It was better back then

Maybe it is the amount of traffic on the roads, the violent crime or simply modern technology, but older generations appear united in their belief that life was better back in their day. The journalism class from Aoraki Polytechnic decided to put that theory to the test, interviewing people born in eight different decades of last century.

Cecelia Risk (1918), By John Hobbs

Email, mobile phones and MP3 players are as alien to 91-year-old Cecelia Risk as writing with pen and paper would be to some today.

Yet that was how people communicated "back then", when no-one had a TV and if you sang along to the radio it was probably to a hymn.

The mother-of-five was born in Te Awamutu but moved to South Canterbury with her mother and older sister after her father passed away.

Mrs Risk was married in 1942 and moved to a farm in the Esk Valley, shifting to Timaru in her 80s.

She said they did not have cars when she was growing up and there was nowhere to go for a night out, as younger people do these days.

"We used to sketch; people used their hands for everything.

"They used to write to each other ... and pull faces at each other!"

One of the biggest changes she had noticed over the years was how technology-driven society was today, especially with television.

"Everyone has technology today. You wouldn't go into a house without a TV now, but we didn't have it back then."

There were no supermarkets or takeaways so families grew a lot of their own food if they lived on a farm or had a garden.

"I don't remember having a favourite food; we just had what was put in front of us."

She said there were no fashion or tailor-made clothes. Most people made their own clothes or wore hand-downs.

Mrs Risk has always been fond of animals. She rode horses when she worked as a domestic help and land girl and said people lived alongside animals more – "they would just come into the house".

As to whether life was better back then, she said it was simply "different".

Despite the lack of modern comforts, Mrs Risk would not choose to be born in another era.

"You only get born when you were, you didn't have a choice.

"There's more to do now; we had to make our own fun and now the fun is made for you.

"It would be a lot simpler today."

John Chambers (1941), by Samantha Pooke

AS A child he could leave the house to go biking without even needing to even tell his parents where he was going. He remembers going to the park, bike rides with friends and "swinging in the trees like Tarzan".

John believes there are more dangers today for children and teenagers growing up.

"Parents didn't put restrictions on their children. It's just so different – it was easier back then for parents," he said.

But teachers certainly weren't more laid back then.

"Today the teachers are more human, more approachable and friendlier towards kids and parents. When I was a kid it was the cane or strap."

He's not quite so positive about the material pupils are taught now.

"I don't think there is enough emphasis on basic stuff. The first thing they do is reach for the calculator."

He said teenagers in his day were better behaved than some today.

"Smoking was about the most daring thing we ever did."

John says there is an emphasis on the challenges faced by teenagers today which didn't exist when he was growing up.

"Being a teenager you just got on with it, there were no dramas. Nobody would say `he's just going through puberty' or anything."

After leaving school, John's first job was at a grocery shop, but it was his next one, at the freezing works, that was to dominate his working life. He stayed for 43 years.

After his first marriage ended, John realised he had to start cooking for himself.

"I started experimenting and asking questions. I was thrown in the deep end."

Now he loves to cook, inviting friends around and preparing meals for them.

He has five children, three from his previous marriage. The older of two children from his second marriage is 13.

John lives with his wife and two children. He is overwhelmed by how much they are involved in – hockey, netball and other after-school activities.

John is happy with his life now, but finds it hard to believe things could have possibly changed so much since he was growing up – maybe it was better back then.

LIFETIME MILESTONES - In your lifetime, what has been the most significant: 1. Political/national event and 2. World event? 1. Muldoon, while he was in power the economy of the whole country was better off. 2. The death of President Kennedy. I think he was the one who was going to do so much for the world and then some idiot shot him, crazy. 3. Personal achievement/defining moment: I guess going on a world trip on my own for 17 weeks. Something that I yearned to do for a long time, I wanted to go to the Greek Islands. It was an achievement as far as I was concerned. 4. Favourite music: The Beatles, Yesterday, and Elton John. 5. If you could have been born in any generation, which would it have been? "Quite happy where I was, thanks – the technology today; my father, if he saw what we were walking round with today, he would freak out. I can't keep up with it."

Shirley Piddington (1930), by Louise Risk

Shirley Piddington's 15 minutes of fame came before she turned five, but that has not stopped this enchanting 79-year-old from enjoying a rich, exciting life.

