Order of Directions
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While the directions can be listed in any order, most formally in clockwise or counterclockwise order, starting from some point (such as NESW, or, following the sun from daybreak in the northern hemisphere, ESWN), different languages conventionally use different orders, often using pairs of opposite directions. In English, the conventional order of the directions is "north, south, east, and west" (NSEW = N/S + E/W). In Japanese, most common is EWSN (東西南北 = E/W + S/N), and east-west (東西) is idiomatic for “everywhere, in all parts”; Japan is located at the extreme east of Eurasia.
Read more about this topic: NSEW
Famous quotes containing the words order and/or directions:
“A self is, by its very essence, a being with a past. One must look lengthwise backwards in the stream of time in order to see the self, or its shadow, now moving with the stream, now eddying in the currents from bank to bank of its channel, and now strenuously straining onwards in the pursuit of its chosen good.”
—Josiah Royce (1855–1916)
““Have we any control over being born?,” my friend asked in despair. “No, the job is done for us while we’re sleeping, so to speak, and when we wake up everything is all set. We merely appear, like an ornate celebrity wheeled out in a wheelchair.” “I don’t remember,” my friend claimed. “No need to,” I said: “what need have us free-loaders for any special alertness? We’re done for.””
—Marvin Cohen, U.S. author and humorist. The Self-Devoted Friend, New Directions (1967)