[tforcram]

I remember living in Japan around 2001 and having to handle random addresses.

We had several atlas books of regions and neighborhoods. Looking up an address was an exercise in getting the right book for the neighborhood, then using an index which noted which block of the map that house number was in (eg 'c10' using a grid with numbers across the top and letters down the side).

Plotting a course from where you were to this location was also exciting and required patching together multiple maps.

Actually following that course in real life was another challenge altogether and really required visualizing what you saw on the map since, as noted, there aren't many street names.

I'm honestly surprised we were able to succeed at getting to places as often as we did.

I kind of miss that experience, just plugging an address into a phone and following directions is much less exciting.

[timr]

The first time I went to Japan was also pre-smartphone, and navigating anywhere involved a combination of going to a convenience store with a written address and getting the clerk (hopefully a young girl -- they have better language skills!) to pull out the big white books for the area, look up the address in the index, etc. If you were in the unfortunate situation of needing to navigate in a puzzling neighborhood, you'd have to make a copy of the map or draw a little diagram, and then if you got lost, you'd use the random "neighborhood maps" posted on signs on major streets (these still mostly exist).

Guidebooks would often have little tiny maps drawn in the margins that tried to get you from the nearest train station, but even that could be a nightmare, because the typical downtown Tokyo train station has a dozen or so exits, and just getting to the right exit to use the map was a navigation puzzle in its own right. I got lost for the better part of an hour on my first visit to Tokyo station!

Doing this without any language proficiency meant that getting anywhere could take hours. Fun times. It's sort of mind-blowing how much easier it is for tourists now.

[082349872349872]

The piecing together of multiple maps doesn't sound much different from the days when we relied upon "The Thomas Guide to Los Angeles & Orange Counties": https://qph.cf2.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-8541cb8ec83526640938d...

> just plugging an address into a phone and following directions is much less exciting.

Something I realised a year or two back: my mental model of breaking down a larger goal into smaller subgoals is navigation. If you want to get from somewhere in Los Angeles to somewhere in San Francisco, and that step needs to be broken down, it can be analysed into (a) get from LA to Harris Ranch, then (b) get from Harris Ranch to SF.

Obviously people growing up now don't think of things that way any more, because you don't have to be able to think of the equivalent of Harris Ranch on demand; what do you all use instead as a mental model?

[gedy]

First job was a delivery driver pre-Internet and Thomas guide was a lifesaver. It's hard to explain to younger people my pride in that I was "good" at finding multiple addresses and plotting best course between locations, then knowing where phone booths were to call in on the road, etc. Definitely makes me appreciate GPS and mobile mapping apps.