A prize-winning photograph of Mrs Piddington dressed as child star Shirley Temple hangs with pride alongside framed photographs of some of classic Hollywood's finest.

"By the time I was five, I was fish and chip paper," she said.

Not so the actors and actresses whose images her father collected for her from the Majestic Theatre in Christchurch, where he worked.

"I used to walk in with a note from my father and sit and watch films with the usher.

"Films were built around the actor in those days; they were elegant, not like some film stars today."

Watching films, musicals and stage shows are pleasures Mrs Piddington, a patron of Timaru's Theatre Royal, has always enjoyed.

When the controversial musical Hair toured New Zealand, her offer to buy a friend a ticket to accompany her was swiftly declined.

"I ended up buying her two cups and saucers as a gift instead," she laughed.

The controversial nude scene was over before Mrs Piddington could even judge what she was looking at.

"My mother went as well. She was very modern for her time."

Life was not all glitz and glamour, however.

Born in 1930, the combination of two world wars and the Depression influenced everything from the food people ate to the clothes they wore to what they could say.

"Imagine people nowadays going to a small corner store and only being able to buy the absolute basics.

"We didn't hear as much about healthy eating when I was growing up, but then there were not as many obese people around then either.

"Nearly everyone had their own vegetable garden."

While Mrs Piddington felt the war years cast a shadow on many aspects of daily life, she also felt they led to many rapid advancements, particularly in the areas of medicine and travel.

"Flying was in its infancy during the Great War. The speed of development from little single or double-winged planes to jets and spaceships was amazing."

Hemlines had shrunk and society's tolerance was growing, Mrs Piddington said.

"If you became pregnant out of wedlock, it was a great shame on your family.

"It was always the girl's fault, and they suffered psychologically for it."

Sharing a flat with someone of the opposite sex was controversial, let alone living with them before marriage, Mrs Piddington said.

"It was tough on the first parents of the sexual revolution.

"Nowadays you seem to wonder more about why someone is not living with their partner, not why they are."

She moved from Christchurch to Timaru after marrying her sweetheart at 25.

"We lived in a flat for two years while my husband built our first house."

To the consternation of some, Mrs Piddington continued to work part-time as a shorthand typist during these years.

"Our section was relatively cheap, but we were always saving for something.

"We had a strong saving ethic back then. I don't know if people save in the same way these days."

So, did she think life was better for people born in the 1930s?

"People are more affluent nowadays. There's not the poverty there was when I was growing up, and that makes for a better life," she said.

"...most people seem to have enjoyed growing up when they did. Age colours you, it's relative."

LIFETIME MILESTONES - In your lifetime, what has been the most significant: 1. Political/national event and 2. World event: 1. Becoming part of the Commonwealth in 1947 was memorable. The shift from first past the post to MMP was also important. 2. It would have to have been World War I. The Depression also changed things a lot. 3. Personal achievement/defining moment: Having a happy married life and having children and then three granddaughters. 4. Favourite music: Music you could dance cheek-to-cheek to, rather than doing the jungle jive. Glenn Miller was one of many that I liked. 5. If you could have been born in any generation, which would it have been? The one I was born in. Everyone will say their own, won't they?

Greta Fraser (1927), by Hayley McCaughan

Greta Fraser says life is not about when you live, but how you live it.

And she has lived it.

Now in a Geraldine retirement home, her life has been quite different from that of most Kiwi women of her era.

A past pupil of Timaru West and Timaru Girls' High, early nursing training was spent in Timaru and Dunedin. After a short time in Australia, England and Scotland, she headed to Canada.

A good part of her life was spent in the Americas. After studying in Canada and the United States, she was appointed as assistant professor of nursing and director of continuing education at the University of Kentucky in 1962. Five years were spent in New York, as a director of nursing in a hospital.

On a flight back to New Zealand, Miss Fraser got talking to a top official from Costa Rica, who promptly offered her a job there, working in health. She accepted.

At some point, and the years are difficult to pinpoint, she took a year off and spent it in a log cabin in Maine, wood-carving, fishing, and relaxing with friends.

"Oh, Maine, Maine, I became a Maine maniac," she said, of her love for the beauty of the American state and the people there.

"Aah the people, the men," she said with a wry smile.

