The Digital Detox - an experiment

Many people take their phones to the bathroom. Some feel like it is anatomically
part of their body.



Mid-January 2012, I'm feeling a bit drained and worn out . I haven't had an awesome holiday or leave for that matter for a long time and I spend many useless, unproductive hours on my computer instead of gyming (or exercising may be the correct verb) and going to bed at the right time. During the week I read about the digital detox in January's issue of Fairlady and about the "media fast" in the Tim Ferriss book “the 4-hour work week”. I also felt, strange as it may sound, that I needed a vacation from myself.

I thought on Friday evening (20/01/2012) after reading the article that I am going to ignore my Blackberry.  No BBM-ing , no twitter, no checking Facebook or updating my status, no TV (I thought this would be difficult).

I also realized after the weekend that I had done this before – last year in June for a whopping 14 nights – our trip to Thailand (including the transit time). Taking the advice of the consultants at MTN we didn’t switch on roaming. We decided that we would get a SIM card at the airport (sometimes they give them out for free) or at any one of the millions (hyperbole) 7-elevens in Bangkok. We got there and we eeevvvveeentuuuaaaallly ( this reads eventually but I hope that by writing it this way emphasizes how unconcerned we were).  We just called from the hotel to let the family in SA know we were okay. So no newspapers (although we did watch a bit of TV –mostly movies), minimal phone calls, no Twitter, Internet, Facebook , checking the Groupon emails for amusement,blogging or BBM. Ahhhh – what bliss , it was all non-stop massages and being totally unplugged from the world. I remember last year when Blackberry had the service problem - so no BBM for a few days. People were going crazy having withdrawal symptoms, complaining,crying, whining and generally acting like their life was over- I was like hello? SMS people!


The next time I try my little-experiment at home, I will switch the BB on silent except for calls from my family . It was really difficult to ignore the tinkling Twitter alert of the retweets and mentions and also that I couldn't thank the Tweeps for the mentions (which I did first thing Monday morning). Another thing the hubby and I do is while a show is on (like 3talk, 3rd degree, Cheaters - whatever is on TV) we usually check what people are tweeting about the shows and laugh ourselves silly - from Noeleen's crazy guests to Deborah Patta's tan . I can't deny that I love Twitter. Also please excuse those bracket things - I think they are the work of HTML demons - I can't rid of them - I have tried.


While on the detox I decided to fill my time with other things.



What did I miss? My sisters and I have a BBM group where we BBM (yes it is a verb)
the arb-est things to each other. Mini sent this picture to me, after I had done my nails
and Yashmita bought a Samsung washing machine. I also missed all those crappy, purple broadcast messages





I baked this at 11:30 PM on Friday Night





 I also painted a hideous painting on Friday Night. I had clearly lost my
mojo as I used to do quite well in terms of art. Maybe I need to paint more often.







I made a lot of Jewellery! Can you believe that the "pendants"
on both these necklaces are from a broken piece of jewellery I had. The one on the right is
an actual "pendant" while the components of the one on the left formed the neckpiece.





On Saturday morning the hubby and I went to gym, and then went to breakfast at Aroma di Caffe
in Glenvista. The breakfast was nommie but a bit pricey comparatively. He then announced
that we should get out of the house and see where the road takes us. He wanted to go Magaliesberg and Harties(dam)
which is technically in the Northwest province. So off we went. Also I thought if I wasn't detoxing I may have tweeted
or FB-ed " We're seeing where the road takes us". I mean, who the hell cares hey? So I'm glad that instead of tweeting about how pretty it was , or what an amazing drive it was or how awesome the dam looked I actually just let myself experience it.
We stopped at a place (the name escapes me) which was a monkey sanctuary, mango "orchard" and candle-making place.





We didn't really want to go to the sanctuary so I told my husband I wanted to do the candlemaking. He saw how much fun I was having and decided to do one too. Two grown-ass adults candle-dipping. It was fun and therapeutic.
The people at the shop were really impressed with my enormously ugly candle (see above)
I decided to light it and use it as a base to form one of those old school "drippy" candles.

 This is the look I'm going for but much larger.

After the candle-making (it's hard work!) we decided to go to go to the craft market to eat - and chose a place called The Fighting Prawn and had pizza there - bad life choice. The food and service was very bad but the setting was fantastic



We then decided to trek on home. I was still hungry since I didn't
really eat what we had for lunch and I wanted to show my husband this place at 44 Stanley.
We were also hoping to check out the Bean There Coffee company but sadly they were closed.





We decided on IL Giardino.IL Giardino rambles out under a grove of Olive trees in the vibrant 44 Stanley Ave. It is a classic Italian restaurant with a relaxed and tasteful ambience. We got to sit right next to the fountain outside - I threw a coin in and made a wish.





They have a good cheese board and cut out of the picture is the rocket

and Gruyere. The preserved figs were excellent. The only thing was that

 a micro-swarm of bees were bothering everyone.One drowned in my

drink which I didn't finish anyway. It was overwhelming at one point -

the bees.I loved the setting though. I'd been there before with a friend

but we sent inside which was also very nice - try the place!

The Video below makes me think of that poor bee :



On Sunday I went to hang out at my parent's place which I actually do everyday





I made an Orange-infused, honey, star-anise, sherry roast chicken - sounds weird but tasted good hey *Surprise*. I also went
to gym (miracles)





I made rotli/roti. I decided to cut them in flower-shaped bite-sized pieces.
A nice relaxed Sunday Lunch.



Since I've done the detox , it's amazing how many things have cropped up about it - digital detox-ing, smart phone addictions and just general discussion on our addiction to social media.  I felt good after trying it out but I did miss the social media interaction as well.

Tanusha's brother Jeetesh actually wrote a blog that may not exactly be about digital detox but it points to our dependence /addiction to digital devices. Read his blog here.

Here's a bit of it :

Also find an interesting article here - where a patient's life was in danger possibly because of the distractions of a Smartphone http://www.ama-assn.org/amednews/2012/01/02/prl10102.htm

                         Cut the habit

UpDate:Also I understand the irony of blogging about a digital detox - please note that I blog this after the digital detox with pictures I took during the detox.