As children, we all had beliefs at one point or another that were far from reflective of reality. In the ‘I used to believe…’ task we asked Roamlers to enlighten us on some of the strange beliefs they had as kids. As it turns out, 80% of Roamlers were led to their strange beliefs by a family member, and to top it all off, the family member was most frequently a parent!

Here are some of our favourites. Maybe you can relate?

“I used to believe, that when you are on an aeroplane you can open the window and grab the clouds and it would taste of candle floss but as soon as you grab a chunk of the cloud it will start raining”

“I used to believe that there were tiny little painter men in printers printing the work”

“I used to believe that if I ate my crusts I would get curly hair”

“I used to believe that if the wind changed while I was pulling a face; it would stay that way forever”

“In the middle of a banana you have little black dots. Spiders lay their eggs in bananas and that’s what the black dots are I used to believe”

“I used to believe as a child… that if I didn’t clean my ears properly one day potatoes would grow inside my ears” 

“I used to believe that my toys were alive and just pretending to be toys (like in toy story) so would never put them in a cupboard/anywhere dark in case they thought I didn’t care about them any more, and I would always apologise if I dropped/hurt one of them…”

“I used to believe that the radio presenters lived in the radio”

“I used to believe that the small sink hole that stops the water in the sink over flowing would signal an alarm to the police that would get me in trouble if any went into it”

“I used to believe that when you flushed the toilet, monsters came out”

“I used to believe that men with an outie belly button had to marry an inie belly button women to have kids! (or vice versa)”

“I used to believe that shadows were ghosts and that they were going to get me at night”

“I used to believe, that if I left rings on when I went to bed my fingers would swell up & fall off”

Most people are brought up with the understanding breakfast is the most important meal of the day. Even so, it is not uncommon for the chaos and sheer busyness of our day-to-day lives to get in the way of our morning meal. To top it off, when we have the time to eat breakfast, sometimes it is hard just to figure out what to eat!

In the ‘Breakfast Club’ task we asked Roamlers what they ate for breakfast and if they were satisfied with their breakfast. We also asked those who were satisfied with their breakfast to provide us with a tip for a good breakfast. We are happy to report that 83.87% of Roamlers are satisfied with their current breakfast.

The breakfasts that Roamlers were eating ranged from a simple cup of coffee, to a bowel of cereal, to a full English breakfast. To give you a few ideas, here is what some Roamlers eat for breakfast (click to enlarge the images):

Acai shot with a spinach smoothie

An orange, apple and pineapple Tropicana juice, and Dorset cereal (granola with chocolate & macadamia) with milk.

Instant porridge, a banana, and a cup of hot water with lemon.

A bowl of Shreddies with sultanas, grapes and skimmed milk.

English breakfast with eggs, beans, bacon, tomato, mushrooms, coffee and orange juice.

A variety of fruit, such as pineapple, banana and apple, with non fat yoghurt and a glass of cranberry juice.

Coffee (in this case, a cappuccino)

Two bread rolls with an assortment of toppings; such as jam, pate, president cheese, or butter and spreadable cheese.

Frothy coffee, and pancakes with strawberries and cream.

Last, but not least, here are the top breakfast tips from Roamlers: 

1. Eat something healthy
2. Never skip breakfast, even if you’re not hungry
3. If you are short of time, grab something quick for on the way (e.g. a granola bar, or fruit)
4. Eat something filling that will sustain you until your next meal (e.g. avoid simple carbohydrates that break down quickly). If your breakfast isn’t sustaining, you might find yourself snacking on unhealthy foods in between meals
5. Choose food that gives you energy
6. Give yourself a variety so you don’t get bored
7. Caffeine!

For those of you who do enjoy unhealthy foods, a number of Roamlers suggested that you eat your biggest and most unhealthy meal for breakfast (followed by small, healthy meals for lunch and dinner). Arguably, eating yourbiggest and most unhealthy meal for breakfast allows you to burn off the calories throughout the day during your regular daily activities.

Recently Swedish Roamlers performed a task in which they could ask Dutch Roamlers questions. Along with sharing the results with Swedish Roamlers, we also wanted to share the results with you.

How many Roamlers are there in Holland?
Around 4000 Roamlers are active in the Netherlands, but the number fluctuates with new Roamlers joining and other Roamlers who are not active anymore.

Can I perform tasks in the Netherlands or UK with my Swedish account?
You can perform scout tasks in other countries. Whether or not you can perform the task is dependent on the language of the task, and the language settings of your Roamler account. In order to perform Dutch scout tasks, add Dutch to your language settings.

What is the highest XP score?
We can tell you there is a Roamler in level 9 with 60241 XP. You might wonder how this Roamler got there. To answer this question we asked Roamlers in level 8 and level 9 to tell us their secrets on getting a lot of XP. Here are some of their tips:

- Invest time in performing Roamler tasks. Some of the Roamler in level 8 and 9 have irregular hours for their job and are ‘lucky’ to be able to perform a lot of tasks during the hours they don’t have the work.

-Perform all tasks, also the unpaid ones in order to earn as much XP as you can. Performing the unpaid tasks that become available every week will lead to a growing amount of XP.

