21 Hours in Lisbon
One city, one disposable camera, 21 hours and 21 pictures.
‘Make sure to take some pictures’ - Everyone who has been on vacation, has probably been told to capture their experiences. Experiences that one should share with family and friends upon return.
Sure, camera phones have made sharing simply easy. Especially when going on a one or two-day trip, where bringing your whole camera equipment would be considered exaggerated.
So what is the camera phone - equivalence to a film camera?
We at HONEST. call point-and-shoot cameras into action.
Our Social Media Unicorn and Globetrotter T. is a big fan of weekend trips, as well as disposable cameras.
In June she jumped on a plane to Lisbon to meet up with some friends, so we equipped her with a 9,90€ point-and-shoot.
To make it a bit more interesting we made a challenge out of it.
A challenge with one simple rule: One picture per hour.
No matter where T. would go, she would have to take one picture every hour, for 21 hours.
“A couple of hours in another city? Sign me up!
It’s been almost a year since my last trip to Lisbon. Portugal is by far one of my favourite countries to visit, no matter if it’s for surfing, road-tripping or visiting friends in the capital.
Therefore I had absolutely no objection to take the little plastic camera with me for the weekend. I was really excited since I didn’t bring any of my other cameras.
I had all these great shots in my head, places that I’ve been to, places I thought would be great to capture for the project.
The 21-Hour-Challenge sounded very easy. I mean, how hard can it be to take one picture every hour?
I arrived Friday night and decided to start shooting Saturday morning (noon-ish) and keep going until Sunday morning before heading back to the airport.
In the beginning I always had to check my bag to see if I brought the camera with me, since it was so light.
We went to the Flea market and I started to check the time more frequently. I think, it was after the first 4 hours that I realised that I couldn’t take pictures of all the things that I actually wanted.
At one point I really did want to break the rule. Lisbon has amazing Miradouros (viewpoints) which I did want to get on film. Unfortunately I just had taken a photo.
By the time I reached the airport the next day, I was pretty much used to take out the camera and just shoot what was in front of me.”
“I will definitely do this again. It’s such a fun experiment and it’s definitely a different kind of holiday snaps. ”
Top 3 things to do while in Lisbon
- Miradouro de Santa Catarina - Bairro Alto
- Alfama Flea Market - Feira de Ladra
- Take a Tram.
Confession: I gave my best, but I did cheat once when I failed to hear the timer. And once when I was sleeping for a bit. Mum’s the word!