Entertainment- Delphine, a Belgian 16-year-old that runs a
Taylor Swift fan account, went viral for missing the release of "Folklore " while on a two-week camping trip. - Before she departed, she asked her Twitter followers to notify her if the musician did "something big" while she was away.
- Swift dropped her eighth studio album, "Folklore," six days later, and Delphine's tweet went viral.
- When she returned home from her trip, Delphine received a "welcome home" message from Swift.
- "For a split second, I almost believed I had just imagined it but then my phone started working again and I realized it definitely wasn't some kind of fever dream," she told Insider.
A Belgian 16-year-old named Delphine went viral for missing the release of Taylor Swift's eighth studio album, "Folklore," while on a two-week camping trip.
Before she lost WiFi, Delphine, who runs a Swift fan account on Twitter called @seeitinmymind, asked her followers to notify her if the songstress did "something big" — a nod to the time Swift dropped her "Lover" promotional single "The Archer" while Delphine was camping in 2019.
"In the weeks leading up to my trip, I had been joking about Taylor deciding to do something like that again when I wouldn't be home to know about it," she told Insider in an interview conducted via email.
—camping girl (@seeitinmymind) July 18, 2020
"Never would I have expected her to release a full album while I was away," she said, explaining that the tweet was "mainly meant as a lighthearted joke."
Swift dropped 'Folklore' days after Delphine turned off her phone
Six days after Delphine announced that she was going off the grid, Swift surprised fans by dropping "Folklore."
—Taylor Swift (@taylorswift13) July 23, 2020
Delphine's friends took it upon themselves to pre-order her a CD, a deluxe album, and a "Cardigan" sweater from Swift's store, while her parents wrote her a letter to break the news.
When their note reached Delphine's campsite, she had a feeling that she should open the message in privacy.
"Something in me told me not to open the letter in front of everyone else, so I went to one of the tents on my own and opened it there," she told Insider. "I remember feeling surprisingly unsurprised."
Delphine said it was "pretty hard at times" to be present for the two and a half days remaining in the trip knowing that "Folklore" had been released.
"All I could think about was how my jokes about Taylor doing something 'big' had come true," she said.
While Delphine was camping, her tweet went viral
As Delphine processed the news that she'd once again missed one of Swift's surprise releases, people circulated her final tweet before she left in anticipation of her reaction.
—kaylalore (@blessedswift) July 30, 2020
—Michele Walters (@MicheleWalters) July 26, 2020
—dawsyn is a mirrorball (@teIIthemmyname) July 29, 2020
When she turned on her phone, Delphine said she was met with an inpour of direct messages, more than 10,000 likes on her tweet, and about 25,600 new Twitter followers.
She'd been coined as "camping girl" while she was away and had become the subject of strangers' tweets and TikToks.
—camping girl (@seeitinmymind) July 30, 2020
"It was honestly a pretty insane experience. It was already crazy to find out my own tweet was at 10k, but then I discovered that other people had viral posts about me, which made it even weirder to experience," she told Insider. "I don't know if I can even explain it other than that it's just really overwhelming in so many ways."
Six days after the album was released, Delphine listened to "Folklore" for the first time and live-tweeted her thoughts about each track.
"this is really miss swift at her best huh," she wrote.
Delphine told Insider that while she believes "every track is great," she is "for now" particularly enthralled with "Mirrorball," "August," "Exile," "Invisible String," "This Is Me Trying," and "My Tears Ricochet."
Swift welcomed Delphine home from her trip
As Delphine prepared for bed around midnight on July 30, the same day she got back from her camping trip and found out about her viral tweet, she received an unexpected reply.
"Welcome back from your trip! We are all somber woodland fairies now. Feel free to grab a wicker basket and join us!" Swift wrote to Delphine.
—Taylor Swift (@taylorswift13) July 30, 2020
Her phone briefly crashed from a sudden flood of notifications.
"For a split second, I almost believed I had just imagined it but then my phone started working again and I realized it definitely wasn't some kind of fever dream," she said, explaining that she "starting shaking and almost cried."
"It was just a moment of extreme happiness and shock," she recalled.
—camping girl (@seeitinmymind) July 30, 2020
—camping girl (@seeitinmymind) July 30, 2020
—camping girl (@seeitinmymind) July 31, 2020
Delphine confirmed that Swift's tweet was the extent of their exchange, adding that she didn't expect a further interaction with the star.
"Just the fact that she commented, and clearly knows about the entire story and how I went camping and missed the 'Folklore' release already means a lot to me."