The Way They Lived (and we live..)

Last year during my father-in-law's visit, we were chatting after dinner about how they used to live when he grew up in China. The story he told was very fascinating! It was around year 1920, Nanjing, China:

"We have no electricity. At night, we lit kerosene lamps. There's no toilet or sewage, instead we use wooden basins in an out-house shared by adjacent families in the same quarter. Every day before dawn, peasants from the countryside will arrive with mull cart and collect those wastes. In exchange, they give us firewoods that we use to cook. Those wastes were turned into composts that fertilize their fields."

"There was no running water and we used two different sources of waters - from the well and from the river. Well water is only good for washing and bathing. For cooking and drinking, we boil water from the river."

Since China already have cities of similar population like Nanjing in 800 AD, the mechanisms needed to support urban life must have already existed by then. How different was a life in 800 AD, compared with 1920? I suspect not very much. I forgot to ask him how they started a fire, perhaps using matches? And perhaps using matches to start a fire was the one of the few things that had changed since. Other changes would be kerosene and the new world crops that were introduced to China around 1700 AD - vegetables with funny names in Chinese (sometimes in English too), like potatoes, tomatoes, peanuts and corns.

No change is not necessarily a bad thing. A way of life that does not change for a thousand years can probably last another thousand years, although not necessarily on an upward path. According to a Cambridge economic historian, China today's GDP finally matches up its previous record, set at 800 AD. Go figure what had happened between 800 and 2007.

How does our our modern live compare? The energy sources it depends on will be gone in 30 or 150 years, based on the most pessimistic or optimistic estimates, not to mention global warming, rising population, depleted resources and food supplies. If we get rid of the things we can live without - air conditioners, big screen TVs, dryers and only keep one car, how many years can we add to the 30, or 150 years estimate? Another 100? Are we willing to sacrifice a little, so our children and their children can have a comparable living standard like ours?