawai’i and Hong Kong, or India and Vietnam, for instance.
on November 17th, 2008 at 7:58 pm
Hell yeah, another reader of xkcd <3
Phils last blog post was: WOTD: Kinrō kansha no hi