la luna es mentirosa.

the moon's a liar.

this is what the spanish children are taught, so that they can deduce which phase the moon is in by looking at it.

the ancient spanish :-) thought that it would be cool to have some kind of mnemonic to do the deduction. they tried this one (forgive me for the capital letters):
when the moon looks like a D it is evolving towards new moon (it's Decreciente), while when it looks like a C it is evolving towards full moon (it's Creciente).
sounds cool, but it doesn't work.

the ancient spanish were on the verge of giving up, but then one particularly brilliant ancient spanish thought: "ehy, it's just the other way around!".

so when the moon looks like a D it's Creciente and when it looks like a C it's Dereciente -> the moon's a liar!

i especially like stories about the sky and the stars and the dreams children believe in, so when clara told me this story i instantly loved it.
then i started telling her how romantic it is when two people who are far away look at the same star and feel as if they were together and...
the engineering instinct kicked in :-).
i though: "hey, wait a second, the earth is round. what happens if i look at the moon from the other hemisphere? will it still be lying?".

suspance.

no, it won't.
if you look at the moon from argentina, for instance, the moon does not lie!

you can have a look at this blog for a confirmation of that. and for a really nice picture of the moon.

by the way, what happens to the moon if you look at it from the equator?