but who wants simple when it means losing the knowledge of the weight of a stone or the number of feet in an acre???????????????

rods and chains in that?

On Edit: Besides. Switching to measuring gas by the liter will drastically lower the price!

Blowed up is blowed up.

and only if they have a work visa! More if it's a skilled position....

Many things in the UK are Imperial, not metric. Distances are always given in miles, but gasoline is sold in liters. Beer is sold in Imperial pints and half pints, while wine is sold in measurements of milliliters. Weight is generally given in pounds and stones, though some things are sold buy the kilogram.

For example, the official unit used when buying a house or land is the tsubo, which is about 3.2 square meters. Also, the floorspace in a room is determined by the number of tamami mats it can hold, rather than by the number of square meters. And the old shakukan system is still used for agricultural measurements. For example, one koku of rice weighs 150kg.

I think traditions like these should be held on to, so long as they aren't causing harm. It's like preserving uncommon languages; keeping these things around gives us an understanding of the world that wouldn't exist otherwise.

That said, I'm now even more frightened by the prospect of ever moving to Japan.

I've lived in Japan for years and years. It's got its disadvantages, to be sure, but it's definitely one of the better countries in the world-- extremely high literacy rate, universal health insurance, the world's highest life expectancy rate, the world's highest infant survival rate, one of the world's lowest crime rates, very little gun-related crime, no hate radio, well-developed public transportation system, relatively low GINI index, fairly decent educational system...

but I get the impression that the culture is significantly different to what I'm used to. I always say that I'd go anywhere for the right work, but if it were somewhere in Asia, I'm not sure I'd be able to cope - Europe is easy.

In high school and early college, I had thought my future was in Europe, and I started preparing for that. I had never even considered Asia, because like you, I thought I would not be able to cope in any Asian culture. But I ended up heading in the other direction after an amazing experience that I had many years ago.

It helps if you have someone to guide you through the new culture.

I've been in the UK for nearly five years now, and I have leave soon (though there's a chance I could get a new visa later this year, I don't have a job lined up). I really don't want to go - this seems more like "home" to me now, whatever that is. I've lived in my town here for longer than anywhere since I was 18. I've got a gig in Switzerland for the first half of next year, and maybe I'll feel the same way about that place, but I don't know, having only visited before. Who knows....

how much longer I'll stay in Japan. I have been here a lonnnnnng time, and I have the right to stay here indefinitely, but at the same time, I do get homesick, especially when I go back to the States for a visit. But my hometown has changed drastically from the time I was growing up there, and I'm not sure I could live there as an adult. I'm sure I would get reverse culture shock if I did go back for good.

By the way, Switzerland and the UK were the two countries I was particularly interested in when I was in high school. One of my former classmates actually ended up in Switzerland, and he seems to like it there.

At least 20 years ago it was. Food was sold by the jin which is 1.1 pounds or half a kilo or liang which is .10 of a jin

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_units_of_measurement#Mass

if they are comfortable with them.

Americans are comfortable buying gas by the gallon, weighing things by the pound, measuring distance with miles, judging home size by square feet. Having lived long periods in both English and metric systems, I cannot think of one single instance where dealing with a metric measurement made my life any more convenient than dealing with an English measurement. Even today, in fact, I still subconsciously convert kilometers to miles to determine how fast and how far I am "really" going. LOL.

Of course, the metric system is superior for science and engineering because those fields involve a lot of calculations, but for the average American who doesn't need to make a lot of calculations, metric doesn't really have any special benefit in daily living unless it's for small units without an English equivalent, like grams and millimeters.

I agree that if you're comfortable with the system for everyday things, then what's the harm? I used to convert Chinese pounds into Imperial pounds (it wasn't that hard, only .10 of a pound difference).

There are things in the US that are metric but mostly non-metric.

but I am confident that with our Liberian and Burmese allies we'll eventually be able to win the rest over.

That's Andrew Johnson in 1867 ==> [font size="1"]http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=llsl&fileName=014/llsl014.db&recNum=0370 [/font]

We actually use metric measurements more than you think.

You can drink that whilst I have a litre of ale.

Let me finish my pint of ale and I will get back to you.

BTW, That was a real nice hit by Bill Mazeroski a few years ago. Anytime the Skankees lose is a good time!

And how many mg of aspirin did you have to use last summer upon seeing your bill for August?

I could eat a tonne.

though we still have a few holdovers e.g. psi.

But we still use that expression and others ("do the hard yards&quot . We also say "It's raining cats and dogs". Idiomatic expressions.

I sure wish it would happen in my lifetime.

solar panels off the White House?

To steal an old MAD magazine classic...

weight I still do the old fashioned way forty years later.

Fighting for every yard...

One foot in front of the other...

You can have my feet and inches and miles and gallons and pounds and ounces and Fahrenheit degrees when you pry them from my cold, dead fingers!

I've used the American system my whole life and it works just fine. I have no desire to try to acclimatize myself to a new system just because "it's simpler" or "the rest of the world uses it".

the metric system is the Antichrist.