Time travel

2. Imagine that you have the opportunity to travel back through time. At what point in history would you like to stop and why? (Swarthmore)

Anytime the word time travel comes up, my mind immediately wanders to “Back to the Future.” To an observer this may seem slightly bizarre, but I have a good reason for this. When I was small, “Back to the Future” and its sequels were one of the movies that my father and I would watch together. It was our thing.

Ironically, for a person who has watched a great number of time traveller movies, I never ever actually developed my own plans for time travel, and which event in history I would preferably stop at. I think as a child I was too distracted by finding Hogwarts and my broomstick to dedicate a great deal of attention to time travel (and wizards clearly still existed in the present so why go back to the past?).

Do not misunderstand me to be a person who does not care for history. I very much do so! History has always intrigued me, the tales of ancient civilizations to the invention of the first computer. Everything has a story, a story that is its own.

The question asked by this prompt is a hard one for me to answer. It is not that I would decline the opportunity to travel back through time; I would be delighted to do so. Yet, to choose one particular event at which to stop is proving extremely difficult to decide.

In my European History class, my mind drifts off to the century being discussed. I imagine the people and their lives. How different some of them are from mine, yet how (at the same time) my life still resembles theirs.

My top five time travel choices are as follows: Florence during the renaissance, the Harappa river valley civilization, Greece under Alexander the Great, Cleopatra’s Egypt, and Europe in the late 1800’s. Even during the composition of this list, my mind is filled with other historical events that intrigue me. 

Out of all these places and historic events, the one I know the least about is the Harappa civilization. The disappearance of this great empire is shrouded in mystery, just as its language and people are. There is so much left to learn about the Harappa inhabitants.

I realize that my appearance in this civilization might cause some confusion, as I do not speak the language nor know very much about its customs. Yet, I hope that I will somehow manage to overcome these difficulties and still be a respectful observer.

Travelling to Harappa would enable me to bring back information about this civilization to the present, and thus hopefully answer some of history’s great mysteries, such as how such an evolved civilization disappeared out of the blue.

If I were to travel to Harappa, I would intend to stay there for at least a month. I believe this period of time would allow me to observe the society to good degree, and gain an understanding of its workings.

If time travel were possible, perhaps a lot of things will change, and a lot of questions of the past will be answered. Whether this will be beneficial to society is another question, and perhaps one that has no specific answer.

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