An Anti-Social Love Affair

I am not the first person to admit this, and I am definitely not the last, but I have a bit of a love affair with my phone. More specifically social media, but even when I'm not on social media I'm constantly checking if I have any notifications. A notification whore if you will. 

But I didn't realise how much I was in denial about my screen time and phone usage until I downloaded the 'Moment' app.  And today I'm willing to admit to that. 

Moment is simply an app which tracks your screen time. You may download it just to be a little bit nosey, but you will quickly become paranoid. 

I started on Monday 6th March. 

Monday

Because this was the first day of using it, I think I was very much aware of the time I was spending on my phone, so probably not particularly accurate. I was travelling back up to Nottingham, so rather than spending the four hour journey scrolling through Twitter and catching up on Keeping Up With The Kardashians, I read some magazines instead. The one thing I immediately noticed was that I hadn't had to use my portable battery pack halfway through my journey, which is obvious but it kind of felt like a mini sense of achievement. I still felt the need to pick up my phone, especially when I got in to bed, but I turned my wifi off at 11 in attempt to force myself off of it.

Tuesday

On Tuesday the app challenged me to put my phone in my bag whilst I was commuting. The walk to uni was absolutely fine, but I was walking to and from different places quite a lot that day so it was hard to not do it at least once. I spent 2 hours and 44 minutes and picked my phone up a total of 110 times. 30 minutes of this was just being on my home/lock screen, which tells you what my worst habit is. 

Wednesday

My next challenge was to not take any photos, including the use of Snapchat. Due to the nature of the day, where we were filming for our colour film project and having to document it, I definitely did not achieve this. However, I did realise how little I actually use Snapchat and it made me question whether or not to just delete it.

Thursday

My screen time was starting to average out by Thursday, as I generally spent about 2 and a half hours on my phone in total. It's painful to see because I could have done so much more uni work that I'm now stressing about if I had stopped looking at my phone for even half of that time. My challenge was to delete an app, but I was too scared to delete one of my "major" ones like Instagram or Snapchat, even though I was considering getting rid of it before, so I wimped out and just deleted a couple that I no longer used. An app spring clean. 

Friday 

Friday was a complete disaster. I spent 3 hours and 48 minutes on my phone. When you see your time in the red zone, you start to feel very guilty. 

Saturday 

My next challenge was to take a fakecation, where I set a period of time to go off grid. I think I actually turned my wifi off for about four hours in the end; only picking it up to text Harry a couple of times. Honestly, it felt really good and I'll be doing it more often. And keeping my screen time in the green zone (1 hour 40 minutes) also felt very good too. 

Sunday 

I returned to my 2 hour 30 minute average again, which was probably just down to the fact that I usually have Sunday's off from doing any uni work so I had more time to just scroll through Instagram and Twitter. 

I think they've been very clever in the way that they use a green/orange/red system, because it's a system that we've all been conditioned to recognise since we were children. It's all psychological and it's because of this that you can easily start to panic and feel guilty and wanting to check it all the time to see where you're up to. 

Overall, I think it's interesting to get an insight into how much screen time you use, and it's a topic that is definitely worth discussing and something I want to possibly address with my dissertation next year. However, the app itself is not worth keeping. It only makes you paranoid and obsessed, which are both negative traits, and eventually it starts to get annoying. 

There are things I can take from it though. For example, the fakecation is definitely something I will make a habit of doing, especially when I really need to get some uni work done, and it might start to cure my notification obsession that I clearly have. In regards to Snapchat, I think I'm going to delete it; even if it's for a week. 

Things You Should Do In Berlin

I must admit we went to Berlin unprepared. Other than the Berlin Wall, we had no idea what the highlights were or how we were going to fill our days when we weren't at the trade shows. Luckily my brother had brought me the Eyewitness Travel Top 10 Berlin travel guide, which definitely came in handy!

If you're going to Berlin, or thinking of planning a trip there, and are unsure about where to go, I've compiled a list of places that are worth visiting.

