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My favourite timezone oddity - the border between Afghanistan and China has a 3.5 hour time difference! (yes, Afghanistan and China share a border)

andirk 4y ago
My fave time zone oddity is that Guam claims "Where America starts its day" but turns out the tip of Alaska does. And the International Dateline in general is strange
- Thlom 4y ago
  Guess what happens with crews daily Internet allowance when ships cross the international dateline the wrong way. :-)
LAC-Tech 4y ago
China has a single timezone, despite the fact it is a little wider than the "Lower 48" States of America. It's heavily biased towards the eastern coast.
- gerikson 4y ago
  From my reading, "One Time" for the whole country has deep ideological roots in the CCP ideology.
thakoppno 4y ago
Mine is certainly: > Nepal Standard Time (NPT) is the time zone for Nepal. With a time offset from Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) of UTC+05:45 all over Nepal, it is one of only three time zones with a 45-minute offset from UTC.
- SanjayMehta 4y ago
  Nepal used to follow IST (Indian Standard Time) but chose to switch by 15 minutes in the 50s. I read somewhere that it was to make sure everyone knew that it was an independent country.
  - soneil 4y ago
    Ireland technically doesn't mirror the UK's timezone. Irish Standard Time is UTC+1, and we go back an hour for winter. Unlike the UK, which is at UTC+0, and goes forward an hour for the summer. They're functionally identical, technically opposites, and I can't help feeling the reason is very, very similar.
    - closewith 4y ago
      Yes, if it wasn't for the over-riding desire to avoid a time difference between Northern Ireland and Ireland, we may have ended up with a performative GMT+0:45 timezone.
    - gerikson 4y ago
      TIL! Wow, that's definitely something else.
    - BerislavLopac 4y ago
      > They're functionally identical Until one of the countries (or the EU) decides to get rid of the DST...
Rebelgecko 4y ago
Dunno how widespread this is, but I've heard that unofficially some regions of western China use different time zones
- nirimda 4y ago
  It is apparently widespread in Xinjiang outside of the biggest cities, to the point where bus timetables are written in unofficial timezones. In some cities you have know whether the business uses local time or standard time to understand the opening/closing hours (although I guess it's usually pretty obvious). To a large extent it is political so I guess probably it's being eradicated as part of the current genocide.
BerislavLopac 4y ago
> yes, Afghanistan and China share a border They do, but it's a) extremely short, and b) highly unlikely to be crossed on land, as it's along the ridges of very high mountains.

andirk 4y ago

My fave time zone oddity is that Guam claims "Where America starts its day" but turns out the tip of Alaska does. And the International Dateline in general is strange

Thlom 4y ago
Guess what happens with crews daily Internet allowance when ships cross the international dateline the wrong way. :-)

LAC-Tech 4y ago

China has a single timezone, despite the fact it is a little wider than the "Lower 48" States of America. It's heavily biased towards the eastern coast.

gerikson 4y ago
From my reading, "One Time" for the whole country has deep ideological roots in the CCP ideology.

thakoppno 4y ago

Mine is certainly: > Nepal Standard Time (NPT) is the time zone for Nepal. With a time offset from Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) of UTC+05:45 all over Nepal, it is one of only three time zones with a 45-minute offset from UTC.

SanjayMehta 4y ago
Nepal used to follow IST (Indian Standard Time) but chose to switch by 15 minutes in the 50s. I read somewhere that it was to make sure everyone knew that it was an independent country.
- soneil 4y ago
  Ireland technically doesn't mirror the UK's timezone. Irish Standard Time is UTC+1, and we go back an hour for winter. Unlike the UK, which is at UTC+0, and goes forward an hour for the summer. They're functionally identical, technically opposites, and I can't help feeling the reason is very, very similar.
  - closewith 4y ago
    Yes, if it wasn't for the over-riding desire to avoid a time difference between Northern Ireland and Ireland, we may have ended up with a performative GMT+0:45 timezone.
  - gerikson 4y ago
    TIL! Wow, that's definitely something else.
  - BerislavLopac 4y ago
    > They're functionally identical Until one of the countries (or the EU) decides to get rid of the DST...

Rebelgecko 4y ago

Dunno how widespread this is, but I've heard that unofficially some regions of western China use different time zones

nirimda 4y ago
It is apparently widespread in Xinjiang outside of the biggest cities, to the point where bus timetables are written in unofficial timezones. In some cities you have know whether the business uses local time or standard time to understand the opening/closing hours (although I guess it's usually pretty obvious). To a large extent it is political so I guess probably it's being eradicated as part of the current genocide.

BerislavLopac 4y ago

> yes, Afghanistan and China share a border They do, but it's a) extremely short, and b) highly unlikely to be crossed on land, as it's along the ridges of very high mountains.