(no subject)

[arethinn]

Occasionally I run across Muslims performing one of their multiple daily prayer sessions around campus. Once we had someone who had brought her own rug and was camped out in the corner of the Media Lab after we had closed - I let her finish, of course, but it was a tad awkward. It's my understanding that one is supposed to face in the direction of Mecca while praying, and historically there have been some quite exquisite compass-like devices for determining which direction this was relative to the city where one happened to be. But on campus I have only seen people facing roughly north to northeast, which isn't the way to Mecca from here even on a great circle route, at least if Mecca is still in Saudi Arabia where I last left it (rougly east-by-southeast). What gives? Am I missing something?

Comments

[ungarsfragile.livejournal.com]

It looks like the great circle route (http://gc.kls2.com/cgi-bin/gc?PATH=sfo-jed) takes you north by northeast..

[arethinn]

I guess that's what I get for trying to visualize a great circle on a Mercator projection and not with a globe in hand.

[arethinn]

Obviously one can also get there going east by southeast. I wonder if the worshipper is enjoined to pick the direction that is the shortest distance...

[razorjak.livejournal.com]

That has always been my understanding.