Why do we use the wrong place names ?

I started travelling the world in the 70s and I soon realised that my Geography teacher had misled me.

Arriving in Egypt I enquired about a bus to Cairo. Nothing. "Cairo ! The capital of Egypt"

It dawned on me. To Egyptians Cairo isn't the capital of Egypt.

Just as to me Londres isn't the capital of England where I was born, and nobody in Germany lives in Cologne.

Would it not be better to educate ourselves and our children to use the place names as used by the people who live and work in them ?  

I would like to see Google Earth using alternative local names including countries as an educational aid. Thoughts ?   

I beg to disagree. Just as linguists describe usage rather than prescribe it, we should follow tradition here rather than impose foreign names on the population (or the posters), if this were feasible at all.
By the way, would you really extend your idea to names of countries? Deutschland, España, Nippon?
I think we did a disservice to India (following decisions taken in the country itself) when we renamed Bombay Mumbai, Calcutta Kolkata, Bangalore Bengaluru, Madras Chennai, Benares Varanasi, Poona Pune. Many people were familiar with the old names, the new names in many cases do not ring a bell. And I always stuck to Peking.

Bridgeplayer your reply confuses me. You beg to disagree and then say "we should follow tradition here rather than impose foreign names on the population" which is actually agreeing with me.

Why impose a foreign name eg. Cologne , on a population who traditionally call the place they live Köln. What use is a map if the place names are different to the actual place names written on signposts in the places you wish to travel ?

"By the way, would you really extend your idea to names of countries? Deutschland, España, Nippon?"

Yes that is exactly what I propose. English children are taught the place is called Germany, Spanish children Alemania, French Allemagne etc. Why not teach all children the name of the country is actually Deutschland.  

"I think we did a disservice to India (following decisions taken in the country itself) when we renamed Bombay Mumbai, Calcutta Kolkata, Bangalore Bengaluru, Madras Chennai, Benares Varanasi, Poona Pune. Many people were familiar with the old names."

Many people were familiar with Rhodesia, Burma etc. How many maps show New York as Nieuw Amsterdam ?

Names change as you say following decisions taken in the country itself.

According to wikipedia "While the city is still referred to as Bombay by some of its residents and by Indians from other regions, mention of the city by a name other than Mumbai has been controversial, resulting in emotional outbursts sometimes of a violently political nature"

The English, French ,German, Spanish name for Mumbai is....Mumbai. It's not that difficult.

I think a lot of folks would get confused if you informed them that you traveled to the country of "Misr" ... it's by-and-large accepted as "Egypt" in the English speaking parts of the world and as "Ägypten" in the Deutsch speaking parts .