1. East Side Gallery
The East Side Gallery is part of the remaining Berlin Wall and the longest open air gallery in the world. It's 1.3 kilometres of art and history, with each painting representing something different and personal to both the artist and Berlin. Whether you're into art or history or both or neither it's definitely a must-see.

https://www.visitberlin.de/en/east-side-gallery

2. Flea Market 
There is an amazing flea market in Mauerpark near the Mitte area of Berlin, which looks small from the outside, but stretches way back through parkland and has such a variety of stalls. It's open every Sunday from 9am till 6pm making it a nice easy Sunday browse.

https://www.berlin.de/en/shopping/markets-and-flea-markets/1998222-2983302-flea-market-at-mauerpark.en.html

3. Bikini Berlin
Bikini Berlin is a shopping mall located near the Zoologischer Garten station. It's more high quality fashion that high street but it's very urban and the visual merchandising is very modern so even if you don't plan on buying anything it's worth a walk around. There is a rooftop too, which was pretty in the evening when as the sun was going down and has some good views of the zoo, but this is definitely more of a summer attraction!

https://www.bikiniberlin.de/en/

4. Alexanderplatz
If you're looking for a day of shopping and eating, Alexanderplatz is the place to go! It's known for being Germany's largest square and hosts a variety of shops, restaurants and attractions such as the TV tower. Within the area is a big shopping mall, Alexa, with a range of shops and cafes, then outside in the main square you can find a large Primark and a large TKMaxx, as well as a department store called Galeria Kaufhof.

Around the corner is Hackesher Markt which is a square full of restaurants, boasting some good happy hour deals and pizza's bigger than you can manage.

5. Jewish Memorial, Brandenburg Gate and Reichstag
These three are in a line with each other so it's worth doing them all together. Even if you're not into history that much it's worth taking a visit in to the Jewish Memorial to see the both the memorial and the museum underneath. You'll read stories of the Jews who were caught up in the Second World War and you cannot imagine what they must have felt.

Once you've visited the memorial take a walk to the Brandenburg Gate, which is amongst all of the embassy buildings, and then walk over to the Reichstag building, which was the former parliament building. You can register in advance to go up to the dome at the top of the building, where there are 360 views of the city. Make sure you pick up a leaflet on your way up, which tells you which building  is which down below.

https://www.bundestag.de/en/visittheBundestag/dome/registration/245686

6. Mall of Berlin
Another amazing shopping mall is the Mall of Berlin, which is a fifteen minute walk from the Brandenburg Gate. It has two sides - the East Mall and the West Mall. Although, if you haven't got much money this may be somewhere you want to miss because it's very hard not to find to buy something here! However, the slide from the top floor to the ground floor in the East side is worth a look.

7. Helmut Newton Foundation
This is more for those who are interested in photography or art in general. It's €10 or €5 for concessions, and in here you will find Helmut Newton's private collection, as well as a mock up of his office. There is currently an exhibition on Guy Bourdin and in June 2018 they will be opening an exhibition on Carla Sozzani's photographs.

http://www.helmut-newton.com

The Perfect Pair Of Jeans

Over the Christmas break I had to write an essay about Levi's and I did about a months worth of research on the brand to the point where I became obsessed. I had to have a pair, but where I was so used to buying £20 jeans at New Look, they were just so expensive!

I've never been one to fork out on a product. Brands like ASOS or New Look are always my first point of call and that's based on price over quality. I suppose you could say that these are the brands that I'm loyal to, but would I be choosing them first if I wasn't on a student budget? With all that's on offer these days, I wouldn't say that I've ever really been loyal to a brand in terms of what it stands for. This all changed after researching Levi's. It got to the point where my mum had had enough of me banging on about them and dragged me in their Regent Street store the other week. 

And that's how I ended up with my first pair of Levi jeans.

This is the first time where I have brought a product and felt like a genuine customer. I didn't just buy them for the image of the label, I brought them because of the quality and the history behind the brand and I understand what the brand stands for. It's not often that you can say that and this is definitely not the last pair that I will be buying. And I figure that if they're going to last then why not fork out a bit extra, rather than paying £20 4 or 5 times a year.

From walking in to the store, to walking back out again with my brown bag in hand, I loved the whole experience. It was exciting and the visual merchandising is perfect for the brand. And even though it was 7pm and they probably just wanted to close up and go home, the staff were so friendly and helpful. Little things like that are so refreshing, especially after you've been in shops were the staff were pretty much snapping at you. 

