My escape to Albania proved to be more than I bargained for when my phone disappeared – here’s what I learned after undergoing an intense withdrawal from the Internet
I ran away to Albania ‘to get away from it all’: road tripping through mountains and experiencing quality time with my partner. Except I got way more than I bargained for when my phone was stolen – and I was forced into what’s become known as ‘a digital detox’.
An increasing number of people online are attempting to completely wean themselves off the technology. The subreddit digital minimalism has over 130K members, while the TikTok hashtag has tens of thousands of posts, with many Gen Z claiming to be experiencing ‘tech regret’.
While a digital detox may look slightly different depending on an individual, the idea is to intentionally limit or reduce your time on devices like smartphones and laptops. For some, it means disconnecting completely. But does it actually make a difference?
Personally, I’d never have labelled myself a ‘tech addict’. I have an average screen time of six hours, sure, but I have other hobbies. I read, I go to the gym, I take the occasional stroll (to touch grass, one might say). I always liked to think that, if phones vanished tomorrow, I’d be fine.
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Except mine did vanish – and I wasn’t okay. I woke, groggy from a nap, in a rented apartment in the mountain town of Berat. My first instinct was to check the time, but after patting the bed several times I realised the familiar smooth surface of my phone’s case wasn’t there.
‘I left it in the car’, I thought. I jumped up, put on my shoes and stumbled down the lane to check. But when I swung open the door of the Opal, it quickly became clear the phone was nowhere to be seen. A creeping thread of panic began to take hold. Two hours of intense searching later, it became clear: it was gone.
Suddenly, I was thrown into a flummox, where everything I had taken for granted was literally gone. My random two am thoughts captured in notes, funny in-the-moment pictures. Being able to check the weather forecast every hour.
I tried to suck the panic in and let reason take hold. Most of my data was backed up. I would be able to get another phone. After all, I was determined to enjoy the remainder of the holiday. We had come to embrace nature and explore, which Albania had in abundance. I mean, of all places to be without a phone, where better to be?
However, after just a day of being without one, a troubling realisation came to a head at dinner. There was a prolonged silence at the table where I supped the local wine. My partner then asked me about the Albanian fare, which was delicious. Another question about the decor. Silence again. “Do you have any thoughts about the dinner?” he then asked.
“Are you prompting me?” I asked, incredulous. My first instinct, obviously, was to be incredibly insulted. But then I realised I hadn’t attempted to start a conversation in the past few hours.
Why? Well, I had nothing to say. Every time I had had an impulse to search something: i.e. a town’s population, the name of the purple trees we saw everywhere, what was happening on Instagram, I was met with an empty space where my phone once was. My information sources had run dry and so, too, it seemed, had my personality.
Every time when my partner was occupied, something up himself, or in the bathroom, I had nothing to do. There were no TikToks to suck up my time. No random facts to search on Google. No stories to watch.
The physical, monetary reality of losing my phone was tolerable, if frustrating. But it had become more than that. It was, in many ways, a digital companion. An addiction. Something that not just entertained me, but filled silences.
Of course, now back in the UK, I have managed to source a replacement phone. My apps are back, as are my chats and most of my photos. My three-day phoneless stint is becoming a distant haze. Although, the potential benefits of a full-on digital detox has left me curious.
Across the digital minimalism subreddit, others who have voluntarily decentred phones from their lives have documented their experiences. One user, who switched to using a flip phone wrote: “Over time, I just enjoyed life more. I read more books. I payed attention to the movies I watched and was more present with my friends and loved ones because I wasn’t scrolling on my phone. I enjoyed travel more when I was living in the moment rather than constantly taking pictures to post.”