Then in her early forties, she was the epitome of a successful, independent woman who had risen to the top of a demanding career. Yet she took the time to step back and enjoy life in the wilderness, pre-empting today's work-life balance concept.

Several photographs show a woman holidaying with friends, spending time at a lake, smoking a pipe, gutting fish for the evening meal.

"I'm a wood carver, and an astronomer, and have been for a long, long time," she said, referring to some photographs.

Clearly, this had been the time of her life.

There had been a husband early on, then another later. The first, the late Leon Scott Wolfe, a Kiwi graduate of Cambridge University, went on to a distinguished career in the emerging science of neurochemistry in Canada. Their careers led them in different directions and an amicable parting ensued.

For many years after Miss Fraser returned home to New Zealand, she farmed with her second husband, not too far away.

She has no children. Astronomy and bird watching and photos of a beloved dog are treasured.

Stepping outside the resthome to smoke, and why not at 83, it's clear she would prefer to be in her house in the nearby countryside.

"You would love it. A lovely, wooden house, lots of land," she said.

LIFETIME MILESTONES - In your lifetime, what has been the most significant: 1. Political/national event and 2. World event: JFK's political life and death had a great effect upon me. 3. Personal achievement/defining moment: The decision to travel overseas to study and experience other nations and peoples. 4. Favourite music: Prompted with "Elvis?", she replies, "Oh God, no. Bach, Beethoven." 5. If you could have been born in any generation, which would it have been? Greta considers there is much to offer the present generation, but having lived through most of the 20th century, the times she enjoyed the most were the mid 1960s to 70s.

Ross Holgate (1956), by Alana Dixon

A diesel mechanic in Timaru, Ross thinks there are many reasons why life is better now.

"Kids have better relationships with their parents, I think. I know mine have.

"We were more fearful of our parents. You never sort of sat down and had a heart-to-heart.

"I don't know bugger-all about my parents. They just weren't included in what you did."

He grew up in the tiny Central Otago town of Lauder, the third of four sons to a part-time secretary and a father who worked in a rural transport company. At eight, he moved "just down the road" to equally isolated Omakau.

Modern parents would be horrified if children started replicating some of the antics of the past, he said.

"They'd have a fit. We were always wandering around outside by ourselves. We'd go eeling late at night, lighting fires and putting spuds in cookers and beating the s... out of eels," he said.

"You couldn't go anywhere or do anything. All you could do was walk up to the local dairy, but you couldn't buy anything because you didn't have any money."

But some changes haven't been for the better.

"I think there's more violence these days, or there seems to be. More disjointed families maybe. But there were drugs back then as well – LSD, heroin, and speed was around too."

"You had to pay 100 per cent cash to buy a car. Now people expect a lifestyle you couldn't have back then, with hire purchases. Today it's a lot freer, and I guess that's what's created a lot of the world's financial problems."

"I think people of my generation are more thinkers and doers, just because we were left to amuse ourselves."

His favourite childhood memory is a two-week family trip to the West Coast when he was eight.

"We took our holidays in August, when everything was quiet at Dad's work. It would have taken bloody ages to get anywhere, cause all the roads were gravel," he said.

After leaving Dunstan High School in Alexandra at 17, he started a diesel mechanic apprenticeship in Dunedin. He bought his own home at 22, spent a two-year stint working in Wollongong, Australia, then decided to head home.

In April 1984, back in Alexandra, a chance encounter at the pub saw him meet his future wife, Angela. They married early the following year.

Eldest child Grace was born in 1987, son Bowen in 1989 and Claudia in 1992.

"A full course of Rogernomics," coupled with three young children, meant life was often financially draining, Ross said.

He and Angela, who celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary in March, moved to Timaru in 1996 after work on the Clyde Dam dried up.

Looking back, he found it difficult to pick just one thing that made him happiest.

"It's sort of your lifestyle that makes you happiest and contented. Going to the AC/DC concert made me pretty happy, but that was shortlived. You've got to be happy in yourself to be happy."

LIFETIME MILESTONES - In your lifetime, what has been the most significant: 1. Political/national event and 2. World event: 1."Norman Kirk dying in 1974. Wages under him had sort of doubled, so it was a big thing." 2."When the IRA blew up Lord Mountbatten in 1979. I just thought 'how futile'." 3. Personal achievement/defining moment:"I remember one night in Australia I got on the booze with Dad, a few of his cronies and the Deputy Prime Minister of Australia, in this seedy little bar. We got picked up in a limo with the wee flags." 4. Favourite music: Jethro Tull's Aqualung; School's Out by Alice Cooper. 5. If you could have been born in any generation, which would it have been? "I probably would pick the same one."