If you haven't got a pair already, I promise you it's a bloody good investment. 

Berlin On A Budget

I'm hopeless at saving money. It's one of the things that I'm trying to be better at this year. Last year I went to New York with $300, which was never going to be enough, and this year I went to Berlin with €160.

Before I went to Berlin I'd heard that it was quite an expensive city and it was safe to say that I was worrying about it. Spoiler alert: I came back with €30, which is pretty good considering we were there for seven days; so I've come up with a few tips on how to do Berlin on a budget.

1. Stay at a hostel 
What's the first thing that comes to mind when you think of the word hostel? Probably squeaky metal bunk beds with a grubby shared bathroom right? This is the second time I've stayed in a hostel with FCP and both of them have far exceeded my expectations.

We stayed in the Meininger East Side Gallery hotel and I couldn't recommend it more. It's a new build so it was modern and clean; the beds were super comfy, we got our own bathroom, and the breakfast was good too!

Not only are hostels a lot cheaper than a hotel, but they usually have kitchens for guests to use so we saved a lot of money on dinners like pasta and vegetable curry by just shopping at Aldi or Lidl. This leads me on to my second point...


2. Eat cheap 
There is no need to eat at five star restaurants every day, and admittedly it does get boring after a while. For lunch we just had small things like sandwiches or a slice of pizza from a the cafes in the train stations. We ate out a couple of times before dinner, but as I said before we did half of the dinners ourselves. There's also a lot of the common franchises in Germany like McDonalds and Subway, which aren't very cultured but it saves a load of money.

3. Have your money physically rather than paying on your card
Having the physical cash to see makes it easier to not spend much because you can see it going down.

I took my money in an envelope which I hid in one of my pockets in my handbag and then put €30 in my purse each day as my budget. If you don't feel comfortable having so much cash on you, withdraw your budgeted amount for each day each morning.


4. Free or discounted activities 
In New York I found that for most tourist things you have to spend money one way or another, but in Berlin there are loads of things to do for free. For example, you can go up the Reichstag building, which has 360 views of the city, and you don't have to pay a penny, just register before you go! The Berlin Wall is also free to go and look at, and if you walk the whole thing that's a couple of hours of your day done. The Memorial of The Murdered Jews is also free.

A lot of the museums, such as the Natural History Museum and the Helmut Newton Foundation do discounted rates for concessions such as students, making a ticket €5 instead of €10.

5. Day travel ticket
A day travel ticket which covers both the S and U Bahn, trams, and buses is only €7. This gives you the ability to jump on all of the public transport until 3am the next morning as many times as you like, so it works out so much more cheaper, especially as a lot of Berlin's highlights are located around a lot of different areas and it's worth it when it's SO cold outside!


To be honest you can probably use these tips wherever you choose to go. Both Meininger and The Generator (where we stayed in London - see my review here) have hotels all over Europe, making it so much easier to book good quality, yet affordable, accommodation, and with a bit of a Google/Pinterest search you can always find budget friendly things to do!

End Of The F***ing World

End of The F***ing World is a 8 part dark-comedy series, which has recently been added to Netflix and has had the whole world talking. This is not your average girl-meets-boy love story, and that's why I absolutely loved it.

End of The F***ing World is based around a confused, teenage pair, Alyssa (Jessica Barden), and James (Alex Lawther) who run away from their parents in search of escape, and find themselves on a road trip around Britain. Alyssa, a loud and assertive character, is the contrast to the socially awkward James, who believes he is a psychopath. But they do say opposites attract.

Ever since he was a young boy, James has been obsessed with murder; killing animals and recently deciding it's time to move on and kill a human. He's convinced that Alyssa would be a perfect first victim and pretends to fall in love with her in order to get her closer and gain her trust.

Watching the first episode, I found the show very bizarre. There is minimal contact with supporting characters and the humour is dark yet witty, but you can't resist sticking with it. It's a breath of fresh air for British television, and television in general, moving away from the general feel of young adult shows nowadays such as Riverdale and Pretty Little Liars. I've got my friends watching it too and they found it equally as fascinating.

The show is very fast paced and each episode is the perfect length for binge watching, which I did in Berlin! And trust me, you will be left wanting more.