Most things are translated. Many speak English - at least at the touristy spots. Most of the signs are in Hebrew, English, Arabic, and might even include a picture.
However, you don't get any help on the metric system. Speeds signs were in kilometers per hour. Temperatures were done in Celsius. At the Dead Sea there was a thermometer. On television we could see weather forecasts. All were in degrees Celsius.
It was pretty warm there. It is a little closer to the Equator than I am used to. Also, were were in places below sea level. Those along with the fact that they said they were experiencing a warmer than usual November made for pretty warm days. The temperatures were usually in the 20's. My wife would see these and ask me how hot it really was.
Converting can be done with the formula F = (9/5)C+32. However, most people aren't going to be in the mood for this formula with or without a piece of paper, and usually we were without paper.
I came up with a passable method. My method was round off to the nearest multiple of five. Then divide by five, multiply by nine, then add 32. As I thought about it, I kept refining my method. My goal was to come up with something easy to use and would give a pretty good approximation for the degrees Fahrenheit.
- The above method - round off to the nearest multiple of five, divide by five, multiply by nine, then add 32.
- Multiply by two (close to 9/5) and add thirty-two.
- Multiply by two and add thirty.
I thought the last was pretty good. Adding thirty is easier than thirty-two. And it might compensate for using the larger value of two rather than nine-fifths.
So how does that work? Lets try it out for 20, 25, and 30 degrees Celsius.
- 20 degrees C: Real temperature is 68 degrees F and with my method 72 degrees F.
- 25 degrees C: Real temperature is 77 degrees F and with my method 82 degrees F.
- 30 degrees C: Real temperature is 86 degrees F and with my method 92 degrees F.
I felt somewhat good about myself and my new method. Some further expansion on this application:
Graph y = (9/5)x+32 and y = 2x+30.
How close do these match up?
Are there temperature ranges this approximation works for and doesn't work for?
Are the better conversion formulas that approximate the temperature?
What would be a good approximation formula for an Israeli visiting the U.S.?
