Original photo by Victor Maschek/ Shutterstock
The international date line, established in 1884, lies smack dab in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, far removed from the coasts of any major continent. But even though the date line may appear to be in the middle of nowhere, this imaginary boundary has caused temporal oddities for some Pacific nations over the years.
Take, for example, the country of Samoa, which the international date line runs right through. Countries bisected by the date line can choose which side to be on, and in 1892, in a move meant to strengthen ties to the U.S., the island nation decided to move to the time zone on the eastern side of the line. Because this change was officially implemented on July 4, the Pacific archipelago technically experienced the same day twice.
Oops, incorrect!
It's a factThe U.S. is the third-largest country in the world by total area, and all that land is located in the Northern Hemisphere — except for the 76-square-mile island territory of American Samoa, situated 14 degrees south of the equator.
But that wasn’t the end of Samoa’s strange journey through time. Fast-forward to 2011, when the country decided to strengthen ties with two other important trade partners, Australia and New Zealand, by moving back to the western side of the date line. That year, Samoa never experienced December 30, 2011; when the clock struck midnight on December 29, Samoan calendars flipped over to December 31.
Today, Samoa is still on the western side of the international date line, but when its close neighbor American Samoa — a U.S. territory only about 135 miles away — was asked to do the same, it declined, choosing to stick with the U.S. on the eastern side. That makes American Samoa the very last inhabited U.S. territory to enter each new year.
Numbers Don't Lie
More Interesting Reads
The only city in Samoa is ______, which serves as the country’s capital.
Ready to reveal?
Confirm your email to play the next question?
The only city in Samoa is Apia, which serves as the country’s capital.
There are four genders in traditional Samoan culture.
For centuries, many Indigenous cultures have viewed gender beyond the binary of male or female, and in Samoa, there are four recognized genders. These include male and female as well as two other genders, fa’afafine and fa’afatama. The former translates to “in the manner of a woman,” referring to people assigned male at birth who embody both traditionally masculine and feminine traits, and the latter to “in the manner of a man,” referring to people assigned female at birth who similarly embody both sets of traditional gender traits.
Fa’afafine and fa’afatama fulfill important roles in Samoan culture by educating their fellow Samoans about sex (which is otherwise taboo for men and women to discuss directly), taking care of the elderly, and performing rituals such as the dance of the taupou. Today, organizations including the Samoa Fa’afafine Association continue to advocate for equal rights for all genders throughout the archipelago.
Darren Orf lives in Portland, has a cat, and writes about all things science and climate. You can find his previous work at Popular Mechanics, Inverse, Gizmodo, and Paste, among others.
top picks from the optimism network
Interesting Facts is part of Optimism, which publishes content that uplifts, informs, and inspires.
