内容摘要：The US State Department website says that F-1 student visas can be issued up to 365 days before the start date of the programme, but students can only enter no more than 30 days before the start date.

The US State Department website says that F-1 student visas can be issued up to 365 days before the start date of the programme, but students can only enter no more than 30 days before the start date.

“Which map projection did you use?” she asked, referring to the method of representing maps on a flat plane.The sellers never responded, but Ogundairo suspected they used a problematic projection. Discouraged, she refused to place an order.

Ogundairo’s obsession with map projections is not random. The 28-year-old is leading an African-led campaign to get more of global institutions and schools to immediately stop using the Mercator Map projection – the most common version of the world map that is generally recognised – because it shrinks Africa, and much of the Global South, while disproportionately enlarging the rich and powerful regions of the world.Greenland, for example, is shown to be relatively the same size as Africa, but, in reality, can fit in the continent 14 times over. Europe, portrayed as bigger than South America, is actually half its size.Advocates like Ogundairo are pushing instead for “equal area” map projections, which they say more accurately represent the prominence of the African continent.

Since early May, Ogundairo, as lead campaigner at Africa No Filter, a nonprofit working to change negative perceptions of Africa, has hassled big institutions like the United Nations with a “Correct the World” campaign. People are encouraged to sign an online petition to pressure their governments into compliance. Most people, Ogundairo said, don’t know about the distortions and react with surprise and outrage.“We’ve had a lot of, ‘Oh my God, I didn’t even know this was happening,’” Ogundairo told Al Jazeera. “I have an uncle who decided to support this because I told him you can fit the US, China, and India into Africa, and he felt so betrayed. He was like ‘Oh my God, I had no idea.’”

Institutions have been harder to crack, Ogundairo said, but she expected some resistance to this sensitive, controversial topic.

For centuries, experts have debated the question: Can anyone accurately depict a three-dimensional, spherical world on a flat surface? Is it possible to take a rounded object, like a football, for example, cut it up, paste it on a board, and have a precise representation?The resulting images – usually two or three from each session, which can last up to an hour – can appear dreamlike and undefined.

“As we know, memory is very, very, very fragile and full of imperfections,” Garcia explains. “That was the other reason why we wanted a model that could be full of imperfections and also a bit fragile, so it’s a good demonstration of how our memory works.”Garcia’s team found that people who took part in the project said they felt a stronger connection to less detailed images, their suggestive nature allowing for their imagination to fill in the blanks. The higher the resolution, the more someone focuses on the details, losing that emotional connection to the image, Airi Dordas, the project’s lead, explains.

The team first trialled this technology with their grandparents. The experience was moving, Garcia says, and one that grew into medical trials to determine whether synthetic memories can be used as an augmentation tool in reminiscence therapy for dementia sufferers.From there, the team went on to work with Bolivian and Korean communities in Brazil to tell their stories of migration, before partnering with Barcelona’s city council to document local memories. The sessions were open to the public and held last summer at the Design Museum in Barcelona, generating more than 300 memories.