The 1920s

[boann]

the best time for women is now.
who wants to go back to
beating your laundry against a rock or living before antibiotics ...
when childbirth could kill you... or when a woman was just property or
cooking in a wood stove during the middle of summer.
ahhh no thanks..
rather be here right now with all the modern things
that make life more easy for a woman.
be able to own my own property ..
work at any job i can handle and decide for myself when and if i want to have children.

[Dis]

favourite decade? 530's.

[Slaughtermeyer]

Originally posted by boann
the best time for women is now.
who wants to go back to
beating your laundry against a rock or living before antibiotics ...
when childbirth could kill you... or when a woman was just property or
cooking in a wood stove during the middle of summer.
ahhh no thanks..
rather be here right now with all the modern things
that make life more easy for a woman.
be able to own my own property ..
work at any job i can handle and decide for myself when and if i want to have children.

Having been to the Philippines, I can say from personal experience that you don't need to go back, you just need to go there or to many other 3rd-world countries for all or most of those conditions to be present. Lots of people there can't even afford wood-burning stoves, they cook in open fires in their shacks. What I found most interesting is that people can live in those conditions and still be very happy.

Whenever I go there, I get the feeling that I'm going back in time to something like depression-era America. Even the popular music has a very 50's sound to it.

[DAVOUT]

Originally posted by Zkribbler
The 2010's

War on Terror brought to a successful conclusion.
Federal Budget is balanced.
Universal healthcare has been adopted in the U.S.
Social Security has been fixed.
Standard of Llving is increasing across the board.
Dropout rate, teen pregnancy rate, crime rate, abortion rate and unemployment rate are all falling.
Dems are back in control of the White House and Congress.
And People Magazine has just elected Zkribbler the Sexist Man of the Year.

... and
I love the President Bush day is celebrated once a week.

[Starchild]

I'd like to spend a short holiday, maybe a temporal exchange program type thing, in the 1920's. The music was good, the alcohol was gin, the people could dress and the dancing was fun.

[JohnT]

Hello my baby, hello my bonnie
Hello my ragtime gal
Send me a kiss by wire
Baby, my heart's on fire
If you refuse me, honey, you lose me
And you'll be left alone,
oh baby
Telephone, and tell me I'm your own

[Mr. Harley]

Mid-1970's. Modern medicine, the beginning of equal rights for woman and minorities in the US, no serious STD's that anybody knew about, tolerable economy and only at the beginning of the deterioration of the middle class (how many people today are middle class on one income?).

Of course you have disco, tacky clothes, and a buch of mediocre politicians. You do however have mini-skirts and bikinis. People talking about Christianity are still talking about the things we should do, instead of the things we need to ban. Not a bad period, if you can skip the beginning and end of the decade and land in the middle.

[lord of the mark]

for the US, the 1940's.
I'd love to be able to time travel to New York City in the 1940's. Say, 1946. New York really at its height as a city, a dominant place of global power, art, commerce. Bebop jazz. Subway system, railroads, at their height. Before crime and drugs really impacted urban living.


For the world, Id go with the 1890's. Fin de siecle Vienna, Paris and the post-impressionists. Id love to see Jewish life in Vienna, Berlin, Vilna, Warsaw, Cracow. Attend the first Zionist Congress in Switzerland. And the US in the 1890's would be something too - New York in the ragtime era. Early Broadway. Brooklyn as rustic suburb.


Or maybe the 1860's (but not in the US, or not till past 1865). Rationality and 19thc liberalism at their height. London at the peak of its dominance. 2nd empire Paris.
Chicago, a raw quasi-frontier town.

[molly bloom]

I'd like to be in Alexandria during Heron's time (roughly 10 a.d. - 75 a.d., or in Chang-An during the T'ang Dynasty in the 720s or 730s.

[Lancer]

boann, you can travel back to the decade of your chouice, why not go as a man? It opens up alot of decades that you feel cut off from because of your sex.

Diss, the 530s? Why? Why not the 615 out of Boston?

"What I found most interesting is that people can live in those conditions and still be very happy."

That's it SM, happy by nature.

"I'd like to spend a short holiday, maybe a temporal exchange program type thing, in the 1920's. The music was good, the alcohol was gin, the people could dress and the dancing was fun."

Starchild, that's it! ...and may I add an excellent choice.

JT the flapper.

shawn, the '70s were nothing special, believe me. However, I didn't own a mustang soo...

lord of the mark, 1890s, very popular decade. '46 in the US? Hard to find a job, yes?

molly, what do you imagine the world was like back then?

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Lancer
lord of the mark, 1890s, very popular decade. '46 in the US? Hard to find a job, yes?
?

Time travelers dont need jobs, you know that, dont you?
Actually I was thinking of 1947, to get past the recession. But in '46 youve still got the overhang of a lot of WW2 phenomena, like the limited auto usage, without actually being at war. But I can go with '47.

[Lancer]

"Time travelers dont need jobs, you know that, dont you?"

Doh!

'47 would be an interesting time to be in Germany, particularly if you don't need a job. Having a few pair of nylons wouldn't hurt too much either.

In NY, certainly an interesting time. The capitol of the world...

[Mr. Harley]

Lancer, having lived though the mid-70's, and it was a nice, low-key time when for the most part the average person was relatively well-off in most of the US. My choice was based on staying there. Just visiting brings up an entirely different set of choices. The 1920's and 1890's both sound nice, but visiting various royal courts at various times in history could also be fascinating. I think though that I just might give Caligula's Rome a pass.

[Lancer]

The '70s were low key, certainly

Royal courts...people with powdered hair, bowling greens, chamber music, that sort of thing? That would be ok if I had a bowling ball I guess.

[boann]

lancer i understand your point...
we tend to think romanticaly about times past.
remembering only the fun or exciting parts.
but truly who wants to go back before modern medicine.
having surgery without being put to sleep or dentistry
without pain medication or gas. when a small cut could get infected and kill you.
plagues and no indoor plumbing.. unsanitary living conditions , child labor,
sweat shops, slave labor, abuse of women
wearing all that clothing layers and layers in the hot sun.

but ok.. putting all that aside...

well after long thought.. theres no time i'd
want to go back to and live. maybe id like to visit for a few hours maybe days..
a few people id like to ask questions ... .

but there is honestly nothing like the present. nothing as exciting as creating the now ,
living in expectation of what might be or what might come... the excitment of the unknown tomorrow.