Anna K (NA1): IF I COULD INVENT A HOLIDAY

One day I read an article that impressed me a lot. A journalist was asked to participate in an experiment where he would not use his cell phone for one whole day. That experience taught him a sad lesson about our mobile addiction. I fancy living one day without a cell phone and not die trying. So, I thought that if I could invent a holiday, I would proclaim a “cell phone-less holiday.”

It may seem weird, but on this day millions of people might feel truly liberated, refreshed and rested – and what is the main objective of every holiday? Exactly, to take a break and to rest after our stressful rhythm of life! I know that many of us, like myself, who are old enough to remember how life was before mobile phones, will be pretty excited to become time travellers to the 1990s. It would be strange to start noticing people on the streets, instead of sending Whatsapps, checking e-mails or just surfing the Internet. I can hardly remember those days, when I needed a camera to take a photo, “used” my own memory to remember someone´s home number and had to make a call at a pay phone. Actually, I have not seen a proper functioning pay phone for centuries!

Our younger generation does not know what an Internet café is. It sounds like a café offering free WiFi! But I am old enough to remember how many e-mails I sent by this method, when we did not have laptops and cell phones. By the way, those places were not cheap at all! The cheaper and more advanced the technology is, the more attached to our gadgets we are. We feel connected to friends, business and news from all over the world and it would give us a false sense of security, but when the battery is low or we are out of range, we get lost and start to feel lonely even in the most crowded city of the planet.

The “cell phone-less holiday” could make us take aware of the anxiety than the lack of this piece of plastic during only one day can cause in our minds. I wish we were able to realize and admit that our phone addiction could be out of control soon, for example, all of us saw some couples spending a romantic evening and staring at the displays of their smartphones without talking to each other. It is true, I do not exaggerate.

In my  “cell phoneless holiday” reverie, such behavior will be forbidden by law in order to force us to recover something that, unfortunately, disappeared – the ability to look around, get surprised, say hello and smile at each other.