Introduce Yourself!

Hi there ! My name is Darren from Singapore, used with the CS community and looking forward to be part of this exciting initiative and be part of this growing community. Working in the maritime / logistics industry as a product manager.

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Hellooooo everyone! I am Brooke, living in Seattle. I have never had the opportunity to host anyone, but I had scheduled many wonderful meetups through the CS community both in my home area and overseas. I’d love to still be part of an online community where I can reach out, find others in an area where I’m visiting, and have food/coffee/chat. :slight_smile:

I am a biology teacher, which doesn’t help with site maintenance, but maybe it counts for something. (And I’m super-jealous of those of you currently staying in Istanbul!!!)

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Hello there. I’m Abhi; I’m temporarily living with family in New Orleans, and I permanently live in Seattle. I enjoy reading, playing board/video games with others, and hiking. I’ve been using CS since 2016, and have hosted over 30 surfers, and had a great experience and met a lot of cool people. The temporary hold on hospitality exchange during the pandemic, plus the required paywall introduced by CS, is a bummer. I’d have happily volunteered to donate to CS had they asked, but Couchers gives me hope of some form of hospitality exchange post-pandemic. I plan to help with backend development of the website once I come back to Seattle. Nice to meet you all.

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Hi everyone! My name is Brenton, I live in sunny San Diego! I was part of the CS community before (never hosted but did meet ups) and now I’m looking for another community where I can foster and build the same experience and relationship. I met a bunch of awesome people through CS and I’m hoping to find that here as well.

I have a solo trip coming up to Spain/Portugal towards the end of July to mid September.

Always happy to hangout, chat, get to know you, and learn other cultures!

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hey all, longtime Couchsurfer looking for alternatives cuz of the paywall, i live in Iceland and since 2011 i have hosted almost 1000 people in my home but in recent years i have not been getting any requests anymore, i don’t think many people use CS anymore and if they do they now have to pay to use it, pay!! to use a platform based on free accomodations given by people who also pay, it’s ridiculous, Couchsurfing should’ve stayed a non-profit and community based but nopes some1 had to cash in, dunno why investors would invest in such a platform when there are no clear returns haha

anyways i’m also on BeWelcome since many years but i’ve never hosted anybody on there, this platform Couchers seems way more professional than BW, i really liked the profile creation here and the website looks really sleek & cool, hopefully it will grow large and one day rival CS

one thing i thought wasn’t so good here is that i visited the website weeks ago and didn’t see a sign up button, so i thought regs were closed, but turns out i had to click Login first, if you want people to join maybe make it a bit more visible ; }

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Welcome @JDarren82 @brookewhy, @abhishekray18 @thefriendlyrover, and @climbatiz!

You’d all be most welcome to join us tonight for the Weekly Online Event (Sunday)! Otherwise, let me know if you have any questions or need any help around Couchers.org :slight_smile:

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Thanks for the invitation! Looks like I just missed it, I’ll attend a future event :smiley:

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Hi! Joined because I was a vet on Couchsurfing and plan to begin travel again soon, also happy to host selectively. Thanks for starting this and getting involved, and hopefully in time (and not too much time) we can take back what was once ours on CS. I grew up in San Francisco where couchsurfing was born and spent some time at a couple of the clubhouses they used to have around there, they would hold gatherings and movie nights etc not sure they exist anymore but it was good back then. Reach out if you have any questions. Also a suggestion would be to allow some of us with the most established CS accounts to carry over our references, that way we could have some vets here too without having to wait years to have it established. Not sure what the ins and outs of that would look like but I believe it would be worth it.

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Hi, my name is Daryl, I’m 19. I live in Neuilly-Plaisance, France, for reference that’s 10 minutes from Paris. The countries I’ve visited are the US, Portugal, Belgium, Japan and Germany.

I work in an elementary school but I’m planning to quit and travel for 2 years with a very small budget (that’s where I’ll need you guys).

One of the objectives of this trip is to create content as a filmmaker and make a living out of it.