-Check the app every morning for tasks on the way to work or school. Some Roamlers get up early to make sure they can perform some extra task on their way. Others get up early on Saturday to perform some tasks.

-When you are a Roamler in an area where there are not a lot of other active Roamlers, there are more tasks available for your to perform. They will add up.

-Having your own means of transportation helps; a bike or a car makes it possible to perform tasks in a wider area

Thanks to Robert, Ed, Mark, Edwin and Roy for giving these insights! If you have any questions, let us know!

Over the past few months there have been two trial instalments of the Perfect Serve  tasks. Both Roamlers and the client have expressed huge satisfaction with the tasks, and interest in continuing the tasks for the next year. That’s right Roamlers, from now on,  there will be new locations for Perfect Serve paid tasks on a regular basis!

In order to continue the tasks, some small adjustments have been made. The change most relevant to Roamlers  is that in future Perfect Serve tasks you will only receive compensation for the beer if you have successfully ordered the relevant beer.  In other words, you will only receive the full £7 when you have obtained the beer and performed the task correctly. This means that if the beer is out of stock, or the location you visit is closed, you will be awarded £3 for performing the task. Keep in mind that all of the locations provided in the tasks should be correct and should carry the relevant beer, so the chance that you will not be able to obtain the beer is very low!

So far those Roamlers who have completed the Perfect Serve tasks have done a fast, and brilliant job. We challenge you to do even better. Are you up for the beer check challenge?

Currently in the UK the task ‘The good old days’ is available. This is a task that was done for the first time a few years ago in the Netherlands. It was such a huge hit that we decided to do the task again in the Netherlands, and also do it in the UK. When we renewed the task for the Netherlands we provided them with a link to the blog from the original task that contained some of the pictures Roamlers had submitted. Since the blog was in Dutch we didn’t include the link in the task for the UK, but we thought you would still appreciate seeing the pictures.

Although the task can be time consuming, the outcomes are endlessly entertaining and absolutely fantastic. We are looking forward to seeing what type of photos UK Roamlers decide to recreate, and what the outcomes look like!

This morning I was listening to music in the train, on my way into the office. To my dismay, I found myself immediately clicking next when every song came on. I didn’t listen to more than 30 seconds of any individual song, subsequently spending the entire commute shuffling through my playlists. The kicker, is that I love each and every song on my music player, I’ve just spent too much time listening to the same songs over and over. Come to think of it, I’ve been listening to the same 368 songs for 7 months. 368 songs may seem like a big enough selection, but seeing as I listen to my playlists for an average of 5 hours a day, its not a wonder I’ve grown so tired of my own music.

I am sure you have all reached a point similar to this at some point in your life, when you’ve realized that you need some fresh and new songs to spice up your music library. There are hundreds of different ways  to discover new music, and everyone has their own method of discovering new and interesting music. In the Unknown Beautiful Music  task we asked Roamlers how they discovered new music. There were lots of different approaches, but the most popular ones were:

Top 4

1. Spotify
2. Radio
3. Youtube
4. Itunes Genius

Another very common method Roamlers used to discover music was going to see live (unknown music), which also includes seeing the supporting acts of some of their favourite artists. Personally, I have discovered most of my favourite artists through music festivals and tagging along with friends to live music shows. I think it is one of the best and most exciting ways to discover new music. Have you tried it?

In the tasks we also asked Roamlers to name one of their favourite, less well known artists and their favourite song from that artist. We made a short playlist which includes a mix of artists that were suggested by Roamlers. Click here to listen to the playlist. 

In March Roamler held a Photo a Week competition. Every week Roamler announced a new category and it was up to Roamlers to submit a beautiful, and creative photo that suited the theme. In total there were 5 themes: detail, culinary, repetition, sports and happy. We are happy to announce that the time has come for us to reveal the Photo a Week challenge winners! Let it be known that it was not easy to select the winners. There were so many beautiful and creative submissions, and the originality of the pictures made it difficult to compare them all to each other.

The winner of week 1, detail, is Wenke! The picture is unedited and was taken last autumn at the beach.

“Hey, we spit a duck!” my boyfriend said proudly, pointing to the sink where a beautiful duckling had suddenly appeared. “Wait!”, I cried, with my toothbrush still in my mouth, “don’t wash it away yet. I’m going to take a picture”.  I didn’t know yet what I wanted to do with it, but I did know that a duck like that couldn’t just be washed away.

What is more romantic than spitting a little duck while brushing your teeth together? Then I thought it would be nice if there were a book with accidental art, as it is good art. I thought of Roamlers, curious about what other people would find.”

-Dutch Roamler Evelien

Evelien told Roamler about the duck her and her boyfriend had spit, and showed us the picture she had taken. From that, the task ‘Accidental Art´ was born. Here are some of our favourite entries:

‘Jet of champagne, as seen at podium of an F1 race.’

‘This little Scotty Dog sitting in its basket has a butterfly on its nose.’

‘A heart.’

‘A drunk octopus putting his dukes up.’

It appears that with open eyes and imagination art can be found everywhere!