May 12, 2008
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How is it possible for there to be a city of 10 million people that I've not heard of?
The ghastly earthquake that struck China today was centered 50-odd miles away from Chengdu, a city of 10 million.
That's roughly the size of New York City or Moscow or Tokyo, for crying out loud! There's a city the size of Moscow of which I knew nothing? How is that possible?
Being unaware of a city the size of Fort Worth is one thing. I hardly expect to be familiar with all the 500K-700K population-size cities in the world, as there are quite a few of 'em.
But I had thought any city of 10 million is large enough that it'd have come to my attention at some point.
[nervously] How many more megacities do you suppose have flown under the radar like that?
Comments (3)
Those mega-cities are all over Asia and South America, and there are a few in Africa as well. It is a bit mind-boggling, but you're find several more like that in the world. Lagos, Nigeria, for example has 8 million -- more than any American city.
Coincidentally, before we knew about the quake, we were chatting in church yesterday with a guy who travels to China on business semi-regularly. He referred to another little (to Americans) known city (I've heard of it, but I can't recall the name) and mentioned that it was about 10 million as well.
And then there's Japan. Tokyo is the only city officially over 4 million (it's listed as ~8M on Wikipedia) but the east coast of the island of Hokkaido is pretty much one big city running together.
Wow. Do they teach about the largest cities in the world anymore in school? I remember when New York City was bumped off the top. Vaguely. I think.
Maybe I remember discussions of it?
It was Tokyo when I was in school.
But we had to know that stuff - and we were still in grade school.
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