Kim Dixon (1965), by Alex Fensome

I loved shoulder pads! ... and long frizzy hair. I thought it was fabulous."

Kim Dixon was born in 1965 in Auckland, and revelled in growing up in the 70s and 80s.

Her family owned a small farm close to the city.

"We were real kids, we weren't so protected. We went to the beach a lot, to One Tree Hill ..."

Aged 19, her first job was as a receptionist at the RSA.

"It was good fun. I used to go out with my friends on Friday nights and we'd have a drink, dance with the old boys and then go nightclubbing. It made their evening!"

Was being young less frenetic than today?

"We still had boy racers but that was fun! We were teenagers; we did the same things they do today. We just didn't have texting and Facebook.

"It's a big time-waster," she says of texting.

"We told our friends about things, or used the phone. I have one friend on Facebook, my niece! I've got enough friends in real life."

Teenagers don't take so much time over their appearance either. "When we went out we used to get really dressed up. Young people today are a lot more casual. If we were going out, we'd put on our best clothes."

As a foodie, Kim loves the changes in New Zealand's cuisine.

"I worked in the hospitality industry and it was quite bland, and then in the 80s you got really small portions. You were starving ... I like being able to buy food from other cultures. I really love balsamic vinegar, vanilla pods, and the spices today."

Kim spent 3 1/2 years in Brisbane, then moved back to Auckland, where she met her husband.

After living in Albany and Te Kuiti, lifestyle and career brought her to Timaru in 2004.

"I don't like big places."

What does she think of New Zealand kids today?

"Young people have more choice. They don't realise how lucky they are."

LIFETIME MILESTONES - In your lifetime, what has been the most significant: 1. Political/national event and 2. World event: 1. The Muldoon Era. My family were big supporters of Muldoon. 2. "That would have to be September 11." 3. Personal achievement/defining moment: "Having my two children." 4. Favourite music: Abba, the B52s. 5. If you could have been born in any generation, which would it have been? "I quite liked the 60s."

Emily Allfrey (1975), by Charley Mann

David Bowie's Young Americans was the No1 song, Bill Rowling was Prime Minister and Kiwis were still making their own clothes when Emily Allfrey was born on May 12, 1975.

The visual art teacher has managed to cram two degrees, travel and a host of hairstyles into the 35 years since.

Flash back to the early 1980s and Emily was playing on the street in the evening with the other neighbourhood kids, when rollerblades and skinny skateboards were the must-haves.

"We had a lot more freedom; we weren't allowed in if wasn't dark outside.

"We played cricket out on the street; our parents were not so stressed about what we were doing."

She remembered when she and her friends started to jump off her garage roof. Rather than stop them, her mother put a heap of old mattresses around the garage.

Most people were still sewing their own clothes.

"There was lots of baking. And we all had vege gardens."

She remembered when her father bought his first personal computer.

"My Dad got a computer in 1985; it was for Pac Man.

"In school we had computers, with green screens, and we never had the internet."

Emily was a teenager attending high school during the late 1980s and early 1990s, a time of Grunge music, too-high jeans and Dr Martens boots.

"Fashion was in crisis!

"I had my favourite pair of boots and wore plastic jewellery."

Grunge sparked the trend of checked shirts, suede jackets and ripped jeans. Emily and her friends followed the fashion, but regret it now.

"My girlfriends and I now sit round and ask, `what were we doing?'

"I once wore a party dress with Dr Martens underneath it and a rip in the sleeve, because it was cool to have rips in your sleeves."

She reckons today's teenagers take much more care with their hair and makeup. However, she believes that her high school ball was just as good as the ones today.

"We had an after-ball party and we had pooled our money together to have Opshop play, back when they were called Gorilla Biscuit, and my friend ended up dating the drummer."

During sixth and seventh forms Emily and her friends began going to parties and out on the town, although she feels that they started drinking at a later age back then. Her parents were also more trusting.

"My friend's parents would drop us off in town and pick us up again."

At 17 Emily was selected to participate in an exchange programme, which saw her live in Lecco in northern Italy for three months. While there she decided to study art at university.

