我自己看到都觉得全身在起鸡皮疙瘩。

In 1983, the world was a different place.

There was no Google yet. Or Yahoo. Or T.sina.cn, for that matter.

In 1983, the year of your birth, the top selling movie was Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi. People buying the popcorn in the cinema lobby had glazing eyes when looking at the poster.
Remember, that was before there were DVDs. People were indeed watching movies in the cinema, and not downloading them online. Imagine the packed seats, the laughter, the excitement, the novelty. And mostly all of that without 3D computer effects.

Do you know who won the Oscars that year? The academy award for the best movie went to Terms of Endearment. The Oscar for best foreign movie that year went to Fanny & Alexander. The top actor was Robert Duvall for his role as Mac Sledge in Tender Mercies. The top actress was Shirley MacLaine for her role as Aurora Greenway in Terms of Endearment. The best director? James L. Brooks for Terms of Endearment.

In the year 1983, the time when you arrived on this planet, books were still popularly read on paper, not on digital devices. Trees were felled to get the word out. The number one US bestseller of the time was Return of the Jedi by James Kahn. Oh, that’s many years ago. Have you read that book? Have you heard of it? Look at the cover!
In 1983… The musical Annie is performed for the last time after 2,377 shows at the Alvin Theatre on Broadway, New York City. Twenty-five members of the Red Brigades are sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of Aldo Moro. Lotus 1-2-3 is released for IBM-PC compatible computers. Seatbelt use for drivers and front seat passengers becomes mandatory in the United Kingdom. Failure of automatic shut-down at Salem Nuclear Power Plant, New Jersey, USA. The final episode of M*A*S*H is aired and the record of most watched episode is broken A reactor is shut-down due to failure of fuel rods at Kursk Nuclear Power Plant, Russia. India wins the Prudential Cricket World Cup. The Nintendo Entertainment System goes on sale in Japan. Australian Dick Smith completes his solo circumnavigation in a helicopter. Six men walk underwater across the Sydney Harbor — 82.9 km in 48 hours. The Red Hot Chili Peppers launch their first, self-titled album. Soviet military officer Stanislav Petrov averts a worldwide nuclear war. Many Soviet officials misinterpret the NATO exercise Able Archer 83 as a nuclear first strike, causing the last nuclear scare of the Cold War. The Reverend Jesse Jackson announces his candidacy for the 1984 Democratic Party presidential nomination. Michael Jackson’s world famous music video for “Thriller” is broadcast for the first time. It becomes the most often repeated and famous music video of all time, increasing his own popularity and record sales of the album “Thriller”. The video game of the day was Dragon’s Lair.

That was the world you were born into. Since then, you and others have changed it.

The Nobel prize for Literature that year went to William Golding. The Nobel Peace prize went to Lech Walesa. The Nobel prize for physics went to Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar from the United States for his theoretical studies of the physical processes of importance to the structure and evolution of the stars. The sensation this created was big. But it didn’t stop the planets from spinning, on and on, year by year. Years in which you would grow bigger, older, smarter, and, if you were lucky, sometimes wiser. Years in which you also lost some things. Possessions got misplaced. Memories faded. Friends parted ways. The best friends, you tried to hold on. This is what counts in life, isn’t it?

The 1980s were indeed a special decade. The Soviet-Afghan war goes on. Eastern Europe sees the collapse of communism. Policies like Perestroika and Glasnost in the Soviet Union lead to a wave of reforms. Protests are crushed down on Tiananmen Square in China. Ethiopa witnesses widespread famine. Nicolae Ceausescu is overthrown. The AIDS pandemic begins. The role of women in the workplace increased greatly. MTV is launched in the US. There is opposition against Apartheid in South Africa as well as worldwide. Heavy Metal and Hard Rock bands are extremely popular. The rise of Techno music begins. Originally primarily played on campus radio stations, College Rock enters the scene with bands like the Pixies, REM and Sonic Youth. The Hip Hop scene continues to evolve. Teletext is introduced. Gay rights become more widely accepted in the world. Opposition to nuclear power plants grows. The A-Team and Seinfeld are popular on TV. US basketball player Michael Jordan bursts on the scene. Super Mario Bros, Zelda’s Link, and Pac-Man gain fame in video games. People wear leggings, shoulder pads and Ray-Ban sunglasses.

