Your Profile: Trampolin to the world

Have you ever been looking for a hotel a hostel – or just a place to crash somewhere in your life? Have you been looking for new friends, local or international ones in your city and you have not met them yet? Then its time for you to read this article, it will open you the eyes for a new way of living! The idea is old, the practice was mostly complicated, but now there is a solution. The non-profit organisation Couchsurfing.org will be your trampoline for the world! Over 1.4 Million wonderful people from every country on the earth joined the idea of sharing – sharing not only your couch but your habits, your house, your culture, your friends, your cuisine, your ideas, your language – your LIFE! On the easy accessible and free Cuchsurfing (CS) Website, every member has a profile where you can find out about your next guest or host. On your CS profile you normally present yourself, your hobbies, what you do, what you think and what kind of languages you speak. But you will also see the persons couch-availability, where you can choice 6 different status from “Definitely”, “Maybe”, “Traveling” or just “Coffe or Drink”. So when you are in exam times, having friends over or just not in the mood of hosting people you can update your profile and make the other couch surfers life easier. Furthermore one can find the room information or apartment situation, e.g. if you have pets or if there are any rules about the stay or whatever else you want to share with other couch surfers. But the most important criteria are the comments that others couch surfers leave on the profile. The comments of CS community embrace the characteristics of the persons, how much they trust the couch surfer, how good and joyful the time was and what else need to be said over this member.

search the world

There was Jazmin, a young Mexican women who was still living with here parents, I wrote here a week before I was coming with two friends to Tijuana, Mexico. She responded quickly and invited us all three to stay at her place. She picked us up from the airport and then we got to know her family and friends. We felt welcome and at home in this pleasant atmosphere which we encountered in this beautiful Mexican family. It was like we would have been friends already for a long time. Jazmin took us with her car to beaches, showed us her city and introduced us to the crazy night-life. In her house we had our own room, we cooked for her and she for us. After four wonderful days which we all enjoyed a lot, she brought us to the airport and we left this vibrating city and could imagined this time without her. It was another of this perfect CS experiencie and we left Jazmin as a friend in our hearts and memories.
Besides wonderful friendships I made in the last years traveling with CS I also learned a lot from our brother and sisters of our mother earth! It is like magic when you receive or give trust for the world, its like a gift you can give to others whenever you invite somebody to sleep at your place. I not only received the key of the couch surfers where I stayed, but I always felt like we are bound in trust hood, brotherhood or some sort of vibration which makes you enjoy the time so much more!

over one million surfers world wide

The CS website is safe, there are several security methods like the “Vouch” which you can only receive from CS-members who got a Vouch from three other members. These “Trust-Signs” come from the founders of Couchsurfing and they went downwards from the pyramid of members. It means basically that somebody who is very trusted by the CS-community puts his hands in the fire for you. Because Couchsurfing is an Organisation that lives from donations of its members, everybody should think about supporting this great site and the thousands of people who are running it, mostly voluntary with small donation. When someone donates with a credit card they also verify your name and your address  – so everybody can see this and it might help you to find more easily a couch.
So there is nothing to fear out there, million of wonderful people awaiting you and is there anything better than to be welcome in a new place, new environment by a friend, a couch surfer?

If you want to see how a profile looks like and who wrote this article check: www.couchsurfing.org/kingoflove
If you just want to explore more of CS or register yourself you can do so for free: www.couchsurfing.org