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Comment by __david__ | Hacker News Reader

As a native Californian I definitely use "up" and "down". Up to L.A., down to San Diego. I might make a trip up the coast to Oregon or Washington. I also might go back east (meaning the east coast). Never used "out" though, probably because I'm already about as west as you can go on this continent!

"Over", however is just used without regard to direction, though it generally signifies a close distance. I'd head over to the city next door, but I'd never head over to Las Vegas. I'd head "out" to Vegas though. So maybe "out" is for far distances?

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As a native of... nowhere in particular, I think "up" and "down" are pretty universal among Americans for "north" and "south." I wouldn't be surprised if they're near-universal to inhabitants of the northern hemisphere, since that's the way maps are drawn. A possible exception would be inhabitants of mountainous regions saying e.g. "up to Leadville" or "down to Denver."

Having lived in Houston, I didn't notice "over" and "out." I would personally use "over" for "within city" and "out" for "outside of city."

Even in Australia which, last I checked, is not in the US, uses up and down to refer to north and south. That seems fairly independent or state as well. For example ins Perth you go "up to Geraldton" and in Sydney you go "up to Brisbane", and "down to Melbourne".

The whole out and over thing seems more regional to me. In Australia "out" is generally just "far from here" and "over"... well that isn't a thing, at least in the dialects that I'm used to. :-)

Perth here, we tend to use 'up north' / 'down south', and 'over' for east. 'Out' just means 'away from home' and could be to the corner shops or the next city.

One thing that always amuses my Eastern States friends is our tendency to refer to the entire other half of the country as "over east". Sydney? Melbourne? I dunno, it was somewhere over east anyway.

Edit: I had 'over' for both east and west, but there's nothing but ocean to the west of here so we don't have much occasion to talk about things being to the west of us... apart from Rottnest Island, which is still 'over' because you get there by boat or plane.

In New Zealand 'up' often means north, and 'down' south, but it also, depending on where you are, refers to altitude. I'm currently at 550m elevation, and I'd go down to the coast even though the place I'd probably go to is very slightly north of here.

The area I'm in is often referred to as the 'High Country' so that probably explains the up and down idea. I'd still go 'up' to Auckland because it's north, even though it's at sea level.

I am in Australia and I use up and down for north and south and I agree they are nearly universal. I don't relate over and out to cardinal directions but I do use them in speech.

I use over to refer to towns on the other side of the river from here. You also go over to people's houses. I guess I use out but it has no direction associated with it. It is more related to remoteness from things. You go out to a farm and in to town. Over the river. Down to the city then back up to home.

It is not uncommon in Australia to say you are going over to a friend's house.

In Perth people often would say they are "going over" to Melbourne or Sydney. There is also the reverse "coming over"

"Out" is used generally such as in "heading out" where often no destination is specified. Also we sometimes use "outback" meaning anywhere not in a city or suburban area.

Out west (the outback) is used on the east coast, but unlikely linked to the the cardinality.

Denver metro resident, I can confirm that `up` means both North and West thanks to the mountains.

Albuquerque born and raised, I use up for north and east for the same reason.

Everyone else I've asked in ABQ uses up for "the direction I'm going".

German here. Up and down are not related to north and south for me. Maybe it's because streets are not neatly arranged like that?

Southern German here and up and down are related to elevation where I live. We drive up to Garmisch (700 m) but down to Munich (500 m) for example. Garmisch is south of Munich.

In dialect we also have different words depending on the the location of the speaker. "I drive up to Garmisch" vs "I drive up from Munich" would be different words for "up".

I noticed the same thing as a native Texan living in northern Bavaria. It's caused me to seriously mix up east and west in Austria and Switzerland - in my mental map, Salzburg is to the left of Innsbruck, which is to the left of Switzerland. However, my mental map of northern Bavaria, along with the rest of Germany, is aligned east=right, west=left, north=up.

Result? Pretty much anywhere is somewhere I'm going "up" to, be it Salzburg or Hannover.

> As a native of... nowhere in particular, I think "up" and "down" are pretty universal among Americans for "north" and "south."

You're probably right, but I think it's relatively new; IIRC traditionally 'up' & 'down' refer to elevation. And of course maps used to be drawn with east, rather than north, at the top (hence the phrase 'orient a map' — 'orient' just means 'east').

I always use 'up' & 'down' for elevation, but I'm weird:-)

(hence the phrase 'orient a map' — 'orient' just means 'east').

I used to think this too, but I did some research once and it appears the origin of "orient" the verb is unrelated to east-printed maps, and has more to do with building your church so that the altar faces east.

Up/down = north/south in my experience near DC as well, although they sometimes are follow the highway directions rather than geographic ones. People say they go "up" to NYC even though NYC is slightly more east of DC than north -- the point is that you take 95N to get there. This was even more extreme in Santa Barbara, CA, where the coastline turns east-west, and people talked about taking 101S "down" to Ventura or LA, even though those were 90% east.

In Santa Barbara I’ve herd (geeky) people refer to grid-north and grid-south to refer to directions along the axis that US101 and State St follow.

I'm surprised to hear a native Californian would say "back east." I thought only people from the East Coast (or I guessed who lived there at one point) would go "back."

West coast Canada we also "back east" -- it's the linguistic opposite of "out west".

The underlying source is the idea everyone is somehow "from" the east, and they (or their ancestors) at one point moved "out west", but if they were to return, it would be to go "back east."

Raised in LA and so was my mother, but she would say "back east". I always took it in a historical sense.

I'm in California now (and have been for over half my life, at this point), but I suspect I'd say "back east" when talking about my past, at the very least. For me, there's a sense of time involved, as well as direction.

As a native west coaster I would not say "I'm going back east" but I might say "she lives back east".

I would not say this as a native Californian.

As a California native, I say "back east" with the same connotation as a farmer saying "the back 40" -- somewhere annoying to get to and somewhat overgrown.

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