Peter Tandy wrote: > Americans should be warned. If you 'go > metric' as Britain has been forced to do it will seem a very strange world > for those not brought up to it from an early age. What the hell is a litre > of petrol?? Mercifully though, I can still get a pint of beer, and with > that I know my limitation. Long may it continue.
This metric versus imperial or american measurements will never end. It certainly has more to do with how you were "brought up" than with any easiness of use or practicality. I was brought up with the metric system. At least at school that's what I learned. Customary measures were not even tought. Now, my grandparents would always use the customary system. My father would use a mix. My mother was "metric-minded". One of my grandfathers was a blue collar work in a railroad built by the British. That means that when he was talking about his tools, nuts and bolts he would use the British system. Maybe I was in a very unique position to learn several systems at once. Now, either I was too lazy or the British and Brazilian customary systems were too much confusing. The fact is that as kid (without knowing anything about politics or imperialism) I rejected both the British and the Brazilian system. It did not seem I would ever learn how to express something in yards, feet, inchs and fractions of inches. To me putting a comma somewhere (we use the decimal comma, not the decimal point) seemed much easier than finding the proper unit that would come next. There was one more problem: many measures we quite unique in the sense that what they represented could change from state to state, town to town or even person to person. One "league", for instance, could mean either 6 km or 6.6 km. Now I know (I did not know then) that a league may also represent 3 statute mile (4.8 km). Now, 1 alqueire (land measure) had its fractions expressed in liters! Oh boy, only I know how my little head was confused: learning at school that liters were used to measure volume, now they were using it to measure surface! Eventually I was to learn that 1 alqueire = 48 liters. And reason was quite simple and straightforward: 1 alqueire was the land that would consume 48 liters of bean seed. Of course, beans have different sizes; some people like sowing close together, other like sowing far apart. So it is easy to see why the "alqueire" was quite elastic. There were other ways to measure the "alqueire". Eventually it was boiled down to *only* for: "alqueire de sesmaria", "alqueire paulista", "alqueiro goiano" and "alqueiro mineiro". Any doubt why I attached myself firmly to the metric system? Even if you love the American Customary System, do your kids a favour: teach them the metric system. So, in the future I'll be able to drink 0.5 l or 500 ml of bear instead of a pint. I can't believe drinking a pint can be as refreshing and awarding as half a liter :-) - fernando -- Fernando Cabral Padrao iX Sistemas Abertos mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.pix.com.br Fone Direto: +55 61 329-0206 mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] PABX: +55 61 329-0202 Fax: +55 61 326-3082 15º 45' 04.9" S 47º 49' 58.6" W 19º 37' 57.0" S 45º 17' 13.6" W
