May 2nd 2016. Malmö (Sweden).
I check the time in my laptop. 6:25pm. I decide it’s time to leave the office. If I don’t leave soon by the time I get home the supermarket will be closed.
“Hello? Is there anyone left in the office? Hello?”. I go around the office and no one answers me. It seems that I’m the last person to leave the office. Again. I find Swedish people are very concerned about balancing work and personal life. There is a lesson here for me.
I search for the security code they gave me. I type it in and press the button “TILL” as they told me. “Beep, Beep”. The alarm system is on. This is another thing that surprises me from Swedish culture. Working for a Spanish company I’m a guest in this office. We work in a project together with this swedish company and they trust me even to the point of leting me work in their office when there is no one else around. From a less civilized culture could be seen as naive but to me this shows culture advancement. I guess trust and responsibility is expected from people here.
I decide to take the stairs down because I spend too many hours seating. I need some exercise. I have several apps in my phone to track steps and I try to make them show at least 30 minutes of walking per day.
I get to the ground floor and before opening the door to get out of the building once again I walk in front of a beautiful paint in the wall. This building is so beautiful. It’s one of the historical buildings in Malmo. Norra Vallgatan 64.
As part of the picture I can read “Parta tuere. Memento mori”. After some research I conclude it means something like “Protect your belongings. Remember that you are going to die“. I think it has to do with the original owner of the building, a life insurance company.
I like the second part of the quote “Memento mori”. It goes well with another quote I like, “Carpe Diem”.
Still I keep working too many hours every day, even knowing this is the number one regret of people when they get old.
Instead of crosing the bridge over the channel and getting the bus 141 in front of the train station I usually walk inside the city trying to collect a few extra steps on my phone app. I enjoy the short walk towards Gustav Adolf torg where I can take a couple of other buses to get home.
While waiting for the bus I usually walk inside a park right beside the bus stop. The amount of parks inside the city is one of the things I really like from Malmö. But this particular park is actually a cemetery. It’s a big old cemetery inside the city.
As a way to distract my mind I walk around the graves and read some of the inscriptions. Many of this people lived in the 19th century. This particular grave I’m looking at says “Born on May 25th 1755. Died on September 20th 1820“. I started fantasizing how would it be if this person wakes up today. Will he see any difference with the world we live today? What will shock him the most?
I decide I will be him for a few minutes. I pretend I just woke up and I start interacting with this new reality. I get out of the cemetery, which probably looks very similar to how it looked 200 years ago apart from much taller trees and the first thing that shocks me is the street. Paved streets with lots of cars moving around. Cars? What are those?
The first Ford T model car saw the light in 1908. 88 years after my death. In fact Henry Ford was born 43 years after I died. Lots of people moving fast. People inside big cars (buses).
The next thing that shocks me is how everything looks like. Materials, colors, fabrics, surfaces. Buildings look like they have grown over the years, like the trees by my grave. It’s shocking how people are dressed. The zipper was not invented until 1891 and plastic was invented in 1907.
Shops show lots of pictures. What is a picture? Photography won’t be invented until a few years after my death. And that will be only black and white photography. Let alone moving pictures. Can you conceive today’s world without pictures and movies? and I’m not talking about digital ones.
At this point my mind refuses to take any more. The last thing that totally collapses my mind is that little thing everyone carry in their hands. They keep looking at it and touching it with their fingers. That little box makes lots of noises and it looks like there are people trapped in it. Alexander Graham Bell didn’t invent telephone until 1876 and please don’t even try to explain me what a smarthphone is.
I got carried on by this imagination game and when I got home I started looking for things that were invented after 1820, which means this person didn’t have the luck or privilege of seing them and enjoying them during his life time. I find this is a nice little tribute to all the inventors in history.
To perform this task I’m using my computer and the Internet. These two were not invented before 1820 but they are too obvious so I won’t talk about them. In fact the basic typewriter with QUERTY keyboard was not invented until 1868 by Christopher Latham Sholes.
- Before 1820 humans beings have not conquered the air space yet. Not just the airplanes didn’t exist but even the zeppelin (dirigible). Yes, the hot air ballon was already invented.
- If the airplane was not invented let alone spaceships. To us sounds ancient when Neil Armstrong walked on the moon in 1969 and people from 1820 couldn’t even imagine sending someone to the moon.
- Modern refrigerators were not invented. By 1856 using the principle of vapour compression, James Harrison produces the world’s first practical ice making machine and refrigerator in Geelong, Australia.
- In 1820 humans didn’t have even a remote idea about the concept of genetics. Gregor Mendel published his book ‘Versuche über Pflanzenhybriden’ (“Experiments on Plant Hybridization”) in 1856.
- In 1877 Thomas Edison invented the first working phonograph. How can those people live without recorded music? They didn’t even have radio which was not invented until 1897. Television was obviously not invented yet and if we add that condoms were not invented and not even the light bulb (1879. Thomas Edison), I think you get the picture.
- Nowadays handwriting is less and less common but those days the ballpoint pen was not even invented (1888. John J. Loud). This same year Nicola Tesla patents the Alternating Current (AC).
Other curiosities:
- Tennis was invented in 1873 and basketball was invented around 1900.
- In 1886, Coca-Cola was invented by a pharmacist named John Pemberton
- The british passenger liner named Titanic departed Southampton harbour on 10 April 1912.
- World War I didn’t happen yet. It started on July 28th 1914. Obviously 2nd WW and Hitler were yet unknown and unborn.
- Some other people that were not born yet: Gandhi (born in 1869), Einstein (born in 1879), Walt Disney (born in 1901), Marilyn Monroe (born in 1926), Elvis Presley (born in 1935), John Lennon (born in 1940).
- Charles Darwin was 21 years old and his “Origin of Species” theory was already warming up in his mind but it wouldn’t be published until 1859. This means that this person never hear the idea that humans “come” from the monkey.
I feel I need to dedicate a separate chapter to health:
- In 1864 Louis Pasteur invents the pasteurization process.
- X rays were discovered by German physicist Wilhelm Röntgen in 1895.
- Penicillin was invented in 1928 by the Scottish scientist Alexander Fleming. Can you imagine what will it be living without antibiotics? Those people were helpless against bacteria infections like the one that caused the Black Death which killed millions of Europeans.
- Anesthesia as we know it today was not invented yet. Can you imagine having surgery those days or just getting to the dentist?
- Life expectancy was less than 40 years. This man was lucky to reach the age of 65. He probably was from a wealthy family.
One thing I couldn’t get reliable data on was money. I would love to know how much did cost going to the movies in 1820. Oh, sorry, I almost forgot that movies were not invented yet. How much was the standard monthly salary in 1820? maybe less than 10 Euros? And what do you think was the cost of a house those days? maybe a couple of thousands Euros?
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May 3rd 2016. I’m leaving the office and today I’m also the last one to leave. When I get out of the building I notice the number 1904 on the building’s facade. The guy in the cemetery comes to my mind. When he died in 1820 this building was not even an idea in someones mind.
I find myself walking around the graves again. I got back to the grave of the man who died in 1820. For some reason today I want to know his name. I get my phone out of my pocket and I Google for his name. Caspar Trendelenburg.
I can’t believe the results I get. This person was a well known and respected doctor. He was a Swedish obstetrician who even wrote several books about that subject.
For the next few weeks the idea of how lucky we are living in today’s world keep coming back to my mind.
Can you think of any other great thing invented after 1820 that changed the way we live today?