"It was a real awakening."

Emily went on to attend Ilam School of Fine Arts in Christchurch, Elam School of Fine Arts in Auckland, and the University of Canterbury College of Education between 1993 and 2000.

University was a different place in the 1990s. Essays were still handwritten and there was no cap on student loans, so some of Emily's friends drew out huge loans and used them to travel on their OEs. Emily tapped into her loan halfway through her studies.

"We didn't know anything about money back then. It was more important to meet people [at university]."

The consequences of the huge loans hit Emily and her friends hard, gathering large sums of interest, until the Labour party abolished interest on student loans in 2006.

However, her uncapped loan allowed Emily to study for eight years, gaining two degrees in fine art and a graduate diploma in teaching and learning.

Emily is not yet married, though some of her friends have started to get married and start families.

So, with 35 years of hindsight, was it really better back then?

"The clothes weren't," she laughed.

LIFETIME MILESTONES - In your lifetime, what has been the most significant: 1. Political/national event and 2. World event: 1.The Springbok tour of 1981. 2.The attack on the Twin Towers. 3. Personal achievement/defining moment: I can't point out just one but being picked as an exchange student to go to Italy at 17 was amazing. 4. Favourite music: Nirvana, because I partied in the Grunge era, and Madonna's early music too. 5. If you could have been born in any generation, which would it have been? The late 50s or early 60s in America, because the post-modern era was such a cool time.

Phillipa Lawson (1983), By Daniel Birchfield

ALF and the incomparable Magnum PI graced our television screens.

Wham! and Van Halen dominated the airwaves. Remember slouch socks and outrageous highlighter outfits?

Philippa Lawson, born on April 14, 1983, does.

"I was a victim of terrible fashion.

"I remember wearing tartan leggings with slouch socks, rah-rah skirts (think cheerleader skirts) and lots of bright highlighted clothes."

Nowadays, Pip dresses more conservatively, preferring darker colours.

"I mostly wear black now. I didn't wear black when I was younger, there wasn't much around," she recalls.

It is not only fashion that has changed since her childhood. So has technology in many ways.

"I was four years old when we got a video player, it was like `WOW!"'

And those bulky audio devices we all lugged around?

"I had a Walkman and a Discman, they were so cool!" she says.

As for the music blaring from them, Pip loved the classics.

"I really liked New Kids on the Block and Cyndi Lauper. True Colours was my favourite song."

Pip believes the biggest changes came in the late 1990s.

"I was about 17 when cellphones and the internet came in; it was a big change at the time," she says.

Something she says has not changed since her youth is her eating habits.

"I have always been a big eater. I love pasta, chips and chocolate; I am still into them," she laughs.

Pip, who is now 27, works as a human resources assistant. It's a far cry from her first job, counting milk tokens, aged 12.

"It wasn't the most exciting job in the world," she says.

When she wasn't counting tokens, she expended far more energy playing netball.

Pip also loved to hang out with her friends and nothing much has changed, except for a drink or two being added to the equation.

Pip says being a kid these days is different from when she was growing up.

"Kids have more freedom today; we didn't have as much when we were younger. Your parents always knew where you were."

Pip started at Roncalli College in 1996, and finished in 2000, heading to the University of Otago and graduating in 2003 with degrees in arts and psychology.

Over the years she has noticed a change in the way people look at education.

"People used to leave school and get a job straight away. These days people go out and get further education to help set them up for the future."

As far as that future goes, Pip would like to get her "big" student loan paid off and do some travelling before buying a home. She is not sure if she wants to get married and have children, with a lot she wants to do before settling down.

So in Pip's view, was life better back then?

"I guess life was better when I was younger as the world was a bit safer and [more] stable, but your responsibilities and problems when you are younger are a lot less so it can make life seem better."

LIFETIME MILESTONES - In your lifetime, what has been the most significant: 1. Political/national event and 2. World event: 1. When New Zealand had its first female prime ministers, Jenny Shipley and Helen Clark. 2. The September 11 attacks. 3. Personal achievement/defining moment: Obtaining degrees in arts and psychology at Otago University. 4. Favourite music: New Kids on the Block and Cyndi Lauper. 5. If you could have been born in any generation, which would it have been? The 60s or 70s, the hippy times.

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