Do you know what was on the cover of Life that year?
Do you remember the movie that was all the rage when you were 15? There’s Something About Mary. Do you still remember the songs playing on the radio when you were 15? Maybe it was The First Night by Monica. Were you in love? Who were you in love with, do you remember?

In 1983, 15 years earlier, a long time ago, the year when you were born, the song Down Under by Men at Work topped the US charts. Do you know the lyrics? Do you know the tune? Sing along.

Traveling in a fried-out combie
On a hippie trail, head full of zombie
I met a strange lady, she made me nervous
She took me in and gave me breakfast
And she said,
“Do you come from a land down under?
Where women glow and men plunder?”
…

There’s a kid outside, shouting, playing. It doesn’t care about time. It doesn’t know about time. It shouts and it plays and thinks time is forever. You were once that kid.

When you were 9, the movie Batman Returns was playing. When you were 8, there was The Addams Family. When you were 7, there was a Disney movie out called Beauty and the Beast. Does this ring a bell?
6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1… it’s 1983. There’s TV noise coming from the second floor. Someone turned up the volume way too high. The sun is burning from above. These were different times. The show playing on TV is The A-Team. The sun goes down. Someone switches channels. There’s Hardcastle and McCormick on now. That’s the world you were born in.

Progress, year after year. Do you wonder where the world is heading towards? The technology available today would have blown your mind in 1983. Do you know what was invented in the year you were born? The Personal Digital Assistant. The First TCP/IP Network. Color LCD Television.

So it was Jeremy in 1983
In his Ocean Pacific tee
Who got a bloody knee
On his skateboard in the half pipe
In the backyard that Tuesday night
…

That’s from the song In Love with the 80′s by Relient K.

In 1983, a new character entered the world of comic books: Wild Child. Bang! Boom! But that’s just fiction, right? In the real world, in 1983, Kim Smith was born. And Kim Clijsters. Samantha Mumba, too. And you, of course. Everyone an individual. Everyone special. Everyone taking a different path through life.
It’s 2011.

The world is a different place.

What path have you taken?

LENNON: I’ve been baking bread and looking after the baby.

PLAYBOY: With what secret projects going on in the basement?

LENNON: That’s like what everyone else who has asked me that question over the last few years says. “But what else have you been doing?” To which I say, “Are you kidding?” Because bread and babies, as every housewife knows, is a full-time job. After I made the loaves, I felt like I had conquered something. But as I watched the bread being eaten, I thought, Well, Jesus, don’t I get a gold record or knighted or nothing?

PLAYBOY: Why did you become a househusband?

LENNON: There were many reasons. I had been under obligation or contract from the time I was 22 until well into my 30s. After all those years, it was all I knew. I wasn’t free. I was boxed in. My contract was the physical manifestation of being in prison. It was more important to face myself and face that reality than to continue a life of rock ‘n’ roll — and to go up and down with the whims of either your own performance or the public’s opinion of you. Rock ‘n’ roll was not fun anymore. I chose not to take the standard options in my business — going to Vegas and singing your great hits, if you’re lucky, or going to hell, which is where Elvis went.

ONO: John was like an artist who is very good at drawing circles. He sticks to that and it becomes his label. He has a gallery to promote that. And the next year, he will do triangles or something. It doesn’t reflect his life at all. When you continue doing the same thing for ten years, you get a prize for having done it.

LENNON: You get the big prize when you get cancer and you have been drawing circles and triangles for ten years. I had become a craftsman and I could have continued being a craftsman. I respect craftsmen, but I am not interested in becoming one.

ONO: Just to prove that you can go on dishing out things.

PLAYBOY: You’re talking about records, of course.

……

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