"Kids these days, you have your eyes glued to your cell phones, always online! See, when I was your age ..."
Ever heard similar remarks from an older person in your life? Your parents, uncles, aunts, grandparents... They all seem to agree that technology is what makes our generation, Gen Z, drastically different from theirs. And they're right. As of now, both generations are living with technology---the only difference is that us Gen Z's have lived with technology all along.
Which begs an interesting question---what was life like before all these tech we take for granted? Specifically, what was college like? Most of Gen Z right now are in the young adult stage of life---a majority of which being college students. Have you ever considered what it must have been like to create a paper without Google Scholar? Or to go to class without the class coordinator reminding everyone to read Chapter 8B on the WhatsApp group? What should one do when they want to fill out their course plan, without a set academic system website?
I asked my mother, who went to college in the 90s, about her college life; in a moderately structured, 20-minute interview session. Here's what she had to say.
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"What was communication with friends in college like, before the Internet became mainstream?"
It seems college students will always find a way to gossip and spend time with each other outside of class. According to my mother, she and her friends used to contact each other by landline---they know all their friends' numbers by heart. Landlines and letters were the two most popular options of communication.Â
Interestingly, there is a cultural difference in going out with friends---bailing is a lot more unacceptable, due to the inability to let your friend know in an instant that you're bailing. So, back then, once you scheduled to see your friends, you had to see them.
"And when we hang out, we're a lot more present," she said. "None of us are on our phones, or anything. But this lack of cell phones brings another problem... when we're waiting, at, say, the doctor's office, there's nothing for us to play with. We would just space out."
Then she told me quite a bit about flirting in the olden days. "We used to slip in notes to our crush's lockers," she said, "and when we lent them books, we would write love letters between the pages." It's adorable to think that humans of all eras will always manage to seek love.
"And what was academic life like?"
College students in Indonesia surely are familiar with the annual war we go through, the Course Plan War. The legendary war where we have to click on the courses we want to take, as quickly as we can. Battling time and terrible WiFi and thousands of fellow students trying to win the best courses... and when we win, it was exhilarating.
Well, back in the olden days, they had a Course Plan War too.
"We had to fill out a card," my mother reminisced, "and then we queued in front of the Academic Office---I remember it was on the second floor back at FISIP---lots of shoving and being shoved around. Peers plan their classes on that same day, like, 'what class are you taking?' I remember one time one of my friends couldn't be present, so she made her boyfriend queue up for her..."
I also asked my mother a bit about what class was like, not having a group chat for the entire class and all. This question stunned her a bit. "Well, hmm," she said, "wow, I never actually considered that before. But I think we survived just fine. We used to just, you know, copy next week's homework to our notebooks when our lecturer reminds us. We had a set lesson plan, too---so we come to class each week already knowing what today's going to be about."
"What, in your opinion, are the pros and cons of the Internet?"
My mother concluded that what she likes the most about the Internet is how easy it is to find information, from family news to learning entirely new skills.
"It's actually a really good thing, the Internet. Back then, when one of our extended families up at Barus fell ill, it took a very long time for us here in Jakarta to hear the news," she said, "now we can know in an instant. And," she added, "these days it's very easy to learn new things. YouTube, the Internet, you can find anything and everything there." It's like there's no longer the barrier of space and time, actually. She told me about how crazy it is that she's able to know what Elon Musk is thinking about, someone living miles away, just by checking Twitter.
However, speaking of Twitter, she especially disliked the lack of privacy the Internet and social media brings. "People share their lives too much these days," she said. "It's like there's no privacy left. We can know that someone is having their holidays at this date, in this hotel... I don't think it's safe."
"For the last question, what advice would you give to us Internet users?"
"Don't overshare..." she said. "It's not even just about 'don't take pictures of you with your ID, that's a scam', but also, for example, we're a young adult, we're pissed off at our friend, we're annoyed at our lecturers... do not share that to Twitter, or something. It's like we're talking behind someone's back, but we're announcing it to the entire world."
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As it turns out, college life during the Internet age and before were not so different. The Internet has its own pros and cons, and it is up to us to use the Internet and social media as wisely as possible to make the most out of it, and end up with a positive college experience with the Internet's assistance.
