I am culturally ignorant. Please believe me when I say I’m not proud of that fact. I’ve lived in the Mid-west United States the whole of my life and not the big cities like Chicago or Milwaukee, or Minneapolis, nope I lived in a town in Iowa boasting a capita of 6,000 in a good year. In Wisconsin not much better - 21,000 the majority of that number were snobby closet racist white people. I worked at a book store when I was younger we did window displays that changed with the seasons and February as you know is Black History Month. I wanted to do a window display but we ended up with like 6 books in the window and a lot of filler because as my boss put it “Those kind of books just don’t move here.” The display stayed in the window a week then had to make way for MORE valentine’s day crap. (btw I didn’t capitalize that on purpose, I don’t think it deserves the distinction of a proper noun - this grammar the Rose way) As I’m sure you understand not really a bubbling melting pot for cultural diversity but I think it’s getting better getting better. Mostly because the snobby white people are outnumbered in the economic sway. However the environment which you are raised is no excuse for continued ignorance later in life. As humans we use so little of our brain, there is always room for improvement.

You may be asking yourself “So what brings on this tirade?” Last night around 10:40p I was driving to work and stopped at a gas station to grab a bottle of water. I look to my right and see the glowing sign of a business in the distance. The name of the business was “Polynesian Clips” it was a hair studio, but that's not the point. It got me thinking where in the heck is Polynesia? I was bothered by my ignorance, shouldn’t I know this? What happened to basic geography? But try as I may I couldn’t remember EVER discussing Polynesia in ANY of my geography classes.

The irritation with my own stupidity was compounded this morning when I googled Polynesia. So I read Polynesia is basically the islands of the South Pacific forming a triangle. The three island groups making the points of the triangle are: Hawaii (score! I know where that is), New Zealand (crap), and Easter Island (I thought that’s where the immigrants used to enter the US? Ha! Turns out that’s Ellis Island. DOUBLE CRAP). There is a whole lot more to it, other islands including Tahiti and Samoa which make up what is Polynesia, Oh and btw French Polynesia is NOT Polynesia only one of the island groups which comprise it and a territory of France.Wikipedia was the best source of info I could find on it. So I thought I would share my little geography lesson so you won’t be as ignorant as I am. It may not be a big deal in the grand scheme of things but I'm always upset with myself when i don't know anything about a person's background. Heck I have issues naming Canadian Provinces. Don't let this happen to you.