The other ones are to create some good memories, friendships, connections, see things I’ve never seen before, do things I’ve never done before, eat good food, learn a bunch of stuff and put my preconceptions to the grave.

I’m really excited to be part of something big while it’s still in the egg, that’s a story I could tell to my future grandkids haha.

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Welcome everyone to the forum!

@thedogmother I saw this being suggested often, here and also on reddit. Let’s open a new topic to discuss it in more detail :+1:

That all sounds exciting @darylfdias! Would love to follow your stories (on the Couchers blog? :sunglasses:) once you start your travel!

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Community hello

My name is Pascal and i was / still am member of couchsurfing since 2008.
During all those years i have hosted, surfed, organized events, participated at events:
I have lived in few countries and travelled in many mores for about 3 years…

I have built up again in 2010 the CS community in Medellin Colombia - as it was mostly dead and the only events were for partying and people looking to make money with their events

So i gathered some old school and interested new cs members, educated them in what it means to be a CS member - and the handed over it when i left to few trustable and nice members, which are still make the best out of the shitty situation on CS.

May i have no capability to build up the page but in the fields of building up communities i am quiet good :slight_smile:

Actually nowadays i am married and we have a daughter - living in Switzerland again

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Hi, all! I’m Ariel from New York City! Obviously, losing Couchsurfing and having the whole pandemic situation has slowed down my travels, but I’m revved to go again!
I have some travel credit for $255, so I’m thinking of places to fly and stay with one of you wonderful people. Any recommendations?

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@nolo I’ll be using this platform a lot so why not share it here too ! Otherwise it’ll be on social media :wink:

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Hi, great to join the site, I’m Ant from Sydney Australia, have been using couchsurfing for over a decade (profile - couchsurfing uniteaus ) and hosted over 150 surfers while living in Sydney, NYC and London. Look forward to seeing how this site develops and congrats to the founders for getting it set up!

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Hi everyone! My name is Polina, I am from Barnaul, a city in Siberia, Russia. I’ve been on CS for about a decade and joined Couchers just yesterday. Very excited to be here, since Couchsurfing has been a big and important part of my life, but their latest money-making policy is extremely disappointing.

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By the way, I also have a vegan food and travel blog, you can find info on Instagram at @our.edible.earth :slight_smile:

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Hi Ariel! San Diego is cool and very vegan friendly. Flight tickets are expensive in June/July/August so not the best place for you to visit if you want to travel ASAP but the prices drop to ± $120 for one way flight or ±$240 for roundtrip from JFK in September/October. If you check Couchers map, you will see there are quite a few people who can or may host in SD or LA area.

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Hi there everyone!

My name is Tyler and I live in Nova Scotia. I grew up in Sarasota, Florida and moved to Nova Scotia last fall. Later this summer I’m taking a train trip around the US with the amtrak rail pass! I’m planning on stopping in New York City, Chicago, San Francisco, Portland OR, and Los Angeles in between train segments. I’m really excited to hopefully meet some fellow couchers through here along the way! This community seems really special, I’m so happy Couchers exists :)!

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My name is Wilbur, and I’m from the Twin Cities of Minneapolis/St Paul. So glad to see @SocratesUnderwater here too, and excited to see more of our old gang from CouchSurfing join us soon.

I’m a life-long traveler, and love to share my home with other fellow travelers. I hosted lots and lots of travelers through Couchsurfing, and did some surfing myself.

I don’t begrudge any platform that asks for a fee to maintain the site, but I won’t participate in for-profit sites again. It automatically puts them in a position to create profits from the site’s operations, and that creates a conflict of interest.

I’m participating in Be Welcome and Trust Roots, which are fine for now. I’m done with Couchsurfing because I won’t pay again.

I’m really excited about the Couchers approach to build it right from what we have learned from all the platforms. I’m also hoping the approach is for a LONG term solution, one that will be durable and last.

Hoping I can help make this an incredible platform!

Thanks for everyone’s efforts.

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Ehhh, so glad you’re here buddy! The Twin Cities HospEx revamp begins :smiley:

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